FLOAT 100 · Comics · No. 29
Saga #1
A writer who dreamed up a galaxy in math class and an artist he had never met turned a story about new parents into the most celebrated creator-owned comic of its decade, and retailers ordered too few copies of the first issue to keep up.
- Year
- 2012
- Maker
- Image Comics
- By price in comics
- 55 of 100
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Create a free account- Published
- Image Comics, released March 14, 2012
- Creators
- Written by Brian K. Vaughan; art, painted cover and hand-lettered narration by Fiona Staples
- Format
- 44 pages of story with no advertisements, at a $2.99 cover price
- Firsts
- First appearances of Alana, Marko, Hazel, Prince Robot IV, The Will and Lying Cat
- First-month orders
- An estimated 37,641 copies ordered by North American comic shops in March 2012, 40th for the month
- Printings
- Five printings; more than 70,000 copies of the issue sold across printings by August 2012
- Grade tracked here
- CGC 9.8, first printing
- CGC census
- 3,106 copies at 9.8 and none higher, as of April 2026
- Recent sale
- $268 for a CGC 9.8 at auction, May 2026
Star Wars for parents
Brian K. Vaughan said Saga began as 'a fictional universe that I created when I was bored in math class. I just kept building it.' He drew on Star Wars, Flash Gordon, children's books and the wonder of first seeing the Silver Surfer. The protagonists arrived years later, when his wife was pregnant with their second daughter: Alana, a winged soldier, and Marko, a horned prisoner of war, lovers from two worlds locked in an endless war, raising a newborn on the run.
'I wanted to write about parenthood, but I wanted to Trojan-horse it inside some sort of interesting genre story, to explore the overlap between artistic creation and the creation of a child,' Vaughan said. He also had a generational itch: 'if every one of us who complained about how the prequels didn't live up to our expectations just would make our own sci-fi fantasy, then it would be a much better use of our time.'
The book was announced at the 2011 San Diego Comic-Con and billed as 'Star Wars meets A Game of Thrones.' Vaughan wanted it to be a comic and nothing else, something 'way too expensive to be TV and too dirty and grown-up to be a four-quadrant blockbuster.' He has said the full story will run 108 chapters.
The writer and the artist
Vaughan was born July 17, 1976, in Cleveland, Ohio, and grew up in nearby Rocky River and Westlake. Before comics he worked as an auxiliary police officer, a live-in dog butler and a psychiatric ward employee. From 2002 to 2008 he wrote Y: The Last Man, about the only man to survive the death of every male mammal on Earth, and from 2004 to 2010 the political thriller Ex Machina. He then wrote for the television series Lost in its third through fifth seasons and was showrunner of Under the Dome.
Fiona Staples was born in Calgary, Alberta, and studied at the Alberta College of Art and Design. The writer Steve Niles, with whom she had worked on Mystery Society, introduced her to Vaughan, who did not meet her in person until just before their panel at the 2011 San Diego Comic-Con. 'Her artwork is incredible. It doesn't look like anyone else,' he said.
Staples is co-owner of Saga and has taken first billing since Chapter 25. She designed every character, vehicle and alien race, paints the covers and hand-letters Hazel's narration in her own handwriting as the last step on each page. The series' organic technology, including the family's wooden rocket ship, grew from her dislike of drawing machines, and some rooms on the planet Cleave were inspired by Cambodian architecture.
Vaughan chose Image Comics because it offered what he called a 'fully creator-owned' contract: no content restrictions, and he and Staples kept 100 percent of the non-publishing rights, 'including the right to never have our comic turned into a movie or television show.' Image publisher Eric Stephenson was, he said, the only publisher thrilled to make that deal.
Inside Chapter One
The first issue opens with a birth. Alana, from Landfall, the largest planet in the galaxy, gives birth to Hazel, her daughter with Marko, from Landfall's only moon, Wreath. Because destroying either world would send the other out of orbit, the two sides had outsourced their war to every other planet. Hazel narrates the series as an adult looking back.
Hunters close in from both sides. Landfall sends Prince Robot IV, a royal with a television set for a head, and Wreath hires the mercenary The Will and his companion Lying Cat, a giant sphinx cat who can tell when someone is lying. The first issue also introduces Special Agent Gale and Vez.
Chapter One ran 44 pages of story with no advertisements, in print and digital, at $2.99. Vaughan's contract with Image held the price at $2.99 for most of the run and required every chapter to run at least 22 pages. The cover, painted by Staples, shows Alana nursing Hazel; when it was reused for the first collection, some retailers refused to display the book.
First printings are the copies collectors chase. The issue went through five printings in 2012, so a reprint can pass for an original in a listing photo. Check the issue's printing information before paying a first-printing price. A separate edition was given to retailers at a distributor's retailer summit in Chicago on April 11-13, 2012, just before the C2E2 convention; one collector guide puts it at about 500 copies.
Sold out before it went on sale
Retailers ordered cautiously. Distributor data compiled by a sales researcher estimate that comic shops ordered 37,641 copies in March 2012, 40th on the month's chart. That month's top seller, Avengers vs. X-Men #1, was ordered at about 203,000 copies.
The first printing sold out before its March 14 release date. A second printing, released April 11 alongside Chapter Two, also sold out, and a third arrived April 25. By August the issue had gone through five printings and sold more than 70,000 copies. The first collection, published October 10, 2012, at $9.99, reached No. 6 on The New York Times graphic books list and had sold 120,000 copies by August 2013.
Grading tells the rest. In March 2024 a CGC census counted 54 copies at 9.4 and 1,443 graded higher. By April 2026 the census showed 3,106 copies at 9.8 and none above it. Prices are modest at the top grade: a CGC 9.8 sold at auction on May 5, 2026, for a reported $268.
Awards, a fight over two panels, and a long pause
In 2013 Saga won all three Eisner Awards it was nominated for: Best Continuing Series, Best New Series and Best Writer. The first collection won the 2013 Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story, and the series went on to collect twelve Eisners and seventeen Harvey Awards between 2013 and 2017. Volume Eleven won the Hugo again in 2024.
It also drew fire. On April 9, 2013, reports said Chapter 12 had been blocked from sale in iPhone and iPad apps over two small panels showing sex between men. A day later the digital distributor said the decision had been its own reading of the platform's rules, not the platform owner's, and put the chapter on sale. In 2014 the American Library Association listed Saga among the ten most frequently challenged books of the year.
Chapter 54, published July 25, 2018, ended the first half of the story on a cliffhanger, and the series went on hiatus until Chapter 55 arrived on January 26, 2022. The price rose to $3.99 with Chapter 61 in 2023. After Chapter 72 in March 2025 the series paused again; in September 2026 Staples said she had taken time to restore her mental health and had resumed work. True to Vaughan's plan, no film or television version has been released.
The numbers
- Print run
- Estimated 37,641 copies ordered by comic shops in March 2012 (distributor data; excludes reorders, later printings and other channels)
- Total sold
- More than 70,000 copies across five printings by August 2012
- CGC census, April 2026
- 3,106 copies at 9.8; none graded higher
- CGC census, March 2024
- 54 copies at 9.4; 1,443 graded higher
- Cover price and length
- $2.99; 44 pages of story, no advertisements
- Awards for the series, 2013-2017
- Twelve Eisner Awards and seventeen Harvey Awards
Timeline
Brian K. Vaughan is born in Cleveland, Ohio.
Vaughan begins Y: The Last Man, which runs until 2008.
Vaughan's series Ex Machina concludes.
Saga is announced at San Diego Comic-Con, where Vaughan and Staples meet in person for the first time.
Saga #1 is released after its first printing sells out.
A second printing arrives with Chapter Two.
A separate edition of issue #1 is handed out at a retailer summit in Chicago, April 11-13.
A third printing reaches stores.
Issue #1 passes 70,000 copies sold across five printings.
The first collection is published at $9.99.
Reports say Chapter 12 has been blocked from iOS; the distributor reverses its decision a day later.
Saga wins Eisner Awards for Best Continuing Series, Best New Series and Best Writer.
The first collection wins the Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story.
Chapter 54 ends the first half of the story; the series goes on hiatus.
Chapter 55 returns the series to stores.
The CGC census counts 54 copies of issue #1 at 9.4 and 1,443 higher.
Saga, Volume Eleven wins the Hugo Award for Best Graphic Story.
Chapter 72 is published, and the series pauses again.
The CGC census shows 3,106 copies at 9.8 and none higher.
A CGC 9.8 copy sells at auction for a reported $268.
The world in 2012
A tornado outbreak across the South and the Ohio Valley kills 40 people.
Voters in 10 states go to the polls on Super Tuesday of the Republican presidential primaries.
Encyclopaedia Britannica announces it will stop printing and continue online.
Avengers vs. X-Men #1 tops the month's comic shop orders at about 203,000 copies.
Disney takes a $200 million writedown on the film John Carter.
Former Vice President Dick Cheney receives a heart transplant.
Price record
| Date | Price | Kind |
|---|---|---|
| May 5, 2026 | $268 | Sold at auctionCGC 9.8, white pages, the grade tracked on this page. Price as reported by a sales tracker. |
A realized auction price is what a buyer actually paid on the date shown, including the buyer's premium where the sale reported it. It is the strongest kind of reference price, and it is a record of one sale of one object on one day, not a promise of what the next example will bring.
By reference price, Saga #1 is number 55 of 100 in the comics entries of the FLOAT 100. 92 of those 100 rest on a realized sale; the rest carry an asking price or a guide value, and each page says which. Rank within the FLOAT 100 itself (29 here) is editorial: how much an object defines its field, not price alone.
Did you know
- Vaughan first imagined Saga's universe as a bored kid in math class.
- Fiona Staples hand-letters Hazel's narration in her own handwriting.
- The family's wooden rocket ship exists partly because Staples dislikes drawing machines.
- Saga's contract keeps the film and TV rights with its creators, including the right never to adapt it.
- The first issue sold out before its release date and went through five printings.
- Every Saga letters column is printed from postal mail; the book gives no email address for letters.
- Lying Cat, the giant sphinx cat who can tell when someone is lying, debuts in issue #1.
How this page is made
- The figure
- One reference price, shown with its own kind. FLOAT does not average it with anything or adjust it for time.
- Realized or not
- A realized price is a completed sale. An asking price, an estimate and a price-guide value are not sales, and are labeled as such wherever they appear.
- The story
- Researched from published records and checked fact by fact. Updated Oct 1, 2026.
- Archive
- Oct 5, 2026