The DIY Man of Steel Cover: Superman vs. Lobo Stickers

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big box of comics, colorforms, jon bogdanove, Lobo, louise simonson, man of steel 30, parasaurolophus, stickers, Superman

The 1990s were a time of gimmicky covers for comic cooks. My favorites are the X-Men Holograms from the Fatal Attractions crossovers, and the skeletal madness of Wolverine #100. But 1994’s Man of Steel #30 takes the award for the most ridicuously creative. DC polybagged this relic with a sheet of “vinyl clings”, which are like the ColorForms I played with as a kid. Through some arcane magic, they cling to the surface but are easily peeled off and re-arranged. Man of Steel‘s character-less, wraparound cover invites you to create your own fight between Superman and Lobo, who spend most of the issue hitting each other before shaking hands at the end. Enjoy this gallery of scans of the front and back of the polybag, the front and back cover, and the vinyl clings.

My scan of the “stickers” is 600 dpi resolution, because I am thinking of getting it enlarged and printed on a t-shirt. My one-of-a-kind parasaurolophus t-shirt arrived last week, printed with a scan of one of the stickers from the Dinosaurs Attack! trading cards.

My version of the cover features eight-limbed octo-versions of the characters:

For being almost thirty years old, the vinyl clings adhere okay, but not great. They were somewhat unenthused about sticking to each other when piled on in layers. And they are much thinner than I recall Colorforms being. Still, they are a bit of nostalgic geek fun. (Update: Redditor /u/bloodfist converted these scans to a web-based version you can play with! If you want something more advanced, check out their digital version at the Photopea site, which is a free alternative to Photoshop.)

Man of Steel #30 went for the gimmick-cover trifecta by also being a variant. The other edition was printed with a face-bashing cover by Jon Bogdanove, who penciled the interior pages of Louise Simonson’s story. I am sure some speculators bought this issue with a $2.50 cover price thinking it would someday pay for their kids’ college funds. Sorry, 90s Boom Buyers! I got it last week for $2.70 in Near Mint, sealed condition. And since it actually cost me nothing with some store credit I earned thanks to this blog’s readers, it deserves a place in the Big Box of Comics!

Collector’s Guide: From Superman: The Man of Steel #30; DC Comics, 1994. DC also produced a vinyl clings cover for 1994’s Worlds Collide #1, which also features Superman.

All the Stickers from Dinosaurs Attack!

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art spiegelman, dinosaur, dinosaurs attack, Herb Trimpe, parasaurolophus, Paul Mavrides, stickers, topps, trading cards

Scans of the cards from this series are on the web already, but I have yet to see anyone post a complete set of the stickers that came with them. So here they are, in all their gory glory!

In 2021, I bought a set of these vintage cards on Ebay for about $20. The set included all the cards plus all the stickers, and a few opened but well-preserved wrappers from individual packs. When read in numerical order, the backs of the cards tell the story of how some incompetent scientists screwed up a time-travel experiment and brought an onslaught of rampaging dinosaurs to the present day. Mayhem and carnage ensue, served with a generous helping of humor.

The complete Topps set includes eleven stickers, and the backs of the stickers provide more factual accounts of the dinosaurs than the main narrative. But keep in mind that these “facts” might be outdated, considering they were printed in the late 1980s. Trachodon, for example, is a species of hadrosaur that has fallen out of favor with current paleontologists, and you won’t find any feathers on this tyrannosaur.

But don’t let that stop you from enjoying these vintage beauties. Below is a gallery of my personal scans of the fronts and backs of all eleven stickers from Dinosaurs Attack!

Have you ever wondered who was the artist for the cards and stickers? Wonder no more! The informative excerpt below comes from the second issue of IDW’s five-issue Dinosaurs Attack comic book from 2013. I was shocked to learn that Herb Trimpe penciled the cards and Paul Mavrides co-created the sticker art — and even more surprised that Art Spiegelman was involved in this insanity!

Monster Stickers!

Tags

brains, monsters, stickers

My Paranoid Pirate Pen Pal sent me these brain-warping stickers. Nice find! Thanks to digital technology they are now in high enough resolution for you to set them as your desktop background.