There
were three different items found in the United States Garbage Pail Kids
All-New Series 1 packs. Topps titled the items for the series
differently than what I will refer to them as. The Big Stickers
or Stickers will be referred to as Cards, the Small Stickers (some collectors
refer to them as mini stickers or white stickers) will be referred to
as Bubble Gum Wrap Around Stickers, and the Foil Stickers or Gold Stickers
will be referred to as Foil Cards. I used these titles to help clarify
which items I am discussing. The cards and foil cards are actually
stickers on card backing, so I decided to continue on with the same format
I had been using on the website and refer to them as cards. The
cards are no larger than any other trading cards, so I did not use "big"
in the naming convention. The title for the bubble gum wrap around
stickers is based on references to similar products sold in the United
Kingdom and other countries around the world. The bubble gum wrap
around sticker title describes exactly what the product is (i.e., a sticker
wrapped around a piece of bubble gum), unlike using the title Small Stickers,
which can be confused with the other Garbage Pail Kids items (e.g. the
United Kingdom Garbage Pail Kids).
I provided samples of what the cards and
items of the series look like. The first and last cards, bubble
gum wrap around stickers, silver foil cards, and gold foil cards are shown
above. There also are image overviews of all of the cards, bubble
gum wrap around stickers, and silver foil cards. The gold foil cards
have the same characters printed on them as the silver foil cards, which
is why there are not image overviews of the gold foil cards. The
purpose of the samples and image overviews is to give you a preview of
the series. Higher quality images of these items will not be provided
on this website or by request.
There were four printings of the All-New
Series 1, and you would need items from the first two printings and the
third or fourth printing in order to make a complete variation set.
The checklists were modified for the third printing because Topps decided
to exclude the bubble gum in the packs and include more cards. I
discuss more details about the packs under the Packaging and Contents
section.
There are a total of 80 different characters
(40 different paintings) in the All-New Series 1. There were 28
paintings from the unpublished United States Garbage Pail Kids 16th Series
that were used in the United States Garbage Pail Kids All-New Series 1.
Tom Bunk and John
Pound each created 6 new paintings for the All-New Series 1.
The card thickness and finish remained consistent
throughout the four printings. The checklists were modified for
the third printing. The card checklist was changed from "Big
Stickers" to just "Stickers" for the third print.
The bubble gum wrap around sticker checklist was changed from "Small
Stickers" to the gold foil checklist or "Gold Sticker"
checklist for the third print. Each checklist for the series was
used for 4 of the card backs. The card checklist numbering is left-justified
and has lower-case a's and b's. The bubble gum wrap around sticker
checklist numbering and the gold foil checklist numbering is right-justified
and has upper-case A's and B's. The die-cuts on the cards were all
the same shape. The cards were not printed with asterisks
on them like the original Garbage Pail Kids series. The cards had
a very glossy coating on them, which helps protect them from damage.
The coloring of the cards appeared to be a little darker than the cards
from the original Garbage Pail Kids series. The cards had a slightly
different look and feel to them compared to the original Garbage Pail
Kids series, but it did not really detract anything from them.
The bubble gum wrap around stickers were
printed on thin plastic much like the material used for trash bags.
The bubble gum wrap around stickers had new renditions of some of the
characters from the previous Garbage Pail Kids series. The artwork
for the bubble gum wrap around stickers was done by Pat Glover and Sean
Glover not Tom Bunk and John Pound. The old characters were used
so that people unfamiliar with Garbage Pail Kids could get acquainted
with them. The style of the artwork for the bubble gum wrap around
stickers was very different than what was on the original cards.
Many collectors did not like this new style because it was too simplistic
and lacked the texture, vibrancy, and depth that the original paintings
had. Instead of using the bubble gum wrap around stickers, it might
have been better if Topps
had created new Garbage Pail Kids comics and wrapped them around the bubble
gum just like each piece of of Bazooka Bubble Gum has a the Bazooka Joe
Comic wrapped around it.
The same artwork used on the bubble gum
wrap around stickers was used for the foil cards, but there were some
exclusions. The bubble gum wrap around stickers 13a Joe Blow / 13b
Rod Wad, 17a Over Flo / 17b Moist Joyce, 21a Sally Suction / 21b Teethin'
Trina, 23a Split Kit / 23b Mixed-Up Mitch, and 25a Sy Clops / 25b One-Eyed
Jack were not used in for the foil cards, and because of that exclusion
the numbering was shifted for the foil cards (e.g., 14a Leaky Lindsay
/ 14b Messy Tessie for the bubble gum wrap around stickers became 13a
Leaky Lindsay / 13b Messy Tessie for the foil cards).
For bubble gum wrap around sticker and foil
card 7b, the name Schizo Fran was used instead of Fran Fran. The
character's name was originally changed from Schizo Fran to Fran Fran
for the United States Garbage Pail Kids 2nd Series,
so it was unusual that Topps did not use the changed name in the United
States Garbage Pail Kids All-New Series 1.
For bubble gum wrap around sticker and foil
card 2b, the name Thin Lynne was used by mistake. In the original
United States Garbage Pail Kids 1st Series, the name was spelled as Thin
Lynn (without the "e" at the end of the name), which is how
the character's name should have been spelled in the United States Garbage
Pail Kids All-New Series 1.
For bubble gum wrap around sticker and foil
card 4a, the name Brainy Janey was used by mistake. In the original
United States Garbage Pail Kids 1st Series, the name was spelled as Brainy
Janie (with "ie" at the end of the name instead of "ey"),
which is how the character's name should have been spelled in the United
States Garbage Pail Kids All-New Series 1.
The foil cards were different in the first,
second, and third printing. The first printing had silver foil cards
printed on regular card stock, and the foil card backs had a glossy finish.
The second printing had silver foil cards printed on thin card stock,
and the foil card backs had a matte finish. The third and fourth
printings had gold foil cards printed on thin card stock, and the foil
card backs had a matte finish. A card with glossy finish is reflective,
shiny, and has a smooth surface, and a card with matte finish is dull,
flat-looking, and has a rough surface. The foil cards printed on
the thin card stock are much more prone to getting bent corners and damaged.
The thin card stock was used because the demand for the product was so
high that there was not enough time to wait for another shipment of the
thicker card stock to arrive. The backs of the foil cards were changed
to matte finish to make it easier to write on the contest entry form.
Unfortunately, the silver foil cards and gold foil cards are somewhat
dark and do not contrast with the characters enough in order to show them
off well.
The Garbage Pail Kids contest was an interesting
promotional idea, which allowed collectors to win a variety of prizes
(i.e., original artwork, full uncut sheets, uncut puzzle sheets, and sealed
boxes from the United States Garbage Pail Kids All-New Series 1).
Every foil card had an entry form on the back of it. Anyone from
Canada (excluding those who lived in Quebec) that wanted to enter the
contest had to correctly answer the math problem on the contest form (United
States residents did not have to answer the problem). The main problem
with the contest was that you would have to send away a foil card in order
to enter it, and the foil cards only came one per pack. Most collectors
would rather hang on to their foil cards than send any of them away to
enter the contest. If you had damaged foil cards, they would be
the ideal candidates to send away for the contest. You could also
write Topps to get a free foil card, but it still would be more tempting
to save it instead of sending it away for the contest. In order
to receive a free foil card, you would need to send Topps a self-addressed
stamped envelope, which cost $0.74 ($0.37 per stamp at the time) for the
postage opposed to buying a United States Garbage Pail Kids All-New Series
1 pack for around $0.99 and getting 1 foil card, 3 cards, 4 pieces of
bubble gum, and 4 bubble gum wrap around stickers (a first or second print
pack) or 1 foil card and 5 cards (a third or fourth print pack). |
