Anatomy of one of those cheap second-hand card bundles.

You've seen these. Repackaged boxes of card boosters, no doubt cobbled together from overstock suppliers. Always with ugly, un-licensed artwork and generally a little tricksy on the actual card game side, preferring to puff up the bundle with non-game card packs. Like, the $20 Pokemon box will have a TCG starter, perhaps two TCG boosters, and then a handful of packs from the collector card series of Pokemon: The First Movie, those silly lenticular sticker sets, or even simply a pack of Digimon cards.

I've seen Yu-Gi-Oh sets, Pokemon sets, "anime" sets, Neopets sets, Harry Potter sets. Usually the value comes from you paying for the real stuff (the TCG stuff) and just accepting the crap stickers and movie cards as free. This, however, is the first time I have seen one for super heroes...

Let's pick this apart. 50 card sleeves, 4 packs, 1 starter. Originally $5, now $3. $3 is pretty much the going rate for a single booster pack, so this already ranks as one of the best bundle deals ever.

Through the window, you can see the starter is fairly hot... it's the Fantastic Four Vs. System starter, released as a stand-alone learn-to-play set (you get an FF mini-deck and a Doom mini-deck) during the summer the first Fantastic Four movie came out. Most of the cards are exclusive to this starter, so any serious Vs. player already has it. Some of the cards are watered-down versions of characters found in the regular Vs. set, but most of the artwork is better so it's not a bad get. This was also one of the last times Vs. System even HAD a starter deck, making this one of the last times you got an actual rulebook with the game. I hate that. This would have originally sold for $10 to $12.

Bottom right is another Vs. find, a First Edition pack of DC Origins, the first DC set. This would have been around $3 when it was first released, although I would not be surprised to see an unopened First Edition pack selling for more on the aftermarket. (Is there a Vs. aftermarket?)

Now things get weird. Although honestly, at three freakin' dollars, we're already in the plus side, and that includes the karmic punishment from having to look at the My First Super Hero Drawings on the boxfront.

Bottom left is a pack of movie cards from Superman Returns. Out of the seven cards inside, not a single goddamned one had Superman on it. Two featured Teenage Mom Lois and one card spotlighted the blonde PR woman who was on the spaceplane flight!

Clark was supremely disappointed.

Top right: a vintage pack from Batman Returns! 1995! What garbage! Four of these cards were publicity shots of Chris O'Donnell. Unbelievably, Clark picked him out as Robin right away... that domino mask could be on a horse and Clark would call it Robin.

Top left: OVERPOWER. And not just any OverPower set, this is the very very very first set, the unnamed initial Marvel release. Also circa 1995. And also terrible.

But inside is a surprise! An unexpected fifth pack, from the colossal fumble, Marvel ReCharge (2001). ReCharge was the game that tried to make a name by declaring itself the only collectible card game that was "fully playable with only one booster pack!" Yes, they were serious. They thought fans would appreciate a game that you can play with only six cards. It's one of the worst card games ever made. I'll assume that no editorial comment is intended by including an unmentioned "bonus" pack of ReCharge. Anyone trying to sell ReCharge packs today probably qualifies for a tax credit.

Total original cost of these items... $10 Vs. starter, $3 Vs. booster, the Superman cards would have probably been $2, the Batman Returns pack maybe 75 cents in 1995 dollars, OverPower boosters were $1.50 (I think) and ReCharge was $1. And the 50-pack of gold card sleeves is, what, $4?

Yep, that matches up with Green Laser Batman's claim of "over $16 value." Would buy again, A++++++.