Card #109: The Man Who Laughs

I have a bunch of oddball Roberto Clemente cards to show off, but I thought this one was appropriate given the subject material I used on my main blog, Collecting Cutch.

Today I wrote about bad comic book movies and this 1980 Laughlin made me think about a really good comic movie.

I am unfamilar with Laughlin products, but I know a good laugh is always good.

The Joker from 2019 starring Joaquin Phoenix is one of the best big screen adaptations of a comic book character ever.

When Jerry Robinson, Bob Kane, and Bill Finger put their creative efforts for the creation of Batman's archnemesis The Joker they used the 1928 horror film, The Man Who Laughs, as inspiration.

One look at the above poster and you can see the influence this movie had on the creation and imagery of The Joker.

It becomes even more noticable in the above production photo.

Card #8: Oddball Alert!!!

As card collectors, we love oddballs.  Anything not produced by the major companies in standard packs always seems to attract us.

Getting a piece of cardboard from a magazine called RBI is no difference.  In 1992 the first issue was produced.  Many of the uncut cards from the magazine can still be found for around $5 or less.  Griffey, Thomas, Gwynn, Ryan are all pretty big names and all have Stadium Club style photography, but this image of Clemente sliding into third base might be the best of the bunch.

The back of the card looks similar to a 60s style Topps card complete with comic and stats.

Card #3: Only 90,000 of these were distributed

Hop back in time with me to 1994.
The hottest movies were The Lion King, Forrest Gump, and Pulp Fiction.
O.J. Simpson, one of the nation's beloved sports entertainment guys was being held on trial for the murder of two cases.
Michael Jordan, fresh from his NBA retirement was trying his baseball career.
The most popular comic books were Spawn and Adventures of Superman.
And nearly every food market had a unique spin on trading cards.  Wendy's, not to be out done by Denny's and McDonald's produced a hologram set of cards, but limited the production to only 90,000 cards.

Only 90,000 existed!!!!

With so few produced, it's amazing that these can still be had for a George Washington.

But, I remember a few years ago grabbing one of these Roberto Clemente Wendy's cards for $1 at a local mall card show.

Despite the strangeness of the card, it does feature a nice green holgram of Clemente swinging at a baseball.

The back indicates the rarity of this card.

ONLY 90,000!!!!!

But it also has a nice collection of basic stats in addition to Roberto's career accomplishments.