Wow, I must be one the first people to crack open a box of this, they were released today. My daughter had bought this box for me for Father's Day, and she ordered it from Rittenhouse Archives, so that's how I got it so early.

Here's what was in Box 3519 of 5500
135 of 156 base cards, missing 21 cards. 46 duplicates.
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8 Portfolio Prints by Juan Ortiz (1:3)
2 Stars of the Twilight Zone (1:12)
1 Portfolio Prints Character Art Card (1:24)
2 Autographs
Jim E. Titus as Young Horace A169 (Limited)
Veronica Cartwright as Anne Rogers AI-15
Inscription "She's Not Real" (Scarce)

Thoughts about this set:
the Inscription card is great, I also like Juan Ortiz's work, my Character card was C4, Richard Kiel from "To Serve Man". The Regular Character cards are a continuation of the series from previous TZ sets. I was disappointed to not get a full base set, considering all the extras I had, but I still have one more box coming, so we'll see if I can finish a set or two. This set is for Twilight Zone lovers, base cards are text heavy, with opening and closing dialogues from the master himself, Rod Serling.
Thanks Steve Charendoff for a beautiful last set of TZ, and thanks to my wonderful daughter Katie for getting this for me

Box # 1018

All 156 Base cards (22 duplicates - Don,
let me what you need)
8 Portfolio Prints ( these are my favorite cards!)
2 Stars of the TZ (Leachman/ Weaver)
1 Character art card (Klugman)
1 Character card (Mumy)
Auto: Jim Houghton - Ann Jillian

Fun set - really impressed with the Juan Ortiz cards

Thanks Wilber, I'm still thinking my second box will have what I need.I agree, the Portfolio Prints are neat, Juan Ortiz's Star Trek sets are among my favorites.

Well, got my second box today, and it illustrates the problems you sometimes have when you get more than one box.
Here's what was in Box 2775:
1 complete set of 156 cards, plus 22 extras
8 Portfolio Prints (all different from what was in first box)
1 Portfolio Print Character card (Billy Mumy)
2 Stars of the Twilight Zone THE SAME TWO CARDS I GOT IN THE FIRST BOX! Anyone need Barney Phillips S38 or Nehemiah Persoff S47, they are up for trade.
1 Mirror Board Character Card M2 Jack Klugman
2 Autographs
Martin Landau as Maj. Ivan Kuchenko (Very Limited)
Jim E. Titus as Horace Ford (Limited - but not Limited enough - I got one in the first box too!)

Thoughts:
Glad to get a complete set - the extras did not help me with the other set. Like the Landau auto, the duplication of the auto and 2 chase cards was a bummer, but I hope I can trade these 3 cards for ones I don't have. I still love this set, and hope everyone enjoys it as well.

Picked up three boxes . . .

I made a complete 156 card base set in every box, plus 20 odd dups in each.

A total of 24 Juan Ortiz art cards. His artwork seems to have become the largest insert set for RA, in this one and in Star Trek. Some may like it, I don't. I did like his C series better. I got C1, C2 and C8.

Twilight Zone Stars were S-39 Wynn, S-41 Leachman, S-44 Weaver, S-45 Jillian, S-49 Meredith and S-51 Salmi.

I also pulled Mirror M7, Johnson.

Autographs:

Box #3243 - Johnny Eiman and William Swan. A bad box with both autos commons (limited). It was my third and I should have stopped.

First box, threw out number - Daniel Kulick (limited) and Morgan Brittany Inscription (scarce). Her inscription was "TZ - 1963". Good card.

Best box #1591 - Got the Mirror card, A156 John Considine (limited) and A1-12 Ruta Lee Inscription. Now this card must be what RA posted as "dozens of unique inscriptions" because it has a word they probably don't want to use. The inscription says "as my favorite "B*t*h". I guess the old girl's still got it.

I liked the cards overall and couldn't help but read them as I was trying to sort. I do wish I didn't pull two common autos together, because that really hurts for the price. I'm sure I will be picking up several individual autos on this one when prices settle down.

quote:

Originally posted by Don Norton:
...

Thoughts:
Glad to get a complete set - the extras did not help me with the other set. Like the Landau auto, the duplication of the auto and 2 chase cards was a bummer, but I hope I can trade these 3 cards for ones I don't have. I still love this set, and hope everyone enjoys it as well

Congratulations on the Martin Landau autograph, a genuine Oscar winning star!

quote:

Originally posted by Don Norton:


Thoughts:
the duplication of the auto and 2 chase cards was a bummer

The amount of times I have got 2 boxes of RA cards and had duplicates is frustrating. Even when from same case.

I had two boxes and had 0 doubles, I got a neat Earl Holliman inscription card, I thought I had been duped out of an autograph but found a Morgan Brittany in the very last pack, the real problem I had was not getting a base set worth collecting in a storage binder.

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:
Best box #1591 ... AI-12 Ruta Lee Inscription. Now this card must be what RA posted as "dozens of unique inscriptions" because it has a word they probably don't want to use. The inscription says "as my favorite "B*t*h". I guess the old girl's still got it.

Playing "bad girls" lets you keep "it" longer?

Maybe RA just got tired of listing the 'dozens' because the whole batch is shown as "Scarce" (<100) so unique qualifies anyway. I've seen six inscriptions that weren't on the main Ruta list.

Looks like all of the regular Darryl Richard autos are inscribed "BEST WISHES" but are not listed as a variation.

Many of the main inscriptions have variations for capitalization or the use/non-use of quote marks, so arguably the Master Set could be even larger.

quote:

Originally posted by allender:
Maybe RA just got tired of listing the 'dozens' because the whole batch is shown as "Scarce" (<100) so unique qualifies anyway. I've seen six inscriptions that weren't on the main Ruta list.

Looks like all of the regular Darryl Richard autos are inscribed "BEST WISHES" but are not listed as a variation.

Many of the main inscriptions have variations for capitalization or the use/non-use of quote marks, so arguably the Master Set could be even larger.

Yes, she went to town on her own inscriptions, wouldn't be surprised if she has some 1/1s.

If all the regular Richard autos say BEST WISHES, they're not variations, but you could call them inscriptions.

Personally I wouldn't count varying capitalizations or the use or non-use of quote marks as a different inscription, which would be necessary for a Master set. (Is anyone still trying for Master sets anyway?) If you went so far as to consider that, you might as well consider different placements of the auto and inscriptions on the cards as another variant. Whether the auto was slated more or less or whether the inscription was written higher or lower or all on one line or two. Or whether is was printed or all in cursory writing. So far I think all inscriptions look to be printed, but who knows.

You could go nuts seeing variants in this one and there are enough of them not to have to create more.

Haven't sorted out the rest but from my 3 boxes ...

Box 1
A166 Carol Rossen
A156 John Considine

Box 2
A171 Bill Mumy
A160 Darryl Richard
unnumbered Rod Serling cut (9/60)
M1 William Shatner

Box 3
AI-3 Bill Mumy
A158 Johnny Eiman
M3 Bill Mumy

Big congrats on the Serling cut. Three are on eBay now BINing at $2000, $2500 and $4000. I think these 60 cuts will find their way to private collections quickly and then not show up very much.

quote:

Originally posted by Raj:
...
unnumbered Rod Serling cut (9/60)

Wow, an amazing card to pull!

Yeah, that's enormous on the Serling, but I'm pretty sure they're numbered to 50, not 60, so even better!

quote:

Originally posted by chesspieceface:
Yeah, that's enormous on the Serling, but I'm pretty sure they're numbered to 50, not 60, so even better!

Yes, it is to 50 copies, #25 and #36 sold in the last week on eBay for $1,500 BINs. Another still up at $2,000.

It doesn't look like cut signatures appeal to a lot of folks these days. I would call $1,500 for the most important Twilight Zone signature, and it can't be anything but a cut, to be undervalued. The Connery Bond cut didn't take off as high as I thought either. Yet the Star Trek Hunter and Oliver and Ireland cuts went for much more than I thought reasonable. Hard to predict the demand I guess.

Thanks.
It still looks like 60 to me but it's hand-written

In the case of Serling, who was also a producer, and therefore probably wrote a lot of them in that capacity, there are still plenty of signed checks out there, even with RA having taken 50 off the market. In those terms, it's somewhat amazing how much more valuable they become with Rittenhouse simply cutting them down and framing them. That said, there must be a premium something over $1,500 on the original 5 that were made for Series 4.

quote:

Originally posted by chesspieceface:
In the case of Serling, who was also a producer, and therefore probably wrote a lot of them in that capacity, there are still plenty of signed checks out there, even with RA having taken 50 off the market. In those terms, it's somewhat amazing how much more valuable they become with Rittenhouse simply cutting them down and framing them. That said, there must be a premium something over $1,500 on the original 5 that were made for Series 4.

Yes, that's why the cut is so useful for card makers. They can picked up signed items that autograph collectors might pass up in their cheaper, raw form and make them into a licensed premium hit.

But the card maker is also guaranteeing the authenticity of that autograph and has to get it certified by someone before putting it in the card. So much like the idea that a high graded card is worth more when in a slab, the certified signature, included on a licensed card, makes it worth way more than those other signed checks kicking around. At least that's what card collectors are supposed to think. And I do.

quote:

Originally posted by chesspieceface:
That said, there must be a premium something over $1,500 on the original 5 that were made for Series 4.

That last Serling Cut (#2/5) from Series 4 that popped up on eBay sold April 22, 2018 for $5,655.55. I was going to bid on it but never had the chance as it was already over my maximum.

I guess I missed seeing that one pop up. I didn't get that for mine, when it went to a private collector. Plus, when I called Rittenhouse to let them know which one I found, I was told that #1 and #5 were never inserted and were kept in their vault. No other explanation as to why.