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Saturday, January 31, 2009

Complete Set!!!

Woooooo! That Lord of the Rings box actually had a complete set in it! Literally the last two cards in the last pack were the ones I needed. I ripped it open looking for #68 and #44 and there they were. THE LAST TWO CARDS POSSIBLE. It was the trading card equivalent of Chipper Jones hitting a walk-off home run for the Braves in game 7 of the World Series against the 1927 Zombie Yankees and then circling the bases and beating Osama Bin Laden to death in the on-deck circle with the bat he hit the homer with and then immediately hopping into the stands getting down on his knees and proposing to Britney Spears who says yes and they kiss on the kiss cam after the cameraman showed two fat guys in Mets caps who refused to play along and everyone went booo but then Chipper and Britney kissed and everyone went awwww fireworks went off and they get married by Hank Aaron right on home plate and Bud Selig gives Chipper the Championship trophy as a wedding gift and Britney finally straightens her life out and joins the PTA and they have a bunch of kids who fight crime and cure cancer while playing in a rock group. It was exactly like that.

Here's my favorite card from each subset in celebration of this momentous occasion.

Cards 2-12 Portraits

Artist John Alvin painted this smokin' hot portrait of Eowyn. Sexay and she'll kick your ass. Faramir is a lucky dude.

Cards 13-36 Paintings

RAAAAR. DRAGON EAT FRODO. Lord of the Rings production artist John Howe painted this fierce beastie menacing poor little Frodo.

Cards 37-45 Costume Designs

I don't care a flip about the costume sketches, but Good Lord, LOOK AT THOSE BIG FEETS

Cards 46-64 EA Paintings

I think these are all pics from the videogame. They were ok, but not spectacular. I liked Arwen sneakin' through the woods on theback of this card best.

Cards 65-72 Caricatures

DWARF NINJA!!!!!!!!! HIIIIIIYA!

Cards 73-81 New Visions - Chiarello

Mark Chiarello is one of my favorite artists. It was tough picking a favorite, the card of Gandalf staring down the Balrog up at the top of the post was also by him. There was a cool Gollum card I didn't even scan because I didn't want this to become the all-Mark Chiarello post. I finally chose this painting of Saruman because Christopher Lee kicks major ass.

Cards 82-89 New Visions - Sturzan

Drew Sturzan did the other half of the New Vision art. It's good, but I like the paintings better. This card caused me to have a horrible realization though. Smeagol is pretty much stark raving nude the whole movie. I'm not sure what it says about me that one of my favorite movie characters is a crazy little naked dude.

Foil Art Cards

In addition to the comploete set I pulled 5 foil cards (1:4) including two Gimlis. Thanks to the ghostly white art on them, they scan amazingly well.

Etched Foil Puzzle Cards

I got three of these suckers too (1:6) that make up half the set. The cards fit together like a puzzle when you put them together. They look a hell of a lot better than the scan and remind me of the old Fleer Metal Universe cards. The artist is Rafael Kayanan who has got a pretty nifty blog.

I can't believe I got the whole set in one box! That never happens to me! I've still got 42 cards and that Gimli insert left over. If someone else out there needs a couple of cards for this set let me know this weekend. Otherwise, if someone will send me a neat non sports card or two, I'll send you the rest of the doubles. I'll send it off Monday, so make your offers.

10 comments:

--David said...

That is awesome! Are the odds of completing the set in a single box listed anywhere? That was a great purchase choice!

dayf said...

The odds of completing a non-sports set through packs is about 80 bazillion to one and completing it through a REPACK box is approaching infinity. I think I've used up all my luck for the year.

Matt said...

"The odds of completing a non-sports set through packs is about 80 bazillion to one and completing it through a REPACK box is approaching infinity."

Unless it is an Inkworks product. My wife collects Buffy cards and Inkworks guarantees a complete base set out of every box.

capewood said...

Really nice cards. I haven't considered buying any of those but maybe I will.

Offy said...

Any Katie Cook cards in the set? She's got a very cartoony style and has done a lot of cards for the various Topps non-sports sets out there. I especially love some of the Marvel and Star Wars cards that she's done.

Captain Canuck said...

inkworks and rittenhouse give you a complete set, and if any "hits" are missing, they'll send you one right away.

Secondly,

Britney Spears???? Really???

dayf said...

LEAVE BRITNEY ALOOOOONE

And no Katie Cook as far as I saw.

Ryan Cracknell said...

Non-sport sets are pretty easy to complete for the most part. Most give you nearly three sets per box, although that number will likely shrink as a lot of products are going from 36 packs to 24 in a box. It's a much simpler area of the hobby and offers a lot more variety.

Are you interested in any LotR Masterpieces Series 2? I'm not sure if I have any singles. I know I have a near set of Indiana Jones Masterpieces, which is a similar set but with Indy instead of Frodo.

Ryan Cracknell said...

PS I think Katie Cook did sketch cards for the set and that's all. She's great. I had her do an ET custom sketch for me a while back. I'm tempted to see what she'd do with Mr. T.

Anonymous said...

The Woooo paragraph proves once again that you are Lord of the Cards; however, one clarifcation. The Mets fans would not be fat and grumpy but slender and hopeful, caught up in the wonder of the moment cheering for Chipper & Britney and the kiss cam even though they are NOT very happy with Braves, still they can be one with the moment, especially if it is early in the season and they haven't had the ---- beaten out of them yet by their stupid team.