Pack Break: 2019 Marvel Promo Pack

A few weeks ago while working in Greenville, SC, I stopped by Borderlands to grab the new X-Men #1 issue that just had released. Upon checking out they tossed this clear plastic pack of what I could only describe as promotional trading cards for the new X-Men titles that are launching out of House of X and Powers of X. I had no idea these existed, but I anxiously ripped into the pack when I returned to my hotel room.

I'm still a little behind in my comic reading, but I am curious about a few of these new titles...mainly New Mutants and X-Force...and maybe Excalibur. The front of the cards show the main artwork for issue #1 of each title, while the backs have the characters listed for each team. There is also strange symbols which turn out to be a type of hidden language. The last card in the pack was a decipher card. I haven't taken the time to translate all of the cards, but I like this idea. 

This is a cool little promotional piece by Marvel. Of course being a trading card and comic fan I love it when these two hobbies collide. I wouldn't mind of Marvel did more of this, especially with some of the upcoming big story arcs like Annihilation or Marvel revisiting 2099.

Fleer Marvel Comics uncut promo sheets

I haven't abandoned this blog.  In fact I've been using some of the "down time" trying to get things organized so I can hopefully return to more active blogging and trading again.  Perhaps even revive my "Affordable Group Breaks" again.

While doing a little cleaning I ran across a very old Ultra Pro pages box (back when Jose Canseco was a spokesman for them!) and inside was all sorts of uncut promo sheets.  I believe the majority of these came from Tuff Stuff magazine, remember them?  Today's topic however probably came polybagged with copies of WIZARD magazine.

Back when Fleer had the Marvel comics license, they pulled out all the stops and released a plethora of comic related trading card sets.  One of my favorites was Marvel Masterpieces from 1994.

Fleer hired the famous Hildebrant Brothers to paint all of the images for their new Masterpieces set.  While there were a few cards I didn't care for their interpretation of the character, most of them were pretty cool...well at least in the 90's.  I have two uncut promo sheets for this series - a 9 card sheet and a 4 card sheet - both having the same back as shown above.

I think their work is pretty impressive overall.  In particular I like their take on Psylocke, Odin, Green Goblin and the Human Torch.

Venom on the smaller 4 card sheet is the best in my opinion.  Just look at all the slobber coming from his nasty long tongue!

A year later, Fleer introduced a new card technology they dubbed Metal.  Of course it was first used in their various sports sets, but they also used it coupled with their Marvel license.  While I loved baseball and football Metal sets from 1995, the Marvel set just didn't grab my attention...though I did buy a metric crap load of it back in the day.

One per pack inserts were normal in the 90's and this trend carried over to 1995 Marvel Metal.  The one per pack Silver Flashers were parallels with a silver etched foil background.  Boring.  The Metal Blasters and Gold Blasters weren't much better either.

I think what hurt these cards so much was the lack of real artwork.  Instead Fleer opted to use CGI art and well the results are...well I'll let you be the judge.  I think I did finish this set at one point, but I've since sold, traded or just threw it away.

I actually have a few of each of these promo sheets, so if anyone is interested in them let me know and I'll send you one.

Cardboard Highlights: 1994 Sportflics Javy Lopez Promo

  

The next card to be showcased as part of Cardboard Highlights is this 1994 Sportsflics Shakers promo card of Javy Lopez.  I know that lenticular cards don't scan very well which is really unfortunate as I'm a fan of these outdated technology.  This card combines several of my favorite things on one card.  1) Lenticular technology, 2) promo card and 3) Javy Lopez. 

As this card is moved around the image of Javy changes from a simple studio shot to an action shot.  His last name grows and shrinks with each movement.  Even the letters in the round Shakers logo change and give a shaken look.  Of course this is a promo card or sample card as it's labeled so you get big black letters printed diagonally across both the front and back of the card.  To some this would deter from the card's collectibility, but to me it only adds a bit of flair.

The back of the card has the standard 90's look - ugly.  The block lettering used for his name, the gold foil used on the last name only - ugly.  The colors - ugly.  Needless to say I won't be spending too much time looking at the back! 

For me it's the front of the card where all the action is - pun intended.  Funny thing about this card is I've seen this promo version of the insert pop up on eBay way more often than the actual card.  Perhaps one day I'll get the production version to display along side this one.