ASM #1000 Second Printing: How to Spot the October 28 Sketch Covers

An issue that tops 400,000 orders and goes back to press before it even comes out raises a very practical question for the collector: in three weeks, two nearly identical objects will carry the same title, the same number and the same contents. One is the first printing, which everyone already knows; the other arrives on October 28 with a different look. At a convention table, in a lot bought blind or in a badly photographed listing, confusion is easy.

This page does not revisit the choice between the first printing's covers, nor the buying strategy around anniversary issues: other articles on the site cover that. It serves a single purpose, identifying a second-printing copy without error, then deciding whether it belongs in a collection. It is written on October 3, 2026, so before this printing goes on sale: everything that follows rests on what Marvel has announced, and on the consistent way the publisher has flagged its reprints for years.

What Marvel has announced for October 28

The confirmed elements fit in a few lines. Amazing Spider-Man #1000 came out on September 30, 2026, two weeks later than the initial September 16 date, because of a printing problem. Before that release, Marvel had already indicated that orders exceeded 400,000 copies and that a second printing was underway. Its date: October 28, 2026. Its look: two so-called "sketch" covers, that is, line-art versions of the first printing's two main covers.

The first main cover is by John Romita Jr., with painting by Paolo Rivera. The second is by Pepe Larraz, artist of the main story "Ravaged." The second printing thus reuses the two images the general public associates with the issue, but stripped of their color: you see the drawing before the finish.

What is not announced is just as important. Marvel has not published the second printing's print run. No distribution ratio has been communicated for these two covers, and nothing indicates to date that one of the two would be scarcer than the other. The cover price is not addressed here, for lack of a single reliable source. Anyone who presents either version to you as "limited" or "ratio" before October 28 is putting forward information the publisher has not given.

Why does a second printing exist on an issue this heavily ordered?

The natural reflex would be to think that an issue ordered at more than 400,000 copies necessarily covers demand. The direct market works differently. Specialty stores order several weeks before release, by a deadline called final order cutoff, and they order copies they cannot return. They therefore calibrate their quantities on their subscribers and on their estimate of walk-in traffic, rarely on the peak of media attention around an anniversary.

When real demand exceeds those estimates, two things happen. Stores sell out on release day, which was observed for this issue, and they ask the distributor for more, which has nothing left. The publisher responds with a reprint. To keep these new copies from being confused with the first ones, and also to give them their own appeal, Marvel systematically changes the cover of later printings. That is why a second printing at Marvel is almost always visually different from the first: the "sketch" cover, an unusual background tint or a new image.

Here, the choice of pencils is consistent with the object. A #1000 celebrates the history of Spider-Man art; showing the line stage of the two main covers extends that theme. It is also a way to offer a distinct object without producing an additional cover.

The three checks to recognize a copy

A cover alone never identifies a printing: there are pencil covers in first printing on plenty of other issues, and nothing prevents a copy from being shown with a misleading photo. Here is the order of verification to follow, from most visible to most reliable.

One point deserves clarification. This volume of Amazing Spider-Man began in April 2025 with an issue #1 that also carried the legacy numbering 965. Issue #1000 is therefore, in the volume's own numbering, the 36^th issue. Depending on how Marvel coded this anniversary issue, the barcode's digit block may reflect one numbering or the other. So do not rely on the first three digits to date the copy: only the last digit, the printing one, counts for this check.

Identification sheet for the two covers

The most likely mix-ups

Issue #1000 is one of the year's issues with the most covers: Marvel has announced variants by Ramos, Larsen, Garcin, Camuncoli, McGuinness, Skottie Young, J. Scott Campbell, Stegman, Bermejo and others, plus a panoramic cover. Within that set, three errors keep coming up.

Confusing sketch and printing. A line-art cover is not, in itself, proof of a reprint. On many recent issues, publishers offer line-art variants of certain covers from the first printing. For issue #1000, the public list of first-printing variants does not mention a pencil version of the two main covers, but the absence of information is not proof. The legal pages check always settles it.

Confusing the variant reprint with the second printing. Marvel sent back to press nine allocated variant covers from the first printing, to fill unfulfilled orders, announced for early November. These copies reuse existing covers and follow a delivery logic, not the creation of a new look. The October 28 second printing, for its part, is recognized by its pencil covers. If you receive in November a copy of a variant you had been waiting for since September, check its printing notice before filing it.

Confusing digital and paper. The visuals circulating before October 28 will be presentation files. They show neither the final barcode nor the legal pages. A sale listing illustrated by this kind of visual, before release, allows no identification.

What is a second printing worth next to the first?

No price guide exists for an issue that has not come out yet, and this site will not invent one. What can be said comes down to the structure of the market, constant for decades.

On a heavily ordered anniversary issue, the first printing is the reference object, the one census sheets and collectors point to by default when they talk about the issue. The second printing is, by nature, a second-rank object in this hierarchy, except in one specific case: when its print run is clearly lower than the first's and its cover appeals. Both conditions are necessary. A high-print-run reprint with a bland cover remains a reprint; a short-run reprint with a cover everybody wants can, on the contrary, become harder to find than the original.

For issue #1000, the first condition is unknown: Marvel has not communicated the second printing's print run. The second is a bet on taste: line-art covers have their fans, notably those who collect an artist's work rather than the character. Our advice remains simple: if you like Romita Jr.'s or Larraz's pencils, buy it for that reason, at cover price, and treat any eventual gain as a surprise.

To go further on the general logic, the article on the value of second printings details the cases where a reprint outstrips its original, and the one on the difference between first printing and reprint explains how price gaps form.

Should you have it certified?

CGC certification specifies the printing on the label, which removes any ambiguity at resale. That is its main interest for a recent second printing. On the other hand, a modern issue in mint condition, released in hundreds of thousands of copies, will reach the highest grades in large numbers. The cost of certification must therefore be weighed against a gain that does not exist yet.

The reasonable approach is to wait. Keep the copy flat, bagged with a rigid board, away from light. If in a year the second printing proves short and sought after, there will still be time to have it certified. The reverse is not possible: once the fees are spent, they cannot be recovered. The guide on CGC grading details what a grader looks at on a recent issue.

How to buy it without mistakes

The simplest remains the specialty store, on October 28 or by preorder before the final order cutoff. A copy bought new, in hand, can be checked in ten seconds. The first printing's sellout on release day, which frustrated many readers, is a good reason to reserve. The article on what to do when an issue sells out on release day recalls how restocks and preorders work.

On the secondhand market, three reflexes protect you: demand a sharp photo of the barcode, ask for a photo of the legal pages, and refuse any listing illustrated by a promotional visual. Beware also of vague titles like "rare sketch cover": the word sketch here designates the second printing's look, not a ratio variant.

Filing it properly in your collection

A second printing is not a duplicate. It is a distinct entry, with its own cover, its own printing notice and, possibly, its own price trajectory. In an inventory, it therefore deserves a separate line, with the cover and printing specified. Without that, in three years, it will be impossible to know whether the copy in the box is the September 30 one or the October 28 one.

On My Comics Collection, each issue can hold several copies, and each can keep its own grade, cover and condition. It is the surest way to track the first printing, a variant and the second printing's pencil cover side by side. If you also follow the rest of the volume, issues 1001 and 1002 come out in October: our collecting guide to issue #1000 and the Spider-Man hub give the context.

What to remember

The second printing of Amazing Spider-Man #1000 is an easy object to recognize for anyone who takes ten seconds: line-art cover, reprint notice in the legal pages, last digit of the barcode. It shares all its content with the first printing, and is set apart by its look. Its future value depends on a print run Marvel has not published and on collectors' taste for pencils, two unknowns as of October 3, 2026. For the rest, nothing forces you to choose: a reader who missed the first printing finds the same anniversary issue here; a collector of Romita Jr.'s or Larraz's art finds an object with its own logic.

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