Mars Attacks #1 Cover Variant, 2012
Vote indeed! (Just not for this guy.)
The terrifically talented Zina Saunders — daughter of legendary Mars Attacks painter Norm Saunders — created this card for our 1994 Topps Mars Attacks “sequel” series. So many good cards were created for that set, including many by Zina, that we ran out of room, and this one went unused…
Until 2012, when we acquired the Mars Attacks comic book license at IDW. Legendary comics marketing guru Dirk Wood had this crazy idea: What if we created 55 variant covers, each featuring one of the original 55 cards? Ha-ha. That’s funny.
Then we went ahead and did it.
And we upped the ante: We added an additional variant cover that you could only get if you bought the complete box set of variant covers.
Honestly, I think we all agreed we were nuts — until some good orders came in. Collectors actually wanted all the covers. It was a novel way to have a complete “set” of the original Mars Attacks.
Maybe those are unrelated thoughts. We might still be nuts.
But I’m not voting the Martian ticket, regardless. Not this year, anyway.
