TZ is the most consistent quality set they've ever produced. For one main reason, they've not ventured too far (yet) into the silly different autograph card styles. No blue borders this month, black borders the next, then gold ones, and all that rubbish.

Same style throughout, almost all nice signatures. That's all these things need.

I find that the way RA choose to post the autograph checklist this time around very strange. They say they have 34 autograph cards, not counting the 9-case incentive. They actually list 88 autographs, with many having the same number and signer. The difference is that they are recording specific inscriptions on their own line, as though its a separate card.

Many products have had signers adding inscriptions before, including Twilight Zone. They were treated by collectors as variants, but not as a separate card. Only recently has inscriptions, apparently specific requested inscriptions, started to be treated by the makers as another type of hit to be preferable and more limited than the plain old signature.

Like the rose, a variant by any other name is still a variant.

Most of the signers with inscriptions have signed for the RA TZ line before, so this was a way to make them something to chase for collectors who already have signed autograph cards from those actors.

I'm happy with the new signers and I'll be getting all of those, but I don't really need any variations. I do still need a TZ Ron Howard since I traded the original Series 4 I had I when I was made an offer (for earlier TZ series rare cards I'd missed) that I couldn't refuse.

Obviously, I want one of those Serling cuts, but I'm still deciding how I'm going to approach collecting this series.

quote:

Originally posted by chesspieceface:
Obviously, I want one of those Serling cuts, but I'm still deciding how I'm going to approach collecting this series.

I don't know how many options there are beyond trying to get at least one of all signers. That's how I approached GoT and I was up-to-date until the last couple of sets.

I broke down the TZ Archives autograph checklist as RA put it out with the inscription variants, the duals, the Serling cut and the archive box exclusive all together. It goes like this:

88 cards - 19 L, 3 VL, 8 EL, 58 Scarce

Just try going after that whole thing.

There are about 4 or 5 that I really want. Would like another Ron Howard as the one I have is from the Grinch set.

Can't think of any reason why I would need any more Cartwrights or Mumy's. I have 3 or 4 of each already.

I always try to pick up at least one Veronica Cartwright whenever she signs in a product. She has a very precise, great looking signature on every copy.

She was a well-known child actor in her day, who has continued to work steady throughout her life. She could have been the star of Alien and really was the star of the Invasion of the Body Snatchers remake. Lots of film and TV credits. Just one of those truly underrated actors.

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:
I always try to pick up at least one Veronica Cartwright whenever she signs in a product. She has a very precise, great looking signature on every copy.

She was a well-known child actor in her day, who has continued to work steady throughout her life. She could have been the star of Alien and really was the star of the Invasion of the Body Snatchers remake. Lots of film and TV credits. Just one of those truly underrated actors.

I've always had a strange relationship with Alien, Dallas (Tom Skerritt) was my favourite and I much preferred the performance of snivelling Lambert to Ripley.

quote:

Originally posted by cheifbrody:
I've always had a strange relationship with Alien, Dallas (Tom Skerritt) was my favourite and I much preferred the performance of snivelling Lambert to Ripley.

Totally off topic, but I get it too. Alien was made in 1979 and the idea of a woman being the hero of a sci-fi film was somewhat revolutionary. Weaver was an unknown actress and when the better known Hurt (Kane) was killed early, and the apparent star Skerritt (Dallas) disappeared and was presumed dead (we didn't see it till the director's cut) it was a surprise to audiences. However I always thought Weaver wasn't that good in it.

Ripley was the character who is always right, but no one believes. She was a pain and Weaver's deadpan delivery in the first half was annoying. As characters I liked Dallas, Parker, Lambert, Brett and even Ash more. Kane was pretty stupid, so forget him. I did enjoy the film, but there should have been a larger cast and a couple more survivors.

Cue in Aliens, my favorite of the series, where Weaver's acting was much better in my opinion and you could see her as the star, even though she is still the character who is always right and no one believes.

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

If you want to see Richard Dreyfuss and Veronica Cartwright in a crazy performance check out a flick called "Inserts"

It is basically the X rated (for mid 70's era now it is NC-17) movie that Richard ran off to do after Jaws was done filming. He honestly thought it was going to do that poorly.

The scenes with Richard and Veronica are the most dynamic.

On the street. Picked up my Shelley Fabares sig already.

Personally I like the design of the standard signature card more than I like the inscription ones.

Wow! The Ron Howard's are taking off hard core right out of the gate!

I mean I get all of them are scarce but it still looks like he signed about 500 for the set.

So I got 3 boxes, which was more than I was getting originally. The breaks will be posted in the other thread. I have a few observations, if it will help anybody.

The cards are almost entirely the text of Rod Serling's Open, Middle and Closing Monologues. Each side contains a small picture from the episode, several have no photos at all because the writing takes up the whole card. As such, there is little point in talking about how the design looks. It's 75% writing or more, if the monologues are lengthy.

These cards are an excellent companion piece for Twilight Zone fans, but you must know the episodes and have other TZ sets to follow it well. The monologues themselves do not cover all the episodes well, so you need to have that other material or to have seen them yourself.

The base set is 156 cards and I made one complete set in every box plus 20 odd duplicates. I have seen someone else say they were short, but I didn't find that.

The largest insert set is the Juan Ortiz art cards. You will get 8 per box. Some people love the art, I don't. Not here and not in Star Trek sets. His artwork is better in the C series that comes 1 per box, at least I can tell what the pictures mean.

The foil Twilight Zone stars come 2 per box and are what you would expect, as are the rarer M, Mirror cards. A solid effort for dedicated fans who will enjoy Serling's writing.

As always, value will hinge on the autograph cards you pull. For two boxes, I got one Scarce and one Limited each. The third had two Limits (commons). That one is a dud. The commons will settle below $12 I'm sure, so if you catch a box like that, value is bad. The other two were fine for me, but that will probably be my last blind break on this one. Hope that helps you decide.

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:

quote:

Originally posted by cheifbrody:
I've always had a strange relationship with Alien, Dallas (Tom Skerritt) was my favourite and I much preferred the performance of snivelling Lambert to Ripley.

Totally off topic, but I get it too. Alien was made in 1979 and the idea of a woman being the hero of a sci-fi film was somewhat revolutionary. Weaver was an unknown actress and when the better known Hurt (Kane) was killed early, and the apparent star Skerritt (Dallas) disappeared and was presumed dead (we didn't see it till the director's cut) it was a surprise to audiences. However I always thought Weaver wasn't that good in it.

Ripley was the character who is always right, but no one believes. She was a pain and Weaver's deadpan delivery in the first half was annoying. As characters I liked Dallas, Parker, Lambert, Brett and even Ash more. Kane was pretty stupid, so forget him. I did enjoy the film, but there should have been a larger cast and a couple more survivors.

Cue in Aliens, my favorite of the series, where Weaver's acting was much better in my opinion and you could see her as the star, even though she is still the character who is always right and no one believes.

A little inaccurate about Weaver I think, as woman as been last one standing from Texas chainsaw massacre (1973) To Halloween (1977) and all beyond, in fact, the only horror movies I can think of off hand with a male left standing are the awful house of wax (2005) where the brother and sister survived and the thing (1982) that didn't have any women in it (there's a Norwegian remake in recent years, haven't seen it but I will put money on female left standing.

Of Alien, Dallas went in the shaft, that's it, I never have (or ever will) watch the directors cut, the good thing about Ripley was that she was scared, in one scene she starting singing to try to hide her fear. Watching behind the scenes documentary, Yaphet Kotto while filming his last scene wanting to change the script so he can kill the alien, but alas, that's not the way it is.

quote:

Originally posted by mykdude:
On the street. Picked up my Shelley Fabares sig already.

Personally I like the design of the standard signature card more than I like the inscription ones.

Jealous you can just go pick it up, Fabares and Ann Jillian are the ones I'm after, plus after seeing it, I also want the Dillaway/Cartwright

quote:

Originally posted by cheifbrody:

quote:

Originally posted by Raven:

quote:

Originally posted by cheifbrody:
I've always had a strange relationship with Alien, Dallas (Tom Skerritt) was my favourite and I much preferred the performance of snivelling Lambert to Ripley.

Totally off topic, but I get it too. Alien was made in 1979 and the idea of a woman being the hero of a sci-fi film was somewhat revolutionary. Weaver was an unknown actress and when the better known Hurt (Kane) was killed early, and the apparent star Skerritt (Dallas) disappeared and was presumed dead (we didn't see it till the director's cut) it was a surprise to audiences. However I always thought Weaver wasn't that good in it.

Ripley was the character who is always right, but no one believes. She was a pain and Weaver's deadpan delivery in the first half was annoying. As characters I liked Dallas, Parker, Lambert, Brett and even Ash more. Kane was pretty stupid, so forget him. I did enjoy the film, but there should have been a larger cast and a couple more survivors.

Cue in Aliens, my favorite of the series, where Weaver's acting was much better in my opinion and you could see her as the star, even though she is still the character who is always right and no one believes.

A little inaccurate about Weaver I think, as woman as been last one standing from Texas chainsaw massacre (1973) To Halloween (1977) and all beyond, in fact, the only horror movies I can think of off hand with a male left standing are the awful house of wax (2005) where the brother and sister survived and the thing (1982) that didn't have any women in it (there's a Norwegian remake in recent years, haven't seen it but I will put money on female left standing.

Of Alien, Dallas went in the shaft, that's it, I never have (or ever will) watch the directors cut, the good thing about Ripley was that she was scared, in one scene she starting singing to try to hide her fear. Watching behind the scenes documentary, Yaphet Kotto while filming his last scene wanting to change the script so he can kill the alien, but alas, that's not the way it is.

Both Texas Chainsaw and Halloween were strictly horror movies and rather cheaply made ones at that. While Alien could be categorized as a horror movie, it's nature is still squarely in science fiction. Plus it was a major release as opposed to the independent horror films like Chainsaw, Hills Have Eyes and even Halloween. So that's where I was coming from with Weaver.

If you liked Alien, you should check out the director's cut. There are a couple of scenes in there that should have been left in the final version. They took out Ripley finding Dallas in the hive because they thought it slowed down the ending. But there is a good exchange and slap that Lambert lays on Ripley for not letting them in the spaceship that I always liked. And there is a bit more conversation with Ash that adds to it.

More so than Alien, the director's cut of Aliens is excellent and definitely has scenes that are important to the narrative and were cut out of the final print for length reasons. I'm not a big fan of adding 15 seconds, but occasionally director's cuts are worth a look.

As for the Twilight Zone autographs, they are just starting to be up in auctions now. The BINs seem too high on the ones I'm looking for, so I'm going to hold off until prices set. I get the feeling that with all the variations these autos will not dry up before they get reasonable.

quote:

Originally posted by mykdude:
If you want to see Richard Dreyfuss and Veronica Cartwright in a crazy performance check out a flick called "Inserts"

I've actually seen that movie. It was a rare (hence, valuable) VHS video we used to look for at old video stores. We only ever found one in seven years of searching.

As for the new TZ cards, I just skipped the chase and bought one of every card. I'll post the rares (including a Serling cut) once I have them, which should be Monday...

OK, so here's the goods:







Got it all and am keeping all not shown (great looking base, regular chase, and new selection of single autographs), but I will be selling 11 (possibly 12 or 13) cards, so I can't yet determine my final price for what I end up with.

Traded away my Series 4 Ron Howard years ago (for earlier series biggies I had missed) so I'm happy to replace it with the inscription from him. That's the only inscription I'm keeping and I'm thrilled to own a Serling cut. Loving the Landaus and the third different single Bill Mumy, but I don't necessarily need extras of the same signer, so I may yet part with the new Mumy single and one of the Landaus. Am selling both duals for the same reason: I already have singles of those signers.

Finally, on the Archive Box exclusive, John Clarke (upper right corner), based on my example and several others that have surfaced, you can kind of figure out what happened there. Well into his 80's, it seemed he was willing to sign, bless his heart, but not quite up to it, so like Elizabeth Allen in the long-ago Series 1, some of his cards were likely returned unsigned, hence it's limited distribution. I don't know if the value will hold as more come to market, but the first one listed sold for nearly $700. Regardless, I am likely to keep mine for wanting to have at least one card from every signer. I'm very close now...

quote:

Originally posted by chesspieceface:

quote:

Originally posted by mykdude:
If you want to see Richard Dreyfuss and Veronica Cartwright in a crazy performance check out a flick called "Inserts"

I've actually seen that movie. It was a rare (hence, valuable) VHS video we used to look for at old video stores. We only ever found one in seven years of searching.

As for the new TZ cards, I just skipped the chase and bought one of every card. I'll post the rares (including a Serling cut) once I have them, which should be Monday...

Not sure if it is still up but there was a full copy of the movie on youtube.

I am pretty happy that RA had the on card Landau signatures. I never picked up one of the sticker versions and now I don't have to.

Just from what I'm seeing, I don't think the Rod Serling Edition is doing that well, which is not to say that it isn't doing that well for us collectors, but for the people trying to sell them.

For starters the boxes are available under SRP. However I have opened about six now and I only made moderate value twice, as an estimate. That's because if you get 2 limited autographs in the box, which unfortunately I got in 3 of those boxes, you are looking at hits under $10 each. This should be the high point period for many of these autos on eBay right after release and the prices are weak even for the ELs. Scarce cards seem, wait for it, scarce.

Now that's good news for collectors. It means you can pick up most of the cards you want at more than reasonable prices. It's also bad news, because it doesn't look like there is much of a future demand for anything beyond Shatner. the Serling cut and maybe a few select inscriptions.

It's very bad news for sellers and flippers, because the boxes are not cost effective to be bought blind by customers and to break them will leave them with a slew of commons and not enough big cards to make up for it. Unless of course you hit a Shatner or Serling or a few good inscriptions.

The cards are very nice to be sure, but I guess the inscriptions from repeat signers haven't got the base excited and the demand isn't there for new card collectors. I gave away a couple of extra sets I put together to a 19 year old neighbor who is in college. I thought he might like reading the text. To my surprise he barely knew about the original Twilight Zone. We assume that what is iconic to us is universally known until you talk to someone outside your circle and find out that nobody knows what you're talking about.

The previous three TZ sets had 4 autographs per box, while this set only has 2, and a higher SRP. That's a lot of value missing per box/case. With no sketch cards in this release the only justification for keeping the price the same (or raising it) while cutting the autographs per box/case in half is the addition of the 50 Serling cuts.