Scavenging for cool stuff at the Montreal Comiccon (2023 edition)

An integral part of convention coverage is the ever-important article talking about all the cool stuff we bought from vendors, because really... other than talking to artists & writers and getting books signed, attending panels, snapping pics of cosplayers, getting photos with celebrities, and checking out the free exhibits... what else is there to do? (That was a joke, by the way)

Justin:

I searched far & wide throughout the vendor floor for anything noteworthy and here's what I came up with:

1) TOTAL JUSTICE Black Lightning & Green Arrow (carded)

Kenner Total Justice Black Lightning & Green Arrow

As mentioned in my post-Ottawa Comiccon write-up last year, Total Justice Black Lightning was a figure I needed to complete my Total Justice collection, but passed on due to cost. It was worth the wait however, because at Montreal Comiccon I saw both Black Lightning AND Green Arrow for sale at a reasonable price. (I was also missing Green Arrow.) The price for the two was very reasonable, so reasonable that I didn't even bargain with the vendor -- I just gave him his asking price, snatched them up immediately, and spent the rest of the afternoon walking around with them. Score.

2) Batman 1989 movie glasses

1989 Batmania is alive every day in my heart and (in a perfect world) in my kitchen, but these Batman 89 drinking glasses were a little too fragile and pricey for me to want to leave with. If memory serves me correctly, these were promotional drinking glasses offered by Ultramar, a Canadian gas station outlet, and there was a total of 6 of them. I really miss the days when gas stations offered cool promotional movie tie-ins; now all they offer is 2 bags of chips for $7.50.

3) Batman Returns AMT model kit

I'm not typically a 'model kit' type-of-guy, but I would make an exception for this AMT Batman Returns Batmobile model kit straight out of 1992. I mean, how hard could it be? The Batmobile is ALL black, as are the plastic parts in the kit. Ultimately, I didn't buy this because it was a project I most likely never would've started or finished. I might've considered this had they been selling it for $15 less, however. Of note, they also had a Batman Returns Batskiboat model kit for sale.

4) Super Powers Batman puzzle

Upon seeing this, waves of nostalgia hit my body. You see, my parents bought me a ton of puzzles throughout my youth during my pre-school and kindergarten years -- they justified that it was a good hobby to increase problem solving skills and coordination -- so yeah, I had lots of puzzles as a kid. I probably even owned this one at some point. The Super Powers starburst logo still gets my heart beating fast as I associate it with awesomeness and DC comic heroes. I didn't buy this, but it was definitely a contender. 

5) Toy R Us Arkham City exclusive Batman

Celebrating 2011's Batman: Arkham City by Rocksteady Studios, this fully-articulated Batman action figure caught my attention for his classic blue-and-grey color scheme. It reminded me of the Super Powers Batman that I owed and loved when I was a kid or, conversely, the Batman that led the Outsiders in the 80s. I ended up NOT buying this because it was a little out of scale with the figs I'm used to collecting.

6) Wall of megos and other DC action figs

One vendor had a whole wall of Figures Toy Company DC figures up for grabs. It's rare for me to see this many FTC figs on sale at once -- typically I only see the odd one in a comic book shop since they sell out so quickly. I already own a few of these, but I'm not sure if I'm ready (or have the display space in my house) to take the plunge and buy more. That being said, smaller-sized figs are still a-okay with me, and I did notice that they also had some McFarlane Toys Super Powers figs for sale, but I already owned those ones and didn't need doubles. To wit, a lot of vendors were selling McFarlane Super Powers figs, but mostly Darkseids and Batmans. On a side note, it's only now that I'm looking back at this photo that I'm realizing the vendor was also selling Boss Fight Studio's Power Star figs (these are actually in-scale with Super Powers figs): 

I'm kicking myself for not noticing that Phantom up for grabs. Flash Gordon and Ming I can take or leave, but Phantom has been high on my want list since this toyline had been announced. DC tried their luck at publishing a Phantom ongoing series in the late 80s, so this totally justifies Phantom and Batman standing side-by-side on my display shelf:

The Phantom #1 v2 (1989)

7) Funko 3.75" Suicide Squad Harley Quinn & Joker (carded)

NOTE: These are not the actual figures. This is an image from ebay.ca

These were the ones "that got away". I had every intention of buying these, but rushed off to do an interview, and when I came back they were gone. These were two of the Legion of Collectors exclusives offered by DC Comics when the first Suicide Squad film was released. I've been collecting them as I see them available, and I'm still missing seven of the nine figures. Is it a lost cause? Well, I haven't given up, yet.

8) Toybiz Batmobile

This was the biggest score of all: a 1989 Toybiz Batmobile complete with plastic 'cocoon' Batmobile shield. While it was nowhere near mint, and the original owner apparently couldn't stick the Batman sticker right-side up, it was still something I gravitated towards and purchased with just a bit of haggling. Really happy to add this to my collection of Batman 89 Toy Biz figs.  

Mark:

1. I did buy a t-shirt. But I have no idea where I put it. It was a Justice League shirt. I love shirts that have a lot of people on them. Oh I remember:

2. I also bought a script from Gail Simone because she's awesome.

3. I looked for the 1990 prestige format series Twilight, but nope. No one had it. It's because I wanted it. 

4. In 2016 I almost bought New Teen Titans #2 for a 100$. Now it's 500$ so that ship has sailed. 

5. I also bought Sailor Moon and Kirby stuffed dolls for my daughter. Shopping is hard. 

---

Big thanks to Leeja Murphy and Agence Pink for organizing this really fun 3-day event. So many interesting things to look at, so little time.

DC Comics Super Heroes Trace n' Color Drawing Set

DC in the 80s is the real deal; we're in the trenches with you guys. We're out there visiting flea markets and consignment shops looking for treasure in that seaweed, we're on our knees digging through $1 back issue bins, we're answering those sketchy craigslist ads about someone selling their collection of bronze age comics in 'nice condition', we're arguing with comic book vendors about why the newsstand version of a comic is $20 more expensive than the direct version, and we're accumulating junk precious memorabilia that gets our spouses mad at us for taking up too much closet space. Today, as I take a break from working on our upcoming fanzine, we take a look at something I picked up during the cold winter months of last year:

I think this was from a Facebook Marketplace ad that I spotted. After a few messages back and forth with the seller, the price seemed fair and I went to pick it up. It's always dicey picking up 30+ year old electronics because, hey, there's a pretty good chance something burned out and it's not working anymore. However, I figured the sheer novelty value of the packaging was worth it alone. Also, I needed a light table (I like to draw. I'm not good at it, but I enjoy it.),... so these were all the reasons I used to justify driving through a Canadian blizzard to pick up this item before someone else snatched it up.

IdeasThatWork Inc., as far as what the internet tells me, was a short-lived New York-based company that operated between 1986 and 1992. They produced and released another DC comics-themed Trace N' Color Drawing Set around the same time:

source: ebay

The packaging on both of these products were very similar to the DC Heroes action figures produced by Toy Biz in 1989/1990 (which is what initially caught my attention)...

source: ebay

...so I'm led to believe that IdeasThatWork Inc. might have been connected to Toy Biz in some way?

Alright, so, examining the box some more:

Apparently, you get a few coloring pencils and several design sheets to work with. This box has been taped shut, so your guess is as good as mine if all the items are included.

Well, curiosity got the better of me and I'm going to take the plunge -- this is now going to be an 'unboxing' article. I carefully removed the tape and opened 'er up. What do you get?

Hmmm... exactly as described on the package, minus the coloring pencils? I guess someone nicked the coloring pencils. Oh well. I'm surprised I got this as is. The light table looks smaller than I was expecting.

I examined the light table (opened it up and check where the batteries go), and it turns out the coloring pencils were inside. So I guess everything is intact. How rare! 

Okay, so the answer to the question you're all burning to ask... what Superman art is included in this Trace N' Color?

 

I'm not an expert, but I'm thinking this might be Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez art, probably from the DC Style Guide. Note the copyright date on the images? 1982. Of course the art isn't signed, so unless I had something to compare to, I really can't be 100% correct.

This light table required 3 massive D batteries, and once I installed them, the light table just didn't want to work for me. (For anyone who isn't aware, a light table is exactly what it sounds like -- it's a bright lit-up surface that allows you to put a piece of art down on it, and you can put tracing paper over it to copy the design. Tattoo artists and artists who are using a photograph as a reference tend to use these.) 

It's only once I realized that the metal strip on the right wasn't touching the end of the D battery on the right that the connection wasn't complete hence no way to light up the lightbulb. Easy fix.

Great it works! The paper is pretty thin -- thinner than your average 8x10 computer paper, but a little thicker than tracing paper. So, when used with the light table, this is the effect you get:

Well, hey, it works! It's a bit smaller than your average light table -- I'd say it's 'kid size' and those three massive D batteries means it's expensive to run (like do you know how much a 4-pack of D batteries cost?). I take the batteries out when I'm not using it, just in case the thing decided to overheat and catch on fire -- because hey, you never know.

To someone reading this article who was born after the year 2000, their reaction would probably be "it's a light table, so what? Why all the fuss?" but you've got to realize that in the late 80s/early 90s these were a pretty exciting gift to receive. You were on your way to becoming an artist! Why not learn from the great JLGL by tracing? Another company called Toymax was also producing Trace N' Color Drawing Sets based on popular properties (i.e. Barbie, The Simpsons) using the exact same model of light table and... lo and behold... it has been revealed that the founder of Toymax, Steve Lebensfeld, also co-founded Toy Biz! 

A few years later, in the early 90s, Trace Plates would become the big thing produced by Hasbro:

Trace Plates were a totally different thing altogether (but still looked just as interesting) and actually included plastic plates you could trace over:

I never actually owned any Trace Plates (nor knew anyone who did), but maybe I'll get lucky someday and find one in the wild. 

Did you own a Trace N' Color Drawing Set or a Trace Plate? We would love to hear your memories/experiences. Feel free to leave one it the comments below. 

-Justin

Review: 1994 Sugar Puffs LEGENDS OF BATMAN trading cards

As a youth, I LOVED all things DC comics (thanks, Super Powers Collection). As a youth, I also LOVED sugary cereal (thanks, aggressive Saturday morning marketing). So, combine the two and I was ALL OVER whatever DC comics-themed promotion some Saturday morning cereal was pushing. (Unless it was the cereal itself. I don't have an unopened box of Ralston 1989 Batman Breakfast cereal sitting in my storage locker waiting to be eaten -- that would be... unique.) If it was released between 1982 to 1993, I either owned it or currently own it now. 

Unless, of course, it wasn't available in Canada. 

Thanks to the power of the internet, I can now purchase said items and show you what we both missed out on. Case in point: these 1994 LEGENDS OF BATMAN trading cards that were only available in boxes of Quaker Oats' Sugar Puffs cereal in the United Kingdom (UK).

Sugar Puffs was not a brand of cereal I was familiar with. Apparently, it tasted very much like Kellogg's Honey Smacks -- which I probably would've enjoyed. 

After a bit of internet sleuthing, I determined that the front of the cereal box would've looked something like this:

Discarded box of Quaker Oats' Sugar Puffs cereal from the UK.

..and the back would look like this:

Reverse of the Quaker Oats' Sugar Puffs cereal box. Image from http://cerealoffers.com/

Upon further inspection, it looks like Quaker Oats' Sugar Puffs cereal was all about about cross-marketing in the 90s, since they had promotions for X-Men, Spider-Man, Judge Dredd and that awful live-action Flintstones movie starring John Goodman as Fred Flintstone.

As per the cereal box's sales pitch, you got 5 random trading cards (wrapped in cellophane) per box of cereal.

So... what did these trading cards look like? Glad you asked:

There were 9 cards to collect in all -- the ninth card (not pictured) was of the Joker, which -- if you found in your pack of 5 cards -- could be redeemed at your local toy store for a LEGENDS OF BATMAN action figure based on whatever symbol appears on the Joker's card. (Remember: I mentioned this was a cross-promotion; the goal here was to get kids interested in these LEGENDS OF BATMAN action figures.) I believe that all these cards were based on figures from the first wave of the LEGENDS OF BATMAN toyline -- except for the Gameboy card, of course. (FYI: That would've been the card you wanted -- get a Joker with a Gameboy symbol and you got to redeem it for a Nintendo Gameboy AND a copy of the Batman: The Animated Series game. Otherwise, depending on the symbol on his card, the Joker allowed you to redeem his card for one of the fig figures or two vehicles above -- if you were lucky enough to get a Joker.)

Okay, so this 'contest' expired back in July 31, 1996. From a collector's point of view, are they worth tracking down?

Let's take a close look at these cards:

To call these 'trading cards' is a very generous description. They are printed on VERY flimsy cardstock, maybe one step up from those firm sheets you use in dividers to separate your papers. They measure 10cm x 7cm, and -- while they look like they may be lenticular [aka: shifting the card slightly changes the card art] -- they are NOT. They are deceptive like that.

The back of the card isn't much better; black print on cheapish cardboard, a running sentence promoting Future Batman, no mention of which comic he appears in, and no credit to the artist. Most of the card is devoted to the contest rules and a promotion about the new LEGENDS OF BATMAN toys (which I suppose was the goal of these cards).

Six of these cards (and I'm including the Joker card, here) feature the same art as the far-superior LEGENDS OF BATMAN trading cards released by Skybox in 1995. The only card art exclusive to this set where the Batcycle, the Batmobile and the GAMEBOY screenshot cards. The Skybox cards were included with the LEGENDS OF BATMAN action figure you purchased, and I promise we'll get around to reviewing these someday since I have a bunch in my 'junk drawer'.

LEFT: Sugar Puffs 1994 LEGENDS OF BATMAN trading card
RIGHT: Kenner 1995 LEGENDS OF BATMAN trading card by Skybox

Noticeable difference between the two cards:

• The Skybox card has a denser cardstock -- like a real trading card you'd purchase in a pack of trading cards.
• The Skybox card is slightly larger than the Sugar Puffs card.
• The Sugar Puffs card has a thin white border, and included the 'Sugar Puffs' logo on the front of the card.

Is it worth it?

Only if:

• You're a die-hard Batman fan, and NEED to own every piece of media he's ever been featured on (this includes international cereal promotions)
• You're a die-hard collector of all things Sugar Puffs or Quaker Oats.
• You can pick up the entire 8-card set for under $10 USD. The Joker card is going to cost you extra; it was pretty scarce since they would've been redeemed by kids wanting their free prize, and then probably destroyed by the toy store.

Otherwise, I'd watch for the Kenner LEGENDS OF BATMAN Skybox trading cards. They will cost a bit more, but you can see the difference in quality immediately.  

The bottom line is that these Sugar Puffs cards have no 'WOW factor' -- you'll get the set, look at them for a while, and then shove them in a drawer and never look at them again. As a DC comics or Batman fan, there's nothing here that will really blow you away.

Addendum:

Apparently some sort of LEGENDS OF BATMAN poster was available, but I'm not sure if it was randomly included in boxes, a mail-away, or an in-store promotion. What I DO have is a nice scan of the poster thanks to cerealoffers.com:

-Justin   

----

Update:

A few people have sent us e-mails asking if we can post some sort of checklist (who knew?), so -- in order to oblige our loyal fans -- here we go:

#1 Future Batman
#2 Cyborg Batman
#3 Catwoman
#4 Power Guardian Batman
#5 Nightwing
#6 Batmobile
#7 Batcycle
#8 NINTENDO GAME BOY
Bonus: Joker (there are 8 variants -- all with different prizes on the front of the card)

(PLEASE NOTE: Checking these boxes won't actually save them to the webpage and you won't see them next time you log in. Either record the cards you're missing, or print this checklist.)

Review: World's Finest: The Collection Darkseid Vinyl Figure by CultureFly

One day I woke up feeling that my writing desk was looking a little empty and decided that some sort of DC-themed statue, bust, sculpture or model diorama would help 'liven things up' a bit (or at least make my office more visually interesting). So, I decided to immerse myself into the wild, wacky world of hunting down and purchasing a statue/bust that I could be proud of. The only problem was that I knew NOTHING about materials (ex: resin vs cold-cast vs vinyl), so I had some research to do.

If you only have room for one statue/bust/sculpture on your desk, you better make sure it's a character you REALLY like and has some sort of impact (aka: no Waverider for me). I decided that Darkseid, the gravel-faced Lord of Apokolips, would be the perfect character to give my office space some gravitas while striking fear into my enemies' hearts.

My requirements for a sculpture/bust consisted of:

• Can't be any shorter than 4"
• Can't be taller than 8"
• Ideally would have a thick enough base
• Not so fragile that it would break if you looked at it the wrong way
• Reasonable price point

After a lot of hunting (i.e., comparing prices & checking different seller platforms), I stumbled upon this:

Image courtesy of www.culturefly.com

This sculpt really piqued my interest because it appeared to be modelled after the Jack Kirby/Super Powers Collection Darkseid I grew up reading about, and not the JLU Animated series or New 52 Darkseid designs.

Okay, so I knew I liked this sculpt, but what were the dimensions and how much did it weigh? This was a bit trickier to uncover since no online retailer really gave this information out. So, I just bit the bullet and bought it regardless. As you can see, it arrived in a really sturdy box that kept it from rattling around:

Sorry for the clarity of the photo, folks. Lots of glare on that plastic window.

The fact that the box said 'AGE 4+' kind of made me immediately re-think this purchase. Good for 4 year old kids and anyone older? If it's good enough for a 4 year old, is it good enough for me? I was hoping for something a little more... sophisticated. How cheap was this thing going to be? Also, the box was incredibly light.

Measuring about 13cm wide x 13cm deep x 14cm high, this bust weighed a measly 140 grams. Despite being a hollow vinyl sculpt, it was actually heavy enough to be used as a book-end (for a row of paperback novels) or even as a paper-weight (for a very light stack of papers).

One BIG positive thing I will say about this bust is that it IS durable -- no wonder it's safe for a 4 year old. The vinyl figure is all one piece of durable plastic, and I'm sure it can survive being dropped on the floor a few times. (No, I'm not going to try it.)   

Normally, I'd re-box this and try to re-sell it to get my money back, but this vinyl sculpture kind of grew on me. The musculature and dimensions of Darkseid are proportional to the Darkseid I grew reading about, and he kind of has that "Come and get me!" pose made famous by Marvel's Thanos from Infinity Gauntlet:

Portion of cover from Marvel's Infinity Gauntlet #4 (1991). Illustrated by George Perez

Also, I kind of feel like I lucked out finding one of these at an affordable price (after much hunting). You see, this vinyl bust was part of a CultureFly 'mystery box' from Spring 2020 that you needed to subscribe to. Needless to say, this mystery box has been discontinued, so it's pretty rare to find. The mystery box also contained other items that I really had no interest in (ex: socks, a t-shirt, a notebook, pins, decals, stickers, etc...), so I feel like I got the best of this deal.

The contents of CultureFly 'Heroes & Villains' box released in Spring 2020.
Image courtesy of www.culturefly.com

So far, my favorite thing to do with this vinyl bust is to use it as a 'figure study' to practice my drawing:

Faces are hard. So sue me.

Overall, I am pleased with this purchase and imagine you would be too if Darkseid is your jam.

-Justin

 

Reviewing the 1996 Fleer/Skybox DC Outburst: Firepower trading card set

About a year ago, while cleaning my closet, I found a dozen or so of these cards lying around in a box mixed with a bunch of other non-sports cards. DC Outburst: Firepower is a trading card set I had totally forgotten about.

Actually, when I first found them, I thought they were misplaced chase cards from another set. You see, these cards really stand out for being "DC Comics' First Totally Embossed Trading Card Set" [at least, that's what the promo card boasted], and you can feel (and sometimes see) that parts of the card are protuberant in a very slight way. For the first time ever, you could feel the contours of your favorite DC characters. (Oddly enough, Power Girl was NOT included in this set.) "The FURY of Batman. The SPEED of the Flash. The STRENGTH of Superman. FEEL them all for the first time!" is how they advertised this trading card set. This card set was slated to release for February 1996.

This is a somewhat modest-sized trading card set weighing in at 80 base cards, 20 Maximum Firepower insert cards (2:3 packs) and 2 Holoburst chase cards (1:36 packs). Cards came 7 in a pack and retailed for about $1.50 USD. Fleer non-sports cards [i.e. X-Men 1994 Fleer Ultra, Marvel Masterpieces 1994, Marvel Universe 1994, The Amazing Spider-Man 1994] were typically a little pricier, but had a nicer card stock and better card art (not to mention triptychs, 9-card puzzles and desirable chase/insert cards). Fleer had been owned by Marvel Comics since July 1992. Marvel later purchased SkyBox in March 1995. In essence, this was a merger of two of the most POPULAR non-sports trading card companies.

This wasn't Fleer/Skybox's first collaboration; they released the DC versus Marvel Comics trading card set two months prior, and the Fleer/Skybox Amalgam Comics trading card set would be scheduled for February 1996 as well.

By 1996, only 6 years after Impel's Marvel Universe Series I trading cards had been introduced, the gimmick era had seemingly hit it's apex and just about anything you could possibly do with a trading card had been done; we'd seen foil cards, hologram cards, over-sized/widescreen cards, chromium cards, pop-up cards, redemption cards, puzzle cards, 'foldees', metal cards, canvas cards, holopix cards, spectra-etch cards, autographed cards, die-cut cards, animation cell cards, embossed cards and a few more I'm forgetting. [Actually, I was pretty sure there was nothing left to be done until 'fabric' cards started popping up in the last two decades.] My first memory of any sort of embossed trading card was from 1993's Milestone: The Dakota Universe trading cards (by Skybox) in which the set's two chase cards were embossed foil cards — which, if I seem to recall, didn't inspire much excitement in me since it was the chase card of a relatively 'ho-hum' Milestone character.

So what was so special about 'embossed' cards? It's a little difficult to capture this effect on camera, but take this normal looking trading card...

card art by Rod Whigham

...and if I tilt the card in the light juuuust riiight...

...you can kind of see the embossed features of the card. Notice how the fiery orange 'Firepower DC' emblem in the left corner sticks out? And how Mr. Freeze's fist kind of protrudes from the card? You can even sort of make out the word 'Outburst' at the top of the card. This was the magic of embossed trading cards, folks. What a time to be alive.

Gimmicks aside (and I do assure you, this was a "gimmick") there isn't very much going on for this trading card set. Actually, the more I flip through these cards, the harder it is for me to justify posting this on a website about DC comics in the 1980s [since, in 1995/1996, DC comics had become more 'extreme' to keep pace with the then-current comic book market]. If nothing else, this will be a nice flashback of what was going on with DC comics in 1996.

Based on my somewhat limited memory, the 1996 North American comic book landscape was dominated by the massive DC vs Marvel/Marvel vs DC event that seemed to have taken up the better part of that year (not to mention all of the DC/Marvel cross-over books). While it was being massively hyped by Wizard Magazine, I remember being more interested in the Amalgam titles that were being published alongside the event. Actually, other than DC's Kingdom Come series (released later that year) and various Vertigo titles, I had pretty much given up on buying comics in general [but still picked up the occasional 'comic industry talk' magazine to see what was going on].

I always felt that the character selection in a trading card set is quite telling of what was going on with the comic book company at the time. As I examine these, I like to pretend I'm a comic book archaeologist digging up facts and piecing together history about a lost era in comics. Let's revisit some 1996 DC comics memories:

Card art by Stewart Johnson

Azrael (Jean Paul Valley) is the second card in this base set — which is a spot normally reserved for a high-profile character — which once again reminds us what a hot property Azrael was after the resolution of 1993's Knightfall/KnightQuest/KnightsEnd saga. His self-titled ongoing series ran from 1995 to 2003 for an impressive one hundred issues. In hindsight, I'm actually surprised that a Knightfall spin-off character could attain such longevity, considering that - to this day - I still know nearly nothing about the character.

card art by Chris Renaud

The Ray was one of those 'new generation' super-heroes that was introduced in a 1992 mini-series that was successful enough to have an ongoing series in 1994. In 1995, even with his own ongoing series, he was often a mainstay in the Justice League Task Force ongoing series or could be found teaming up with one of the other "new generation" super-heros [i.e. Damage, Kyle Rayner Green Lantern, Superboy, etc] somewhere in the DCU. The Ray's ongoing series ended in October 1996, almost six months after this card set had been released. As of this writing, there's talk about The Ray headlining his own CW animated feature — which caught a lot of fans by surprise, considering I don't think this character has crossed anyone's mind since his heyday in the mid 90s.

Starman card art and Fate card art both by Tony Harris.

1994's Zero Hour event indirectly introduced a few new 'modernized' characters to the DCU, one of them being Jack Knight as Starman (created by James Robinson and Tony Harris) and another being Jared Stevens as Fate (created by John Francis Moore and Anthony Williams). Unsurprisingly, (Chase Lawler) Manhunter wasn't featured in this card set since his ongoing series was cancelled before 1996. Fate lasted 22 issues, took a hiatus, and his adventures would be continued in the late 1996 Book of Fate ongoing series for another 12 issues. Starman's series was way more successful and would have an 80-issue run that would conclude sometime in 2001. I always kind of chuckle to myself as Fate kind of looks like Al Bundy (Ed O'Neill) from Married with Children on this card. (Full disclosure: as of this writing, I have never read the 1994 Fate v1 ongoing series, so I couldn't even tell you if it was good or not.)

Orion card art by Joe St. Pierre. Mr. Miracle card art by Ron Whigham.

Orion and Mr. Miracle. Ah yes, this reminds us when Kirby's Fourth World has a sudden resurgence in the mid 90s (Mister Miracle v2 and New Gods v3 had both ended in 1991). New Gods v4 debuted in 1995 (hence Orion being important again), and Mr Miracle got another ongoing series in 1996 (it only lasted 7 issues). Another newly created Fourth World character, named Takion, received an ongoing series in 1996 — which also only lasted 7 issues. New Gods v4 hung around until 1997, and a new title called Jack Kirby's Fourth World was published later that year. Both Orion and Big Barda (Mr. Miracle's wife) would become members of Grant Morrison's JLA in 1997 and Kirby's Fourth World mythos would stay relevant in the DCU for years to come.

card art by Rod Whigham

I don't think any DCU character has ever undergone such drastic character development changes as Green Arrow's former sidekick has. At this point in his superhero career, Roy Harper Jr had re-joined the Teen Titans and renamed himself to 'Arsenal'. When I first saw this trading card back in 1996, I'm positive I had no clue who this was and thought it was a new character DC was trying to sell to the masses. Wasn't Green Arrow's sidekick, Speedy, supposed to have red hair? This guy's got blond hair. In an interview with Bill Walko from The Titans Companion [2005], Teen Titans editor Johnathan Peterson revealed that the name change from Speedy to Arsenal was a DC trademark thing, and was out of editorial's hands (as the order came from the top). The last issue (#130) of New Titans hit the stands sometime in late 1995/early 1996, and the team no longer looked like anything I remembered it being — Starfire, Changeling and Raven were still around, and Donna Troy was still on the team (as Darkstar), but that was about it. This would probably explain why this trading card set didn't have much Teen Titans representation. Arsenal had a one-shot special sometime in 1996, Tempest (aka Aqualad) had a four-issue mini-series in late 1996, and the Teen Titans were given a new ongoing series (with all-new members) by Dan Jurgens in late 1996.

card art by Joe St. Pierre

On the topic of DCU characters who had undergone drastic alterations... we've got 'Warrior' here, but you may remember him as 'Guy Gardner: Warrior'. Guy Gardner, who was probably one of DC's most memorable characters during the late 80s and early 90s, was given a makeover during 1995's Zero Hour to become 'more extreme'. No longer needing to resort to a power ring (green or yellow), his whole body could morph into any weapon as it had been revealed that Gardner possessed alien DNA or something like that. This was another character that had fallen off of my radar since his powers had become so ridiculous that he didn't interest me anymore.

card art by Ron Wagner

Neron here was the main antagonist in the Underworld Unleashed event that DC published sometime in late 1995. Since this trading card set was released in early 1996, it could be expected that Neron was still on DC readers' minds [especially readers who were late to the party and picking up their issues several months afterwards], so it only made sense to dedicate a trading card to him. Underworld Unleashed was an event I completely skipped out on, but had the general understanding that a lot of my favorite DC villains were either jacked up with enhanced powers or altered in such a way that they were no longer recognizable. I just didn't have the heart to read this one.

Flipping through the rest of the cards:

• Man-Bat had a 3-issue series in early 1996. He got a card all to himself in the 'super-heroes' section.
• Bane, who was still a hot property for DC comics following Knightfall, also gets his own card in the 'super-heroes' section. I think his big appearance during that era was in the 1995 Batman: Vengeance of Bane II one-shot.
• Catwoman, who's ongoing series launched in 1993, was still holding strong and the series would run until 2001. Jim Balent penciled the first 77 issues of Catwoman v2, left the title and started penciling Tarot, Witch of the Black Rose for Broadsword Comics.
• The Justice League spin-off titles (Justice League America, Justice League Task Force, Extreme Justice) had all wrapped up by mid-to-late 1996. The 4 issue Justice League: A Midsummer's Nightmare was published around this time to act as a prelude to Grant Morrison's new JLA ongoing series.
• Jerry Ordway's The Power of Shazam, which began as an ongoing series in 1995, was going strong in 1996 and would continue publication until 1999. This was easily one of the more interesting DCU titles being publishing at the time — I'm sorry I didn't pick up more than the first few issues when it first started.
• Batman was still a popular seller for DC comics in 1996, as evidenced by the slew of Batman-related titles published that year [i.e. Batman: Scar of the Bat, Batman, Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight, Batman: Shadow of the Bat, Detective Comics, Batman Chronicles, Batman: Black and White, Batman: GCPD, Batman: Death of Innocents, Batman: Gordon's Law, Batman: The Long Halloween, Batman: Blackgate, Batman Plus, etc.]. I'm sure this was the reason why about half the villains featured in this set were Batman villains.

I'm going to start on a positive note and tell you what I like about this set:

• the colors on the card are bright and vibrant (as demonstrated in the scans above),
• the artists are listed on the back of the card — which is always a nice touch,
• the insert cards are easily attainable (2:3 packs),
• the Holoburst chase cards are more or less 1 per box, and
• in some cases, the embossing actually enhances the card art and makes it appear like the character is bursting right out of the card. It's kind of neat, actually. 

Here are some of the reasons I'm really not keen on this set:

1) There's an incredibly limited character selection. Of the 80 trading cards in the base set, only about 20 of them are villains. It wouldn't be so bad if the other 59 cards (I'm not including the checklist here) were unique super-heroes, but we get the same heroes repeated several times over. Characters that get repeated more than once include Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Hawkman, Aquaman, Flash, Green Lantern,... which makes sense, since these are DC's BIG properties, but it would've been nice to see some attention given to some of the other DCU characters being published at the time (i.e. Legion of Super-Heroes, L.E.G.I.O.N. Showcase 95/96, etc).

Just one of the four Superman cards featured in this set. Art by Norm Breyfogle.

2) The way this set was organized. The base set is divided into seven sub-categories: Attack: Full Force, Attack: Out of the Blue, Attack: Armed and Dangerous, Dirty Deeds, To The Rescue, Close Calls and FreeStyle. None of this makes any logical sense to me. The first three Attack sub-categories have all the unique super-heroes, and the last three sub-categories are various repeats of the first. After carefully examining the reverse of the trading cards, it would appear like we've 'hacked' into Oracle's private database and are reading about the characters in question.

As evidenced by the text on the reverse of these cards, the further you go into this collection as an 'unauthorized log-on', the less time you have before the file 'locks'. I can understand what they're trying to go for here, but all of this extra 'computer interface' aesthetic just doesn't work on the back of a 2.5" x 3.5" trading card. Because of all the extra real estate taken up to make it look like an 'authentic database interface', we're left with enough space for about 2 sentences to describe the character. My theory is that this set was probably planned several months in advance (mid-1995) and the editors weren't even sure what the future plans for these characters were going to be — hence they had to keep the card text pretty vague.

3) This was a terrible era in DC comics [for me, anyways]. Yes, this is pretty biased, but 1995's Zero Hour pretty much rang the death knell for my favorite era in DC comics. It wasn't Zero Hour itself that made me give up on DC comics — I actually thought Zero Hour was pretty good — it was more of the state of comic books at the time. The art and characters had all shifted to becoming 'more extreme'. The 'gimmick era' had burned me out. There were no new ideas floating around, and everything was just being recycled over and over again. That's how I felt at the time. I figured that Zero Hour would be a nice book-end if I was going to take a hiatus from comic book reading for a while. When I was picking up comics, it was either Morrison's The Invisibles (Vertigo), Neil Gaiman's Mr. Hero the Newmatic Man (Tekno Comix), The Maxx (Image) or whatever Grendel book Dark Horse was publishing at the moment.

4) It's pretty bad when the base set cards look better than the insert cards.

Spot the insert card from the rest of the base set cards:

If you picked Parallax (#2 in the line-up), then you are correct. The dead give-away was the moderately foil-stamped 'Maximum Firepower' logo on the card, you say? Funny, because that's really the only thing that really separates the insert cards from the rest of the base set cards. The 20 card insert set appears to be centered around the 1995 Parallax View story arc that ran in Green Lantern v3 #63 - 64, but skims over a few important details (such as what made this such a turning point in Hal Jordan's character development) and only goes so far as to describe each Justice Leaguer's contribution to the overall victory. Actually, this was one of the selling points of this card set: an original story penned by Alan Grant (Batman: Shadow of the Bat, Lobo) that would be featured on the backs of the 20 card insert set. I never took the time to read it. This insert set didn't even do anything cool like join up to form one big puzzle or anything. From an aesthetic point of view, there was really no reason to seek out these insert cards, as the base set cards arguably looked better. Admittedly, the Holoburst chase cards do look pretty cool, but that's mainly because I am a sucker for holograms.

5) That 'je ne sais quoi' that I just can't seem to put my finger on. By this point, I've re-written the paragraph you're currently reading about six times now. My first few versions had me blaming the card art for my dissatisfaction with this set — but that's not entirely fair. The art is actually good. Examine any individual card on it's own and you'd be quite satisfied with it. Most were illustrated by Chris Renaud, Joe St. Pierre, Norm Breyfogle, Chris Batista and Rod Whigham, with accompanying inks by Scott Hanna, John Nyberg, Barbara Kaalberg, or Chip Wallace (among others). I think the problem (for me) is that the art is very reminiscent of the Image Comics 'house art style' that DC and Marvel had started emulating [e.g. dynamic and extravagant art, overly detailed, gritted teeth and 'in your face' poses] in their books around this era. I realize that criticizing a trading card set containing nothing but dynamic, action-packed card art (in order to take advantage of it's embossed gimmick effect) is pretty hypocritical — yet here we are. Upon further reflection, I think my biggest slight with this set is that it reminds me of all the mid-90s comic book industry elements that made me want to quit comics for a while. To me, these cards are a salute to a long begone era that will (hopefully) never repeat itself again.

card art by Norm Breyfogle

I will be the first to admit that there are BETTER sets out there capturing this era of DC comics, and you'd probably be happier with the DC Legends Power Chrome set (from Skybox) that contains more characters and was released one year prior, or even the 1994 DC Master Series (also by Skybox) which is just beautiful to look at.

Why should you buy this? You were at a flea market, and you found a box of these cards for less then $5. Pick 'em up. You're a die-hard Superman fan and you want to purchase the four Superman cards in the base set? Go for it. As previously stated, these cards look pretty good on their own.

If you're a 'got to have it all' DC comics trading card collector (like me), or the DC Outburst: Firepower trading card set is just something you have fond memories of and want to own, you can pick up the entire 80 card base set for about $18 USD (as of this writing) on e-bay. The 20 card insert set will cost you another $15 USD, and the 2 Holoburst chase cards are about $10 USD a piece.


-Justin

If you're a fan of DC comics from the mid-90s, I'd strongly recommend checking out The Unspoken Decade — Dean Compton, Emily Scott and Jason Symbifan discuss and review ALL comics from the 1990s (this includes Marvel, DC, Image, Malibu, etc) and actually manage to spotlight the good ones. It's a great trip down memory lane for those of us who want to remember the "gimmick era". ;)

Some Unspoken Decade articles we recommend:

• NEVER SEND A WOMAN TO DO A WOMAN’S JOB: JUSTICE LEAGUE TASK FORCE #7 & 8 by Emily Scott
• TRIUMPH AND TRAGEDY by Jason Symbifan
• Plenty of Zero Hour articles
• SUPER-BLOG TEAM UP PRESENTS-GODKILLERS: DOOMSDAY & BANE! by Dean Compton