Managed to add Mark Hamill and Anthony Daniels to my custom Star Wars Galaxy Autos set. Couldn't quite manage to get to Star Wars Anaheim(!) so made use of Official Pix's send-in service for the first time (which I would recommend).

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Stunning group, and they all signed so well too.

Will you be looking to add more? Ford is impossible, but I could see James Earl Jones or Frank Oz. Then you'll have to jump to a different trilogy.

Why have you ruined these lovely base cards by having people scribble all over them?

I love the Alien films probably as much, if not more than Bond(!) so have been slowly compiling the limited card sets available for these films, namely: Topps' Alien (1979), Star Pics' Alien 3 (1992) and Inkworks' Alien Legacy (1998). Have had a mint set of Alien for years, just busted a box of Alien 3 (my first sealed box in about 4 years!) but still need a Legacy set, although did recently manage to pick up the binder after years of looking for one.

These were all years before auto cards took off and we are unlikely to ever see any for this property, so thought I'd try and get as many actors from the series as possible as they many do attend conventions.
None of these sets really have any comprehensive cast shots that could be used for in-person signatures so I have settled for a nice foil card featuring Ripley. For the rest of the cast, the Alien Legacy P2 promos offered a lot of blank dark space that look great with metallic pens and work for any actor from the series.

Below:
- Sigourney Weaver as Ripley (x2)
- Bill Paxton as Pvt. Hudson
- Carrie Henn as Newt
- Colette Hiller as Cpl. Ferro
- Trevor Steedman as Pvt. Wierzbowski

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Wonderful autographs, although I am not familiar with the last two by name. I'd love to hear about how you got the Weaver signatures. Those are her better full autographs. I often see the Siggy W version, which is not nearly as good.

I am also a big Alien fan and I believe that there was talk of doing a wrap around set at one time that would include all the new bells and whistles, but then I never heard anymore about it. Alien 5 (not the title) is in the planning stage now and oddly enough it is supposed to pick up right after Aliens ended and forgets about the Alien 3 and Alien Resurrection films. Weaver and Biehn are on board I believe, but of course this will likely take a couple of years.

As for my own Alien signature hunt, I have been able to find certified autograph cards on about 50% of the actors in the main casts from various card products. I have Weaver on a few odd items, uncertified but authentic. Bill Paxton was one of the missing ones, but he just recently appeared in Agents of Shield. Aliens had a 25th reunion at the Calgary Expo last year and the main cast got together for the show, including Weaver. If you haven't seen it yet, the full presentation was still on the internet the last time I looked. Just google Aliens Reunion Calgary.

Beautiful! Those promos do look sharp with the gold ink. As I remember, the 1979 set had some nice character portrait cards. Have you been able to get any of those signed? It's an impressive group: Sigourney, Harry Dean Stanton, Tom Skerritt, Veronica cartwright, Ian Holm. Please show any of those, if you have them.

Raven is right as usual when he says Alien 5 is being made as Alien 3, ignoring parts 3 and 4. That happened one other time with the Superman movie series that ended with Superman 5 made 30+ years later as Superman 3 in 2006. "Superman Returns" did OK money-wise, but obviously not well enough for them to make Superman 4 in the place of Superman 6. They aren't looking for "OK" with these massive investments. (Now we're back to Superman 2, with Batman in it, and I'm so confused!)

I do think Alien 5 (aka 3), also made 30+ years after it's direct predecessor ("Aliens") will go over really well. "Prometheus" primed the pump for more from the mythos and this new Alien is being handled by Neil Blomkamp who did some really nifty work on "District 9" and "Elysium".
He's shown some production sketches online and they look great, plus the original Ripley and Hicks(!) are back, so what's not to like? If Hicks is back, maybe Newt is, too, and she'd be full grown, and probably not to friendly to xenomorphs. The possibilities are endless.

Again, congrats on your collection!

Thanks for the kind words Raven & CPF.

Raven - Colette Hiller was the marine who piloted the dropship and Trevor Steedman was more of a background 'Alien Fodder' marine, he's actually done a lot of stuntwork in films, including Bond. I got them both for the sake of comprehensiveness, they were a tenner each and both nice people to meet.

I met them all this weekend at the London Film and Comic-Con where they had Sigourney Weaver and Michael J. Fox as the headliners. Was a dream come true as she is my favourite actress and I enjoy her work far beyond the Aliens series. Unfortunately mine are not examples of Sigourney's full name. She did do some full autographs were every letter is legible but she tended to reserve those for larger pieces like posters. I see that more as writing her name whereas what I have is her 'autograph'.

These were the other autographs I got from her:



It would be fantastic to get a new card set with all the modern chase and inserts and with AMAZING ensemble cast lists across all four films, that all seem to like signing autographs (apart from Winona Ryder), I think a card manufacturer could have a great hit on their hands if they were willing to take a chance on the property.

Something evident from her signing was that she takes great pains to not sign on her image, instead choosing to use the dead space in an image where possible: she lowered the pen to the foil chase card about 3 times, stopping each time not knowing quite where to sign and put her signature as low down as possible.

It was funny because when Sigourney handed the cards back to me she said: "What are these?" So I said "like bubblegum cards but non-sport" and she got it! Nice to have shown her something different at the weekend beyond the usual photos and DVD covers etc. Maybe the first person ever to show her and Alien trading card as well?!?

I went to a talk with Sigourney at the weekend and she confirmed Alien 5 is 100% going ahead with Ridley Scott producing. She couldn't give much detail on the film but said that she saw the it the Alien films less of a franchise but an "organic" series of films and saw them as a "tree that could branch out in different directions". She said that Alien 5 would not undo the events of Alien 3 and Resurrection but also said that Neill Blomkamp was a true fan of the series from his childhood and his film would be the follow-up to Aliens he always wanted to see as a kid, the "ultimate Alien popcorn movie" she said.

How it can follow Aliens and not ignore Alien 3 I do not know, but I am eager to find out. Personally I have no problems with Alien 3 (killing off Kicks & Newt), and I enjoy Resurrection too. Even though so called fans give the latter two a kicking, it was nice to hear Sigourney say she was immenseley proud of all four Alien films and thought they were all great movies for very different reasons.

A member of the audience pointed out Ripley had had a pretty "crappy life" and she said they had conversations about giving her a happy ending in Alien 5.

I will have to watch the Calgary Expo. Started watching it a while back then forgot to finish it!

chesspieceface - The gold ink looks even better in real life. Was gonna go with silver but the gold looked nice with the green!

You're right, the Alien 1979 set had nice publicity stills of the main 7 actors but I gave them a miss for the following reasons:
- I have those cast shots autographed on 8x10 stills (I have met Tom Skerritt, Veronica Cartwright and John Hurt);
- I would hate to have an incomplete set of those particular Alien cards if I started them now;
- I wanted all the actors to sign the same style of card so doubling up on Alien 1979 plus the Legacy promos would cost too much.

I think you're right and given how much hate Alien 3 gets, that if Hicks and Newt are alive in Alien 5 a lot of fans will be happy. It will do well purely if only because people will be so curious to see a new Alien film 20 years after the last one. Then if it's actually really well received, it could be a monster hit. Personally though, I am not a fan of ret-conning.

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Thanks so much X for describing your Weaver encounter and I'm glad that she did not disappoint you. Even though she is a NYC resident and does do plays occasionally I somehow have not gotten to see her in-person. I did not attend her Con appearance here last year because, frankly she was so darn expensive, and I have plenty of her autographs already. Maybe some day.

I do think you got nice signatures there because I go by the Sigourney not being turned into Siggy. She tends to do Weaver as the W slash more often than not. There are some autographs where every letter in Weaver is legible, but they are few and far between and are often on older signed items or on the contracted merchandise that appear now and again.

I certainly would welcome another Alien movie, although I too am unsure how it will fit in, never mind that these actors are close to 30 years older. In today's films they can do anything.

Boy, you think changing her name from Susan to Sigourney was a good move for her? A great choice that took her from "blah" to "blam!" in an instant (where stage names are concerned, I mean, Susan IS perfectly fine name for normal people).

I liked all 4 Alien movies, too, but do wish we could have seen David Fincher's version of "Alien 3". There were so many cooks in that kitchen, no one even knows who is to blame for its relative failure. Even so, Fincher rebounded well and sure has shown what he can do in the years since. "Fight Club" is a personal favorite of mine, but it's best we don't talk about that.

Was going a bit crazy trying to remember where I saw the announcement of a new Alien set covering everything. Finally found the Card Talk thread and bumped it up.

UD acquired new licenses for Alien, Firefly and Predator, gaming cards and trading cards way back in 2013. As far as I know the trading cards never came out and I wouldn't follow the gaming cards, but I can't recall seeing anything new on that front either.

Firefly: The Verse is from UD, so I guess that's one coming out anyway.

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:
Was going a bit crazy trying to remember where I saw the announcement of a new Alien set covering everything. Finally found the Card Talk thread and bumped it up.

UD acquired new licenses for Alien, Firefly and Predator, gaming cards and trading cards way back in 2013. As far as I know the trading cards never came out and I wouldn't follow the gaming cards, but I can't recall seeing anything new on that front either.

Firefly: The Verse is from UD, so I guess that's one coming out anyway.

They did an Alien Encounters box set for their Legendary game. So they've done something with the license.

Seriously doubt the license includes any new projects though. That's probably a whole new set of negotiations.

Ed

Can't believe that it's been over a year since I added to this thread. At least I guess we now have the answer to what Upper Deck's plans were with the Alien licence!

On the topic of Alien, I have been slowly plugging away at my signed promos project. Having added one name from Alien, another marine from Aliens, and two main prisoners from Alien3. Sadly I missed 4 more names at a show earlier in the year I couldn't get to and Ron Perlman cancelled at LFCC this year (BOO!)
I do really like Upper Deck's Alien set but I will always favour on-card autos and I'm pleased that of the 10 custom auto cards I have, 7 are of names UD wouldn't or couldn't be arsed to get.

So far...

ALIEN:
- Sigourney Weaver as Ripley
- John Hurt as Kane


ALIENS:
- Michael Beihn as Cpl. Hicks
- Carrie Henn as Newt
- Bill Paxton as Pvt. Hudson
- Jenette Goldstein as Pvt. Vasquez
- Colette Hiller as Cpl. Ferro
- Trevor Steedman as Pvt. Wierzbowski (sadly passed away this year)


ALIEN 3:
- Paul McGann as Golic
- Danny Webb as Morse


I also had the rare opportunity to meet Michael Lonsdale (Drax in Moonraker) late last year and got him to sign a vintage Moonraker gum card from one of my favourite sets. I wish the pen came out a little better but he was 84 and struggled on such a small scale. I hope RA get him to sign some official cards one day but if not, at least I have this:


And finally, I am really pleased to be able to add these two to my collection. Mark Hamill was as Celebration Europe last month and given his last UK con was 9 years ago I had to meet him (and what an ordeal that was after trying for 2 days and nearly missing him on both days).
Anway, I ended up at his auto table and the 'helper'/crew asked if I wanted my item personalising, I said no but I would like him to write me a quote. Sour as anything she quickly snapped there was no time for that, which I found somewhat ironic given that his autograph line was so slow all 3 days of the show because he was taking his time to give every fan an 'experience'.
A minute later I'm standing in front of him thinking I'm almost never going to have this opportunity again and to hell with the grumpy witch sitting next to him being a killjoy...
So I told him I've seen the old gum cards he has signed with jokey comments and if he wouldn't mind writing something silly on mine. He paused for a good while, all the while the assistant was staring daggers at me for asking and came up with what is below. I knew he would be up for it and I am so glad I'm sitting here not regretting not asking someone who clearly has a bit of fun signing for fans. He said he'd never written that before as well. Can't say I have seen the image myself and got the impression he hadn't either. Maybe a deleted scene as it was certainly never in the film.
The card is from the Empire Strikes Back 'mini-set' of Topps oversized promo cards exclusive to the show. Big enough for plenty of room to write and a nice momento of the show and meeting him there.

A couple weeks later I got Dave Prowse at London Comic Con on a card from the same set as I thought it would make a nice companion piece.
If I'm honest I feel I am often somewhat harsh on Dave Prowse by thinking of him as just a body in the suit, and that to me anyway, James Earl Jones IS Darth Vader (despite the extra Prowse writes on every autograph). But credit where it's due: Prowse did bring Vader to life and gave intimidating presence to one of cinemas ultimate baddies. So what better pic than of Vader storming about Hoth chasing after Luke and the Falcon? For 7 times less the cost of Hamill I'm every bit as pleased.


As ever, thanks for looking!

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Really happy to have been able to add a few more custom cards over the last year...

Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy were both very nice to meet at conventions.
Tom Baker has started doing only a couple of hours at conventions these days and you can't get near him without expensive 'diamond passes' at £90+
So I got his card done through the send-in service he offers on his website for £20 (+£5 for personalisation on the back). A steal IMO.



I got my Trek Transitions Kirk card signed several years ago and finally managed to add Sulu and Chekov.

Koenig I met in person at London Film and Comic Con, but had to use a send-in service for Takei when I could not attend Destination Trek last year. Disappointed I didn't get to meet him but these guys aren't getting any younger so thought it best not to miss the chance to get their autos.

Love the Star Trek autos. I've still to watch a singe episode of Doctor Who. (dodges bricks)

HI X, ditto on the Star Trek autos as I'm a huge TOS fan. Love it that you had the same card style signed by all.