Revenge Of The Nerds

Revenge of the Nerds is a movie that a lot of us loved, but maybe hasn't aged so well.  There's the cultural stereotypes, the "toxic masculinity" from the bullying Alpha Betas and that problematic err-ummm love scene? between Betty and Lewis on the moonwalk.  But, my '80s kid eyes prefer not to view it as the un-P.C. cluster-bleep it would be by todays standards, but as the underdog sex-comedy it was before our childhood's became so cancellable.  

This is a set I've had the back burner for a long time now.  If you're new to the site I started making custom cards in hopes of sending them off in the mail for autographs 6 or so years ago.  I had made 5 or 6 cards from this movie with no intention of making a mini-set out of it.  Those were just the cards I thought I might stand a halfway decent chance of getting autographs on.  There's a lot of cards from my earlier days that I'd like to expand to a set.  Picture and industrial sized stove with back burners as far as the eye can see, something like that.

I finally decided to buckle down and put this baby to bed.  The cards I had made previously were tightened up since I've got new operating standards that I didn't have then.  I just needed to fill in the blanks character-wise and then design a card back to what ended up being a 14 card mini-set.

For the Lamda's (and one Omega Mu) I used a card front inspired by the  1984 Topps baseball design, a personal favorite of mine.  For the Beta/Pi faction I went with a design inspired by the 1984 Topps football design, which to me just makes perfect sense as the Betas were the football jocks at Adams College.

The cards all got the same card back design to give the set more continuity since the card fronts varied between the heroes and antagonists.  The back design is derivative mostly to '84 Topps baseball set but with some liberties taken to give them the right amount of nerd flare.  

I had a lot of fun packing the card backs with info.  Each card has a "Transcript" section which basically serves as a listing of some of the character's prominent characteristics. Each character also has a quote attributed to them and their frat/sorority affiliation.  There's a "Nerd Factoid" on each just because I'm into that DYK? kind of shit.  The card back finishes off with quiz question so you can test your RotN fanhood.

A number of the sets I've made recently somewhat storyboard a movie so I like to keep those cards together and not offer them with the PCb. card shop's "You Pick Single" option.  This one (all though I would prefer collector's get the entire 14 card set) because they're all character cards and I get that there's some that just might want certain characters, so I'm leaving it open to the Y.P.S. option.  But, as an incentive, I've created a bonus card *only* available with the purchase of the complete set.  

Not that I wanted to highlight the sorta rapey love scene, but it's just that the card makes tons of sense.  What I mean is Lewis was wearing some sort of Storm Trooper/gorilla/Darth Vader hybrid costume and the 1977 Star Wars set is so iconic, and not to mention how the Star Wars franchise is known for their almost cult-like nerd fanboy following.  It just all comes together too perfectly not to make the card.  And hey, *spoiler alert* Lewis and Betty end up married in the sequels so it's sort of  the beginning of a meant-to-be nearly consensual love story!

Fast Times Series II

With the succession of Fast Times cast member's birthdays that are in July and August as well as the 38th anniversary of the film's release that just passed on August 13th it got me thinking of the movie which happens to be in my top 5 favorite movies.  The 20 card Fast Times mini-set I made back in 2018 is still one of my favorites.  I love the look of the 1982 Topps baseball inspired design and Fast Times at Ridgemont High is just soooo good, especially for anyone with a fondness for the 1980s.  

Being in the Fast Times mood that I was in I decided to pop in my copy of the movie and enjoy it for the umpteen-millionth time.  I've always enjoyed the movie from the awkward coming-of-age comedic aspect of things, but this time I was watching it a little differently.  The movie is so well done from the standpoint of really feeling like you lived this high school year with these characters.  You had some just coming into high school trying to figure it out, some in the hazy middle years and others at the end of their journey with "real life" about to bear down on them.  The casting is so crazy when you are able to look at how all of these unknowns, at the time, went on to be important players in Hollywood for years to come.  There's not another movie cast that can boast the same level of career success.  It really is a special movie for so many reasons.

While my first Fast Times mini-set focused on making character cards that spanned that unforgettable cast, I had a thought about making a follow-up set highlighting some of the most classic scenes in a 1982 Topps kind of way.  

I guess you could consider the first set the "base cards" and this second set the special "subset" cards.  I took my ques from the "In Action", "Future Stars", "All-Star" and "Team Leaders" cards from the set.  

The 7 card "In Action" design highlights some of the film's most classic scenes.  The "Future Stars" design I had fun with grouping together some of the film's special interests that came in threes.  

I made the Spirit Bunnies card for two main reasons, one, I wanted to use the Ridgemont Wolf logo on a card, and that was my chance as that's the only cards that had team logos in Topps' 1982 baseball offering.  Two, I wanted to get Pamela Springsteen on a card.  She's The Bosses sister and also she's notable for her role in the '80s slasher classics Sleepaway Camp II & Sleepaway Camp III.

Rounding out the 14 card follow-up set is a Brad Hamilton "Manager" card in the style of the "All-Star" subset.  Brad is the character I related to the most in the film.  I spent my high school career focused on working and having a cool car.  Looking back I would have done it differently and not let the parade pass my by.  Hindsight...there's plenty of time to be old, but not enough time to be young.  

If I hadn't already done a Spicoli surfing card I would have also put it into the All-Star template as well.  But, I feel Spicoli's greatness is represented pretty well in this set.

One thing Series II has over the first Series is dedicated card backs.  I wasn't doing those two years ago.  My goal with the card backs was to stay honest to the '82 Topps baseball but tweaked in slight ways to lend tie-ins to Fast Times.

Although the first 20 card mini-set was not numbered, this set picks up at #21 just to make it feel like a true follow-up to the first set.

1982 Topps 

Hey Bud, Let's Party!

Fast Times at Ridgemont High is among the dozen or so movies that are in my top 5 favorites. It doesn't get much more '80s than Fast Times and the cast is just loaded with Hollywood heavyweights when most were just relatively unknown up-and-comers.

These cards are inspired by the 1982 Topps baseball set customized to give it a look that I could actually imagine the Fast Times cards having had an actual set been made. I started off with a "Mike Damone" and "Charles Jefferson" cards hoping to get autographs from Robert Romanus and Forest Whitaker. I had success with Romanus, still have my fingers crossed for Mr. Whitaker. From there I would just add a cast member here and there and now it's a 20 card mini-set.

The actor's whose characters had names I put in black text. There are a number of iconic actors who played unnamed minor characters in the movie and instead of calling Eric Stoltz "Spicoli's buddy" I put his and other's actual names with the name being in red text to make the distinction. I thought that would be a particularly cool touch seeing as Nicolas Cage was billed by his real name, Nicolas Coppola, for Fast Times which was his big screen debut.

Get the set here.