Harry Potter is a very obvious candidate for a new set.

It has a built in collector base.
There is renewed interest from collectors.
There is a TON of source material to build from.
There are a lot of potential autographs that shouldn't be expensive to acquire
and there is a new Harry Potter series in the works.

No clue what licensing would look like, but it seems to be that it would be hard to miss with HP.

Jelly Belly has been making those Chocolate Frogs with the 3D cards, and with the cards being very popular around the world, you would think the company has at least considered making a larger set of trading cards with images not already used. They could skip the little piece of chocolate and focus on the cards with a subset of rarer chase cards of some kind mixed in. Collectors would go nuts if they were autographs.

quote:

Originally posted by webjon:
Harry Potter is a very obvious candidate for a new set.

It has a built in collector base.
There is renewed interest from collectors.
There is a TON of source material to build from.
There are a lot of potential autographs that shouldn't be expensive to acquire
and there is a new Harry Potter series in the works.

No clue what licensing would look like, but it seems to be that it would be hard to miss with HP.

quote:

Originally posted by webjon:
Harry Potter is a very obvious candidate for a new set.

It has a built in collector base.
There is renewed interest from collectors.
There is a TON of source material to build from.
There are a lot of potential autographs that shouldn't be expensive to acquire
and there is a new Harry Potter series in the works.

No clue what licensing would look like, but it seems to be that it would be hard to miss with HP.

For there to be no proper HP set since the Artbox sets, there's got to be some roadblock.

And that roadblock is probably an exorbitant price for the license. The Harry Potter people think everyone who gets it is going to get rich so they price it accordingly.

quote:

Originally posted by Ted Dastick Jr.:

quote:

Originally posted by webjon:
Harry Potter is a very obvious candidate for a new set.

It has a built in collector base.
There is renewed interest from collectors.
There is a TON of source material to build from.
There are a lot of potential autographs that shouldn't be expensive to acquire
and there is a new Harry Potter series in the works.

No clue what licensing would look like, but it seems to be that it would be hard to miss with HP.

For there to be no proper HP set since the Artbox sets, there's got to be some roadblock.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: catskilleagle,

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:
The problem with "House of the Dragon" that I see hampering RA is that the show is very slow to film. If the production schedule delays season starts, how can RA get the cards made each year when they are waiting for it to begin? The cards are coming out a year or more after each season ends. It seems like there will be a lot of time lost on the license, without any profits but expenses paid out, if new cards can't be made on a regularly scheduled basis.

They could pull the old Cryptozoic Walking Dead trick and release it in two series. Not too crazy of a thought given there was a time lapse that caused some actors to be replaced by others.

quote:

Originally posted by Ted Dastick Jr.:

quote:

Originally posted by webjon:
Harry Potter is a very obvious candidate for a new set.

It has a built in collector base.
There is renewed interest from collectors.
There is a TON of source material to build from.
There are a lot of potential autographs that shouldn't be expensive to acquire
and there is a new Harry Potter series in the works.

No clue what licensing would look like, but it seems to be that it would be hard to miss with HP.

For there to be no proper HP set since the Artbox sets, there's got to be some roadblock.

Could be that the license, plus trying to get the autographs of the talent make it too expensive to produce and make a profit on.

How many sets has Rittenhouse released/will release in 2026 ? Looks like only these:


Star Trek Connections (came out in Feb)

Frasier (April)

Star Trek Voyager (July)

House of the Dragon 2 (Sept)


Do you remember the days when they used to release 8 to 10 sets a year ?

quote:

Originally posted by Tommy C:
How many sets has Rittenhouse released/will release in 2026 ? Do you remember the days when they used to release 8 to 10 sets a year ?

Since 2012 there hasn't been a single calendar year that RA did not put out a new Game of Thrones product. There were a couple of years in the middle when they even did two GoT releases. As long as their license is paid up, I would expect another one to come out this November or December.

I say that because it would appear that the cards are still selling through despite the bottom of the barrel mining for new signers and because that dual autograph card of Clarke and Dinklage has not shown up yet. I have to believe it's still in the vault. RA did all the other big combinations, no way they wouldn't have secured that one too. They may well be waiting for the truly final set.

Without NSU printing the schedule of manufacturer's new products, even with most of them being TBD, we can only rely on rumors to guess who may be working on what. If it's limited to non-sport entertainment cards, I don't think any maker can do a product a month anymore. For companies like UD and Cryptozoic, where card production seems to take years and is limited, I don't know how they can make any good money on even the winning titles.

RA is missing the Headey/Clarke combo card too. So that's another one still open and Pedro Pascal just joined in the last release. They may have other designs autographed by him. I would be surprised if new Got didn't come out around the holidays.

I wonder if House of Dragons will be the last set for the year ?

Only 4 releases in 2026 ? Is that a record low ?

quote:

Originally posted by Tommy C:
How many sets has Rittenhouse released/will release in 2026 ? Looks like only these:


Star Trek Connections (came out in Feb)

Frasier (April)

Star Trek Voyager (July)

House of the Dragon 2 (Sept)


Do you remember the days when they used to release 8 to 10 sets a year ?

quote:

Originally posted by Tommy C:
Only 4 releases in 2026 ? Is that a record low ?

Do you remember the days when they used to release 8 to 10 sets a year ?

[/QUOTE]

NO and YES.

Only 4 releases would tie the minimum record output for 2021. But that was the year coming right off the pandemic, after so many businesses had to shut down at least for a while, so not surprising. This year is very low and it's because there is no "Doctor Who" and no "Game of Thrones" and no "Twilight Zone" and no second "Cheers" set confirmed as yet. There is a Star Trek 60th Anniversary product listed as Winter 2026 and "Twilight Zone" is there as TBD, so they still may show up.

If RA skips Game of Thrones in this calendar year it will be for the first time since Season 1 was released in 2012. I am sure that they still have certain unreleased signed cards in inventory, so I can't see this title fading away without at least one more final product. But that's just a guess. They could just as well sell off any leftover autographed cards without producing another GoT set too.

As for the record year of maximum output, looks like 23 listed titles in 2003. However not all were cards and not all full sets. Anything between 2001 and 2015 had more than a dozen titles from RA. It started to peter off in 2016.

Now they seem to have gone the route of radio silence, even on their website. So is this just following companies like UD, or is it something else? You could "Ask Steve", but he hasn't responded to a question since January 6, 2026. Honestly, that was the last time he posted on RA's own website, yet people keep asking questions. You can go figure out what that means and I'll form my own opinion.