The Art Gallery: ACEO General Zod

This month’s Art Gallery display comes from a regular Joe sketch artist, I honestly don’t even know his real name because he just goes by GrayBat in our emails back and forth. The card is General Zod, as depicted by Michael Shannon in the Superman reboot Man of Steel.

General Zod has been one of my favorite villains going back to Superman and Superman II when the role was played by Terence Stamp. Sadly, even though the character has been around since Adventure Comics #283 (April 1961) he is relatively ignored in cardboard form. Finding a cool General Zod sketch card is near impossible so when I came across this ACEO sketch card I was more than happy to spend $3 because it is quite a piece.

The Art Gallery: 2012 Cryptozoic DC Comics Superman The Legend Superman-Cheetah

This month’s Art Gallery display comes from graphic artist Chris Foreman. Foreman is from Angel Comics and has had sketch cards in sets from 5Finity, Sadlittles, Bad Axe Studios, Rittenhouse, Cryptozoic and Upper Deck. The card is from the 2012 Cryptozoic DC Comics: Superman The Legend set.

I have been on a bit of Superman kick lately and this card caught my eye. It actually was not my primary want but the seller was offering a deal on multiple purchases so I bid on this one too. I ended up losing the auction for the first card that I wanted but won this cards. The sketch is from when Superman was fighting Cheetah and she scratched him which infected him and turned him in to a cheetah like creature.

Vintage Card Of The Month: 1968 A & BC Superman In The Jungle

This month’s VCoM comes from the 1968 A &BC Superman In The Jungle release, a card set that was released in the UK. This is my second 1968 A & BC Superman In The Jungle card, the last one I posted in September last year.

What draws me to the set, besides being a Superman set, is the interesting history that the set has. In 1968 the set was released in England and it drew interest from Topps which went on to create a test set based on the set but in the end decided not to release the set. You can find some of the Topps Test Proof cards, I would suggest sticking with ones that have been graded so you know they are not counterfeit, and they can run up to $100 each and because they are only proofs that were never intended to be released that are usually graded very low or just “A”.

The reason I selected this specific card is twofold, Superman is blasting a python with his heat vison which is always cool and second because Topps selected this specific card to recreate in the 2013 Topps 75^th Anniversary release so of course I had to own both the original and the Topps 75^th Anniversary version.

You will notice there is a difference between the cards with the original 1968 A &BC card being smaller, pink background and issues with the coloring. Here are the cards together for comparison.

I have never seen the 1968 Topps Test Issue of this card but I would eventually love to pick it up to complete the trilogy.

 

Vintage Card Of The Month: 1972 Primrose Superman

 

This month’s VCoM is another traveler from across the pond. In 1972 the Primrose Confectionary Company inserted mini Superman cards in to packs of Superman Sweet Cigarettes. As a child of the ‘70s I remember the fun of “smoking” candy cigarettes and blowing out sugar smoke but I was born in 1972 (and a continent away) so I was a bit too young to pull any of these cool Superman cards. For some reason the cards have a 1967 copyright but they were not inserted in to the candy cigarette packs until 1972 so there is some confusion when it comes to finding them, most people sell them under the 1972 (they are also graded as 1972) but some people still list them under the 1967 copyright date.

The cards are rather small, 1 5/16 x 2 9/16, which is even smaller than early-20^th Century tobacco cards and modern day minis. The cards are printed on a light weight paper which has led to them sometimes being called “paper thin” cards. The cards are brightly illustrated and the set, which contains 50 cards, depicts scenes ranging from Superman fighting aliens and bad guys to saving innocent people and even punching a shark.

This card is #43, Space Nightmare. He is captured by enemy Spacemen in an attempt to have him fight for them against Earth. There are two creases in the upper right corner and the corners are rounded but still a solid card.

The Art Gallery: 2012 Cryptozoic The New 52 Superman

This month’s Art Gallery display comes from the 2012 Cryptozoic DC The New 52 release. The artist is Dietrich Smith, a comic book artist who has also worked with Topps and Upper Deck for various super hero sketch cards.

 This card was one of my “opportunity” purchases that I ended up buying because the price was right. My logic at the time was “You can’t go wrong with a Superman sketch”, which is pretty accurate but I was not on the lookout for a Superman sketch. These are the kind of purchases that I have vowed to eliminate since 2014 and I am still standing strong on that goal.

As far as Superman sketch cards go this is a nice piece, especially when you consider I spent less than $5 shipped.

Vintage Card Of The Month: 1968 A & BC Superman In The Jungle Awesome Apparition

This month’s VCoM comes from the U.K. in the form of the 1968 A & BC Superman In The Jungle release. In the 1960s Superman was the top guy in the super hero world and there were multiple Superman sets being released around the world. Topps even tossed their hat in the ringer and worked with A & BC to release a “Test” set in the U.S. before the regular release in the U.K. Topps never moved on past the test set but A & BC moved on with their set, which is the set from which my card comes.

The set contains a 66-card checklist with each card depicting a beautifully colored Superman in various African environments like the jungle, rivers and lakes. He fights snakes, rhinos, leopards and even a fire breathing dragon. The set war marginally popular and Topps even included a “Test” Jungle card in their recent 75^th Anniversary release.

The card cost $8.25, which is on the low end for these cards, and is graded a PSA 5. I would love to add more cards from the set to my collection as well as some cards from Topps Test set as long as the price is right. I wish there were subgrades so I could see where the problem is that caused this card to be a mid-grade. Besides the back being cut off-center (top to bottom) this card is in beautiful condition with squared corners and edges, smooth surface and bright colors.

The Art Gallery: 2013 Cryptozoic Superman: The Legend Bizarro

This month’s The Art Gallery display comes from the 2013 Cryptozoic Superman: The Legend release, the artist is the legendary illustrator Joe Simko.

When it comes to bad guys in the Superman world there is a hierarchy beginning with Lex Luther but I don’t subscribe to that philosophy, I have always liked General Zod followed by Bizarro so this card seemed like a perfect addition to my sketch card collection. What surprised me is that I was the only bidder on this card and ended up winning it for .99 cents (plus $2.32 shipping).

To add the windfall is that the illustrator is Joe Simko, who is probably most well-known for his works with Topps and his contributions to Garbage Pail Kids and Wacky Packages. His portfolio runs much deeper than that and includes sketch work with Topps, Cryptozoic and his own sketch card company Wax Eye. Usually his sketch cards, no matter what the subject matter, sell for a premium over every other sketch card in the set so I made a killer deal on this one.

Damaged After Being Graded?

Don’t you love that you spend $35 ($17 cost plus $18 return shipping) minimum to get a card graded and encapsulated and the card ends up sliding within the case and potentially getting damage.

I have one of these 1972 Primrose Confection Superman cards and they are extremely thin, even thinner than a piece of notebook paper, so I can see how it could slide in between the pieces but this would really suck. You would think that the grading companies would take things like this in to consideration. The seller at least realizes this is an issue and is selling the card at $3.99, which is actually lower than even a raw copy price.

Up Up And Away...

 

Yesterday the Action Comics #1 auction that I talked about last week ended at an unheard of $3,207,852 after 48 bids. This tops the previous high of $2.161 million for a slightly lower graded (CGC 9.0 but without white pages) Action Comics #1 that sold in 2011. This auction has brought about a number of sellers who are using the national attention to sell their copies of Action Comics #1, original and reprints, as well as a couple of unscrupulous people looking to profit on buyers caught up in the frenzy.

Six Degrees Of Seperation

Occasionally you catch an interesting story and you find a distinct connection that you never knew was there, and never expected. I was recently reading a story about an amazing sports memorabilia find and along the side bar was a link to a story about the highest graded Action Comics #1 up for auction so I took a look. I have never been a comic book collector though I have read them and just about anyone who has spent time around comic books or comic book collectors know that Action Comics #1 is the first appearance of Superman.

 

A lower graded copy sold for $2 million, the only comic book to ever top that price, and this particular copy is a CGC 9.0, the highest graded AC#1 ever. While reading the story I saw that the owner, Darren Adams, owns a comic book shop named Pristine Comics. The name rang a bell but I couldn’t place it right away. I took a look at the auction and scrolled through the auction details and got to the bottom where Pristine Comic’s address is and it hits me like a ton of bricks.

 

Pristine Comics is located inside a store called West Coast Sports Cards in Federal Way, Washington. A place I called my LCS for nearly 15 years when I lived in the Seattle area. I knew Darren when he ran the first incarnation of West Coast Sports Cards on the corner of 320^th and Pac Highway across the street from Sea-Tac Mall in Federal Way, he later moved up the hill to a larger location which is where he opened the Pristine Comics section inside of the sports card shop.

 

I hope the sale goes well for him, the auction is currently sitting at $1.75 million after 21 bids and over 7 days left on the auction. With this being such a high profile auction they are only allowing pre-approved bidders to keep the bids honest. I like that a portion of the sale is going to the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation, a foundation that is dedicated to curing spinal cord injuries, something that is personal to me.

Superman Kicks Some Alien Asses

I have not read comics book regularly in probably a good 30+ years but every so often when book draws my interest I will pick it up to read.

 

Superman: War of the Worlds is one of those books that got my attention. It was released in 1999, I am not sure how it alluded my attention for so long. I have actually had it on my list for a year or so but just never grabbed a copy until the other day.

 

I am a fan of H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds, if you have a chance I suggest reading it, you can actually get a free Kindle version on Amazon. If you are not the reading type, listen to Orson Welles’ 1938 radio broadcast, you can listen to it on Youtube. I would say skip the 2005 Tom Cruise movie and run from the 2005 C. Thomas Howell movie.

 

I love the idea of mixing Superman with a Martian invasion and the cool thing about the book is that Superman does not have the super powers of his modern day counterpart. His being partially mortal plays a role in the storyline.

Preview: DC Comics Superman: The Legend

In the span of just over 6 months Cryptozoic Entertainment has given us a bevy of DC related comic cards. In September they released DC The New 52, an all-encompassing release based on DC’s New 52 relaunch of their entire monthly superhero books, in December Batman: The Legend hit shelves, a set built on Batman’s history. Now Superman is getting the grand treatment with Superman: The Legend, scheduled to be released March 21^st.

 

Each $60 box contains 24 5-card packs which includes 1 sketch card, 2 Alternate Reality foil inserts, 2 Secret Origins Puzzle inserts, 2 Woman of the Superman Universe, 1 X-Ray Vision card and 3 Base Foil Parallel cards. Other inserts include Printing Plates (1:576 packs or 1 in every 2 cases) and Oversized Sketch cards.

 

The 63-card base set is all original artwork with some of the cards being created by artists who actually work on comic books from the Superman universe like Mahmud Asrar, who is an artist on the Supergirl comics. Not much has been announced about what to expect besides the Sketch Cards, Oversized Sketch Cards and the X-Ray Vision inserts. They actually have only shown one promo card (a very small and pixelated preview), the one that is included if you purchase the binder.

 

A couple things of note, the X-Ray Vision insert uses thermo chromatic ink, which is also known as disappearing ink. When the ink heats up in becomes see through so the insert will have one design, you rub the card face and when the ink becomes semitransparent you see a completely different scene underneath. There was a Simpsons release in the 90s that used a similar ink; it is pretty cool when you see it in your hand. Another cool thing is the Oversized Sketch Cards are done by two artists who worked together in similar styles. The Cryptozoic design team worked to pair artists who worked on the cards so if you think about it the cards have a dual personality. By far my favorite two Oversized Sketch Cards are the collaboration of Joe Simko and Brent Engstrom. These guys have been illustrating for a long time but they are probably best known for their work on Garbage Pail Kids and Wacky Packages. When you see their cards there is no question who the artists were who designed these.

 

 

Since there is no real imagery for the base set or inserts I have gone through some of the sketch artists who are included on the checklist and picked out my favorite sketch cards from their submissions to the Superman: The Legend set. If you are interested in seeing more of the sketch cards that will be inserted in to boxes you can check out Cryptozoic’s Facebook page.

 

The first three sketch cards are my favorites, in order: Brian Kong, Robert Hack and Bill Pulkovski.

 

 

 

These remaining 12 cards are Oversized Sketch Cards, each group of two artists did two different cards that they both worked on. They are redemption cards because the sketch cards are 4x6 so they would have been difficult to insert unless they were done as box toppers but this way ensures that they do not get damaged. The redemption is only for one card, not both. The pack out information has not been announced for the chance to pull a redemption card.