Marvel Masterpieces 1992-2020

[DynaEtch]

Originally Posted by jdandns

The Benevolent Sage Custodian of All-Things Marvel Masterpieces, looking out for everyone.
Great catch, Dyna!

I just hope the error stuff isn’t a huge bore….I know it’s trivial and VERY niche

With the 90s masterpieces era being finite and exhausted, the natural focus is shifted to oddball misprints, for fresh things to collect….that has been my trajectory. Modern era MM is different, always something new to collect.

If the above was never noticed, it would likely have merely resulted in an eBay return…so maybe that minor hassle was avoided at least!

[DynaEtch]

This is a masterpieces promo mystery. Alluded to it above in the set post- it’s about the 1993 Masterpieces Venom promo.



Nslists says two variants of this exist, a no # black printing from SDCC and a scarcer gray printing….numbered P8: https://www.nslists.com/mrvmas93.htm

I have never once seen a different version of this promo. Certainly not one numbered P8. It’s always the no #’d one shown above. And I’ve been collecting in this niche for quite some time.

So Im at a loss. Does anyone have any info on this? What would ‘black or gray printing’ even be referring to here? Color of Venom? Color of text on back?

Argument against the P8 promo existing
-I have never once seen a different version of the Venom promo- on the market, pics online…nothing.
-There have been rare mistakes on nslists, such as it lists a 1995 Marvel Metal silver flasher checklist, but I do not believe that card exists.

Argument for the P8 promo existing
-Listed on nslists (Jeff Allender site)
-Listed as #P8. This would be very specific and random number to come up with if the card doesn’t exist.
-It does say it’s the scarcer of the two on nslists, that lines up with you basically don’t see it.

I’m about at a 75% chance the card doesn’t exist, 25% it does. If it does, my guess is it was not a released promo (if, say, it was at the 93 National as a promo, or in any magazine, there would be more than zero on the market for years on end). One thing is for sure…if this card randomly shows up, it would be an immediate grail for a complete 93 Masterpieces master set. This might require none other than promoking to solve.

It’s a real stumper!

[Alex23]

Very happy to finally be finished with this set(with the exception of one promo card). But yeah. Been quite the journey to complete it!

[jdandns]

Beautiful '96 MM collection, congrats!
There are checklist differences on the sell sheet from the finished cards, pretty cool.
Yours looks to be in great shape, not easy with that one. Well done, well done.

[DynaEtch]

Congrats on the super complete 96MM set! That sell sheet is not easy to find. I love to see all-out master sets like this....thing of beauty. Looks we have the same taste in custom binders

Do you plan on adding the Wolvie gold gallery to finish the promo set? The gallery promos in this set were always an iffy thing for me since there is nothing that differentiates them from the regular cards except the cut corner. So I guess when you see a cut corner one, you can never be totally sure. But I decided to go for them anyway.

[DynaEtch]

How did you go about the base set? One single at a time? Buy lots? The complete set at once?

I assume not from opening packs since boxes are like 8-10k at this point (!)

[Alex23]

Thank you! Its been a journey. I did start out one card at a time, piece by piece. Found the sell sheet in a mixed lot of sell sheets several years back. My wife bought me two unopened packs for Christmas one year before they blew up. But my biggest score of all was at a random comic convention were I picked up a sealed box for an insane $120 from a guy who I'm pretty sure had no clue what it was! But yeah, had to chase down those last two double impacts, Beast and Rouge of course. Yep, same awesome custom binder from that seller on eBay! I will track down that Wolverine eventually, but like others have said, would have been nice if they said promo on the back or anything to differentiate besides the clipped corner.

[DynaEtch]

Originally Posted by Alex23

Thank you! Its been a journey. I did start out one card at a time, piece by piece. Found the sell sheet in a mixed lot of sell sheets several years back. My wife bought me two unopened packs for Christmas one year before they blew up. But my biggest score of all was at a random comic convention were I picked up a sealed box for an insane $120 from a guy who I'm pretty sure had no clue what it was! But yeah, had to chase down those last two double impacts, Beast and Rouge of course. Yep, same awesome custom binder from that seller on eBay! I will track down that Wolverine eventually, but like others have said, would have been nice if they said promo on the back or anything to differentiate besides the clipped corner.

Um wow?! I honestly dont know how that even happens in this day and age, where it's so easy to check values....ebay etc at people's fingertips. Like with someone selling something at a convention, you'd think they'd do more than zero research pricing something.

That sell sheet was a good find. I'd estimate around 1 shows up on ebay per year or so....that's not a lot. In case you are into extras like ads, there were a couple comic/magazine ads released for 96MM that can be added to a master set for cheap (shown in the set post for 96MM on the first page in this thread). Much cheaper than the sell sheet since there are zillions of them.

[exotechktx]

LOL imagine scoring a 10k box for $120....!!! Congrats!!!

Continuing our tangent in the other thread, @Dyna, yea, I'm inclined to agree with you. Only MM94 and MM95 had full dealer folder kits, with MM95 having 2 versions, while MM93 and MM96 only had a single sell sheet. I am biding my time waiting to pick any of them up for a reasonable price

[DynaEtch]

True to the name! Finally added the 1993MM Dyna Etch sheet, after long time searching. (With my username I almost have to add this sheet). Soon going to make a comprehensive post about uncut sheets, a topic which has not been discussed much in the set posts at the beginning of this thread.

[Rictor]

Marvel is releasing variant comic covers next year featuring some Marvel Masterpieces 3 Hildebrandt art.

Personally, I'd like to see them go the other direction. Release some of the variant covers as card art sets. The Alex Ross covers would make a nice card set.

[DynaEtch]

Originally Posted by Rictor

Marvel is releasing variant comic covers next year featuring some Marvel Masterpieces 3 Hildebrandt art.

Personally, I'd like to see them go the other direction. Release some of the variant covers as card art sets. The Alex Ross covers would make a nice card set.

News to me...gotta say I like this! I know for card collectors it's kind of an 'ehh' thing, since it's not the card medium. Plus the paintings are nothing new, having been published since 1994. But I enjoy adding this stuff to master sets, and it gives me something else to hunt for from an almost-exhausted 90s era.

Perhaps we will see some CGC yellow label SS's with Greg's auto on some of these if he does any signings, like we saw with the Joe Jusko ones.

[DynaEtch]

I am trying to source information and compile a pictorial list of all the Marvel Masterpieces uncut sheets. It is not an easy thing to do since many of these uncut sheets are scarce, not seen on the market in years, and even finding pics of many is challenging. So hopefully this can provide a helpful reference….but I am missing several, so if you can locate pics of any MM uncut sheets not shown below, by all means please post them! Some of the below sheets are mine, many are not and just pics I scoured online for- and the bad pic resolution is the best that’s out there.

There are three reasons it is helpful to chronicle these uncut sheets.
1. They inform errors. If there is one overarching message of the last 10 pages of this thread, it is this. Uncut sheets enable you to predict errors, as well as help verify existing errors you see.
2. In some limited cases, they inform relative print runs (whether some cards are short printed vs others in the same set)- note, usually only when the whole set is on the sheet- more on this below.
3. People collect these sheets and it’s helpful to know what’s out there.

1992 Marvel Masterpieces
Base set of 100


Spectra Etch


1992 National Promo sheet (most common MM sheet by far, 2600 copies exist). The Spidey, Hulk, and Wolvie are prototypes, the Cap is the blue back promo.


Not shown/Can’t find pic:
-A 2nd Battle Spectra sheet with 20 cards, per nslists
-A larger promo sheet with 78 promos, all blue back presumably (the other 5 blue backs besides Cap which is on the above sheet), per nslists: 30 Hulk, 24 Psylocke, 3 Silver Surfer, 15 Spiderman, 6 Wolverine. Interestingly this likely informs relative rarity of these blue back promos (note particularly the big discrepancy between SS/Wolvie and the others).

1993 Marvel Masterpieces
Base set of 90 (note cards are in order except the Steranko triptych at upper right)


Dyna Etch



She-Hulk Prototype



No # Promos (note the relativity rarity of the 3 promos- Daredevil, Venom, and Hulk 2099 are revealed by this sheet)



1994 Marvel Masterpieces
Base set (140 cards, over 3 sheets). Nslists says 4 base sheets, I only see evidence of these 3, so will go with 3 until proven otherwise).

Base sheet A: 100 different cards


Base sheet B: 20 different cards, each repeated 5 times



Base sheet C: 20 different cards, each repeated 5 times (easily noticed by the checklist being on this one)



That makes up the 100+20+20 = 140 card set. One might think, are the cards appearing 5 times in the 20 card sheets B and C, such as Wolverine or Checklist, really 5 times as numerous as the ones singly printed on the 100 card sheet A, such as Apocalypse? The answer is a resounding no! (they easily could have just printed 5 Sheet As for every 1 sheet B and C). Indeed, since we don’t observe a major discrepancy on the market, I suspect that’s the case.

Holofoils
2 sheets for the 10 card set

Sheet A (6 different cards, each has 2 blocks of 4)



Sheet B (4 different cards, each has 3 blocks of 4)

It is very interesting that the ones on sheet B, which lets be honest are the more popular characters, have 3 blocks and only 2 blocks for each on sheet A. It just *might* be that these are more common at a 3:2 ratio, but it does not have to be the case! Again, Fleer could have just printed 2 sheets of B for every 3 sheets of A then the numbers would be equal. If, on the other hand, Fleer printed the same number of each sheet, it seems the Spidey, Venom, Iron Man, and Carnage could actually be slight overprinted compared to the others (makes sense since popular characters). My suspicion is they are equal in numbers, but the jury is out on this one. The only real way I could see that might shed light on this, is for someone to open a large sample of 94MM boxes, and do a statistical analysis on holofoils pulled. This is preferable to doing statistical analyses on the market, since there could be bias towards differing characters coming and going from the market etc....best to go to the actual source- what comes out of the pack.

Not shown/Can’t find
-Power Blast sheet, never seen
-Gold Sig sheets, never seen. Probably same scheme as base
-Gold/Bronze holofoil sheets.....I assume they look like the silvers.

1995 Marvel Masterpieces
Base sheet (Base card set is 151 cards. I think there should be two base sheets).

Base sheet A: 100 different cards


Base sheet B: The other 50 cards, doubled on the sheet (note below is of the Emotion gold sigs, but the base sheet should look like this). Again this does not mean the 50 cards here are double-printed in the set compared to the sheet A cards, I imagine Fleer printed 2 sheet A's for every 1 sheet B.

There are probably 2 sheets for base and 2 sheets for Emotion Gold Sigs. Actually there is one slight problem: the checklist #151. While the above two sheets together cover 150 cards, the checklist is nowhere to be found. It’s possible the actual base Sheet B looks slightly different than the Emotion one shown to include the checklist (there was no Emotion checklist). It’s very convoluted. Easily solved if we can just find pics of the 2 missing sheets here. Here is a guess, and it nothing more than pure speculation, given the true sheet B for base has never been seen: since 51 (the remaining cards not on sheet A) is a weird number with prime decomposition 17x3, the only way to make an array for that would be an unwieldy thing 17 across or down (or possibly 34 across if doubled up)....and I say array since I've never seen an uncut sheet that is not an array of cards, having some random straggler. What this suggests to me, is on the actual Base sheet B, there just *might* be the following situation: cards are doubled up like the above Emotion sheet B, but for one or two cards, the checklist replaces its double, making that card shortprinted (one if the checklist itself is shortprinted, two if checklist not shortprinted). No idea which these 1 or 2 cards might be that are shortprinted. Again.....totallllll speculation, until a single pic of this sheet is produced.

22 card Canvas set


Note: since the whole set is on this sheet, we can deduce info about the relative print run (the 10 that are not duplicated in the block of 12 at lower right: Beast, Bishop, Cable, Gambit, Human Torch, Jubilee, Psylocke, Punisher, Surfer, War Machine….are short printed in a 4/5 ratio).

Not shown/Can’t find
Holoflash sheet, which nslists says is a 36-panel sheet. Since the whole set is on this sheet, we can make conclusions on relative rarity. It says 4 each of: Carnage, Mr Sinister, Sabretooth, Venom. 5 each of : Apocalypse, Dr Doom, Mandarin, and Thanos. This suggests the first group of 4 is short printed, in a 4/5 ratio. What is interesting is I think the market has actually picked up on this small discrepancy, probably unknowingly. For example, Mr Sinister's often go for more than Thanos, even though Thanos is easily at or above Sinister's level in popularity. Sabretooth also goes for more than he should, and certainly more than like Dr Doom or Apocalypse. It's pretty amazing that even with only a slight 4:5 difference, the market still picks up on this subtlety over the years.

1996 Marvel Masterpieces

100 card base sheet
(Yikes! This is the best quality pic I can find, a low res sliver of just one part of it. It does give us some info though: the set is clearly not in numerical order on the sheet. )

Not shown/Cant Find
Gold Gallery sheet: 36 cards, 6 of each, per nslists. This suggests none of the Gold Gallery’s are short printed. I think I saw a pic of this sheet years and years ago, but can no longer find a pic.

Double Impact: THE holy grail of MM uncut sheets, if for no other reason than it will contain some major info about the obvious discrepancy in print run between #5-6….vs #1-4. Clearly there are many more of the 5,6 group than the 1-4 group (and so the 1-4's sell for much more than the 5-6's, even though 5 and 6 have the two most popular characters, Spiderman and Wolverine). Very rough statistical searches on eBay suggest maybe 3x or 4x of the 5/6 cards exist compared to the 1/2/3/4 cards, on a per card basis. A single pic of this uncut sheet, which has not surfaced anywhere, would tell us the exact discrepancy in print run.

Upper Deck Era
This era is much simpler than the fleer/skybox era. Usually it’s just the base sheet (or base parallel) sheets, never any insert sheets. No repeats on the same sheet. The 2016-2022 ones were redemptions in packs.

2008 Marvel Masterpieces Series 2:
90 card base set sheet
(thanks to jdandns, who posted this above in thread). This sheet was a prize for redeeming so many UDE points that came in packs- you know, the ones everyone threw away (apparently everyone except jdandns!)


Note: Im not aware of, or at least havent seen, sheets from the other 2 sets in the 2007-2008 range.

2016 Marvel Masterpieces What If sheet



(it is not clear if every 2016-2022 MM set has an uncut sheet for all three versions- base, gold sig, what if). I have heard that 2016 doesn’t have a gold sig sheet, for example (cardboard connection says just Base and What If), but I think all 3 *might* exist for each of the other years.

[DynaEtch]

Spotted on eBay recently….this one is just ridiculous. I’m pretty sure this is an error uncut sheet- a no-foil error sheet from 1993 Masterpieces.

It’s like seeing how the error came about, in action. One of those very few sheets that somehow slipped past the foil stamper. Every card is a no-foil error (no name band or masterpieces text at top, just the raw art. Many examples of these errors were posted in this thread).



Although hard to see, if you really look at that checklist in the lower right corner, it sure looks like it could be a total black checklist (which we would expect with no-foil, since the upper pinkish portion is the foil). Compare it to the regular 1993MM sheet in the previous post, where the pink is clearly seen on the checklist. This black checklist was predicted in post #171. Although I have yet to see an actual no-foil black checklist card….I think I see it on this sheet!

Earlier photoshop attempt at what it should look like (this is not an actual card, just predicted to exist)

[jdandns]

Spectacular look at the known uncut sheets, Dyna, thank you!

As for entering all of those codes to get that MM2 sheet, hoo boy, it took hours to do and I was nodding off like Keith Richards in the 70's.

That set was such an embarrassment of proofreading (with the multiple misnamed characters), I was absolutely astonished that UD gave out at least one as a prize, warts and all, when really, the entire run probably should have been pulped and redone before they were ever packed out.

Even so, I'm glad to have it. I'm certain that big prize was available for at least a month or so, maybe two, and the rewards program was pretty well advertised on the UD website, so I can't be the only person who got one. It was free shipping, but this thing was still sent fast and immaculately packed, flat, not even rolled. I was very impressed with the UD shipping department on that one.

[Rictor]

[QUOTE=DynaEtch;19107268]News to me...gotta say I like this! I know for card collectors it's kind of an 'ehh' thing, since it's not the card medium. Plus the paintings are nothing new, having been published since 1994. But I enjoy adding this stuff to master sets, and it gives me something else to hunt for from an almost-exhausted 90s era.

Perhaps we will see some CGC yellow label SS's with Greg's auto on some of these if he does any signings, like we saw with the Joe Jusko ones.[/QUOTE

More info: https://www.marvel.com/articles/comi...variant-covers

[DynaEtch]

Originally Posted by jdandns

Spectacular look at the known uncut sheets, Dyna, thank you!

As for entering all of those codes to get that MM2 sheet, hoo boy, it took hours to do and I was nodding off like Keith Richards in the 70's.

That set was such an embarrassment of proofreading (with the multiple misnamed characters), I was absolutely astonished that UD gave out at least one as a prize, warts and all, when really, the entire run probably should have been pulped and redone before they were ever packed out.

Even so, I'm glad to have it. I'm certain that big prize was available for at least a month or so, maybe two, and the rewards program was pretty well advertised on the UD website, so I can't be the only person who got one. It was free shipping, but this thing was still sent fast and immaculately packed, flat, not even rolled. I was very impressed with the UD shipping department on that one.

I can say I've never seen another of that sheet anywhere, either on the market or even posted online besides your posting. It's weird because like you said, you'd think some others would have redeemed it (those UDE points in packs were in no short supply). Makes me wonder if they just didnt want to bother with the super tedious code entering

I wouldnt be surprised if there was only a handful of this sheet out there at most.

Originally Posted by Rictor

More info: https://www.marvel.com/articles/comi...variant-covers

Looks fantastic. Great selection of base chosen for those 9 so far. They really should use some of the inserts from 94MM, they are some of the best art from the set imo.

[exotechktx]

Did you end up winning that MM93 no foil one? I was following it and I believe I was 2nd highest LOL

[fabiani12333]

Good stuff, Dyna. Thanks for documenting all-things MM.

[fabiani12333]

Originally Posted by Rictor

More info: https://www.marvel.com/articles/comi...variant-covers

I love that Carnage -- so beautiful. I might pick one up to hang on a wall.

[MMguy]

Dyna, is it just me, or are the 1996 MM cards slightly thicker than the '92 thru '95 cards?

Question for everyone: what sleeves do you use to store the MM from the 90's? I have them in Platinum Ultra Pro 9 Pocket Sleeves, and last night I tried the Ultra Pro Eclipse Binder to store doubles of my favorite characters, but mixing the thin 90's cards with the newer thicker cards was a huge mistake. Essentially, since the binder is double sided, storing a thin card on the front and a thick card on the back, causes the thick card to bend the thinner card.

[DynaEtch]

Originally Posted by MMguy

Dyna, is it just me, or are the 1996 MM cards slightly thicker than the '92 thru '95 cards?

Question for everyone: what sleeves do you use to store the MM from the 90's? I have them in Platinum Ultra Pro 9 Pocket Sleeves, and last night I tried the Ultra Pro Eclipse Binder to store doubles of my favorite characters, but mixing the thin 90's cards with the newer thicker cards was a huge mistake. Essentially, since the binder is double sided, storing a thin card on the front and a thick card on the back, causes the thick card to bend the thinner card.

Yes I think you are right, 96’s do have a very slightly more thick/premium feel than earlier MMs. (Still nothing like the thick nearly 100pt modern MMs though). So 96s may be slightly more thick, but they still fit in regular toploaders.

It’s really a progression in the 90s, where 92s were more basic and thin, to special UV coated in 93, and eventually up to 96 which has a bit of a more premium feel. 2007-2008’s also have this thicker, premium feel. I’m sure most people have noticed for the 95’s, the Emotions absolutely have a different, thicker, feel than the regular 95 base (not the case in 94 where gold sigs and regular base were same stock).

As for the sheets. I am not a fan of combining thick 75-100pt cards and 90s thin cards in the same pages/binder. Gotta be all thick, or all thin for me. My go to for 90s MM is Ultra Pro platinum pages. Since many of these sets are cheap enough, I actually doubled up sets from 92-95MM to have them stored two different ways, one copy of the set in ultra pro platinum pages, and the other, in sleeves, in black side loading double sided pages (Vault X brand). It’s probably not necessary but, just in case if one set experiences bending/problems from long term storage, at least there will be the other. If push comes to shove, I would say I’m more confident the cards sleeved in black side loading pages will end up better in the long term. Either way should be fine though.

[DynaEtch]

Error mail-day: this interesting 92 Masterpieces Spidey vs Venom misprint, which I nickname ‘Demon Venom’!



Back (blank):


Perhaps surprisingly, it did pass Ebay Authenticity. Being an error collector, it’s always a dicey situation with that, they could inspect it and say ‘what the bleep is this?’ and reject it. With this card, I could tell at a glance it is a legit error, and to eBay AG’s credit, they understood it too (they are pretty good at passing misprints, described as misprints in the listing).

Here is the regular card:


Back (oriented as it is on the error, facing left):


So what happened here, it’s pretty clear the back printing of the card was printed on the front (or the front printing/foil was printed on the back, essentially same thing). Hence the other side blank. And on the error you can see the text that is imprinted on the image is indeed from the Spidey Venom back.

Taking a closer look: note the diagonal box across Spidey’s face is the comic book on the back, and the red in Venom’s eyes giving him the demon look is just the red parts of Spidey on that comic cover- his left forearm, to be precise.

What is going on here: Only the parts of the Spidey vs Venom card which are not foiled show anything of the back card. Where there is foil, there is nothing transparent, the foil covers it. Note most of the background on the card- the sewer/piping is all foil thus nothing shows there. The parts that are not foil are areas like Spidey, Venom, the band at bottom across the name, and the small part of doorway to the above left of Spidey (over Spidey’s right shoulder). The other sections of the doorway are all foil thus not transparent. So where the parts of no-foil are, we see this overlapping effect with the back being printing on the front.

As usual we can go to the uncut sheet for insights.

Front:


Back:


In the error, the ‘back printing’ is oriented where the comic box is at the top, across Venom (i.e. back facing left). It has to be that way, based on this sheet. If the comic box was at bottom, it would be a major flag that couldn’t exist as an error, since for that orientation, and the physical printing process, it would have to be a different battle spectra than the front (as well as being split backs of two cards. In fact we saw this split back error before in this thread)- indeed it would look like if you superimposed the above two sheets on top of each other, the Spidey vs Venom corresponding to half color strip/half Thing vs Hulk back....which is not what we see in the demon Venom error.

Instead, in the error here, it is the same battle spectra front as back (Spidey vs Venom). The back sheet, in the orientation shown below, was superimposed on the front sheet above, to make the above Venom error. It aligns exactly, card by card.


This is the key: to get from the first back sheet above to the second image of it upside down, only a rotation was used (180 degree rotation)- not any flip of the image. That means this error is consistent with the physical situation of printing these sheets. Note while the horizontal margins of the sheet are grossly mismatched, the vertical margins are the same size- they are symmetric. This is important for this error, since it allows the full back to be exactly aligned with the front of the card- they match, not a split back or anything.

This error is obviously rare compared to the massive print run of battle spectras (although it should be /6 minimum considering 6 on the sheet….if all got through QC). But like all these errors….we should expect it to happen for every one in the set. Thus we predict this same type of overlapping front and back error for all 4 of the other battle spectra as well, although I’ve never seen any of them.

[DynaEtch]

The above find was not just another 92 spectra error, it is a whole new 92 spectra etch error category. (an error category corresponds to a specific mishap in printing, that causes a number of errors- all the cards on the sheet).

Here is a review of all the error categories associated with 92 spectra etches, known to date:

1. Split wrong back
2. Blank white back
3. Too much foil (the parts of the spectra with foil really stand out, are overfoiled)
4. No foil on front (just printed image)
5. *Only* foil on front (all you see is silver foil on a white card- no printed image. This is one of the most elusive and is a holy grail of mine to find any)
6. Double printed front ('Demon Venom' above- front has the same spectra front printed on its back, and back of card is blank white)

[fabiani12333]

That's trippy -- good catch, Dyna. Do you know why this might have happened? Were sheets manually flipped by factory employees?