Far Out Alien Cards Attack!
By Kurt Kuersteiner ©2025 Monsterwax
Monster Trading Cards for
The Wrapper Magazine
65 summers ago, a strange incident forever changed our perception of UFOs. In September of 1961, Betty and Barney Hill were driving late at night in the New Hampshire White Mountains. They spotted a large, floating, cigar-shaped craft. Then they remembered… nothing. Two hours of their memories had mysteriously vanished. Later on, they noticed evidence that made them suspicious; like torn clothing, bruises, and the fact that their watches had both stopped working at the same time. It was only after the couple underwent hypnosis that they remembered: they had been abducted and medically examined by aliens from outer space. Humanity was no longer alone in the universe.
Five years later, also in September and also in New Hampshire, another famous close encounter occurred. It was in the town of Exeter, and it was collaborated by three reliable witnesses, two of whom were police officers. They reported seeing a large craft “as big as a barn” with flashing lights hovering just 100 feet above them for several minutes. The Air Force sent Project Blue Book experts toinvestigate but they could not find any alternative explanations. That event made national headlines and ignited a UFO craze that has continued to this day.
These are just two of the tens of thousands of UFO incidents reported in the last half dozen decades. Our government alone has investigated over 12,000 sightings. You may have actually seen some of the video evidence played before Congress this year and broadcast on the network news. Up until recently, anyone who believed in aliens was considered a crackpot (or at very least, highly imaginative). Now, however, it’s the deniers who seem oddball. As of June 2025, scientists have confirmed the existence of over 5,900 planets outside of our solar system. Many of them appear capable of sustaining life. With each passing month, the statistical probability of extraterrestrial life becomes more and more obvious.
Given the changing perception of UFOs, it’s appropriate that not one, but two new card sets bring this phenomena into focus, and both of them are on Kickstarter to coincide with the infamous 60th and 65th alien anniversaries.
The first one is called UFO 2: Alien Archives. It is spear headed by artist Ingrid Hardy of Long Dog Cards. I know Ingrid from her detailed Sketch card paintings. She painted dozens of great sketch cards the Dinosaur Galaxy series in 2015. (And I do mean paint, with actual paint and brushes. Not too many sketch artists take the time and effort to do that, preferring markers and pens instead.) Ingrid has gone on to paint many other sketch cards for Topps, including both Star Wars and X-files, and she authored several books on The Art of Sketch Cards. She also co-hosts a podcast that interviews other trading card artists and card makers entitled The Pencilled In Podcast (seen on YouTube).
Her current Kickstarter is called Alien Archives. It's a 45-card set that features images and descriptions of obelisks, text glyphs, forbidden tech, alien interpretations (artist sketches). There are also other chase items including a sketch card, puzzle cards, anaglyph cards, and a lenticular card (totaling 60 cards).
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The base cards feature both art renderings and actual photographs. The sketch card artists include Stephane Leonardi, Lak Lim, Leah Battle, Tim Shinn, Giovanni, and Ingrid Hardy. Another premium card is an autograph card from Robert Clotworthy, the vocal actor who narrated History Channel’s Ancient Alien series.
What makes this series so interesting from my perspective is that it professes to be true. Let’s face it, if even a small portion of it is accurate—that’s basically the biggest scientific discovery of our lives. Any real UFO means alien life exists elsewhere—and not just primitive life, but intelligent life capable of interstellar travel. It would prove that they came here and found us (but for what purpose?) Oh, and by the way, if any of it is true, it also means our government has been lying to us for decades. (Although that part is probably a fact, regardless.)
And speaking of personal perspectives, I should admit that I’ve never experienced a UFO sighting that couldn’t be explained away using the standard government-issued “swamp gas”, Planet Venus, or “weather balloon” debunking talking points. So I’ve been pretty skeptical… until someone I knew and trusted (a long time (but now deceased) card collector and Wrapper dealer Harvey Elander) told me about a personal experience he had at age nine. It was in 1946 when he and his mother both saw a spacecraft hovering above his grandparent’s dairy farm one evening—right outside his window. I always found Harvey to be truthful, and his widow reaffirmed that her mother-in-law remembered seeing that craft. So although I’m not a true believer, nor am I an alien atheist.
The other alien-oriented card series is one featuring all original art by Ron Gross. Ron most recently completed the photorealistic Lost In Space series that I published via Monsterwax, so I knew he is also an excellent writer because I’ve read several of his books. His new series is Creatures of the Cosmos. In it, he creates all manner of alien life forms, based on what scientists currently understand about the newly discovered planets, their environments, and the possible evolutionary paths of any inhabitants (plus a dose of Ron’s artistic license). The process he goes through to envision these different creatures is rather sophisticated. The planet’s size affects its gravity, which affects the strength of any native born life forms. The distance to the sun, the size of the sun, the planet’s light exposure, the prevalence of water, it all impacts the ecosystem. The % of life that might reach advanced intelligence is small indeed, but multiplied by the 200 billion trillion stars and billions of life capable planets, the resulting number is still staggering. Some of Ron’s creatures are humanoid, while others are not. Some are mammalian, others reptilian, fish-like, or insectoid. Some are plant based while others are not even organic! Nearly anything is possible in the vast reaches of space, and Ron’s mind has conjured up quiet a collection of them.
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Much of the set is based on confirmed mapping of recently discovered planets. Ron’s photo realistic art brings his imagination alive with dramatic (sometimes traumatic) color, as does his fact-based writing skills. Some of the possibilities are rather dark and troubling— but that’s the nature of the universe when humanity discovers it is not the only Apex Predator equipped with advanced technology.
Like most of us, Ron relishes a good story. The premise for his set takes place over 200 years in the future. First contact has already been established and Earth has been aware of its many non-human neighbors for decades. Some are friendly, while others are not. One of the more devious civilizations initiates a plot that would destroy humanity, and in an effort to discover the culprit, Earth’s experts quietly investigate all known alien races capable of the scheme.
The set itself is composed of 72 base cards, five supporting cards, a Draw Your Own Alien card, and original sketch cards from artists like Michael Mastermaker and Mark Dorais. There’s also one-of-a-kind printing plates used in the production of the series, as well as sets of six alien metal cards and twelve lenticulars, both of which feature different art not found elsewhere in the set.
Both of these alien themed sets are currently offered on Kickstarter. To get them, surf over to Kickstarter.com and search “UFO trading cards” or “Creatures of the Cosmos”. Check out the images and videos to decide if you want to pledge to help publish the cards. You select a reward that you’ll get after the campaign ends (which is soon) and the product finally gets printed and shipped. (That often takes a couple more months.) You prepay with your credit card on Kickstarter’s secure server, but personally, I advise people to be cautious when pledging for more expensive rewards on Kickstarter unless they know or trust the creators running the campaign. If the creators go bankrupt or die or abscond with the money, you’re screwed! Kickstarter won’t repay you for your loss. So if you’re unfamiliar with the company or person running the project, check and see if they completed and fulfilled previous Kickstarters. That should indicate if they are reliable or not. Just hit the creator’s icon, which shows you how many projects they’ve created. Follow that link and it will disclose how successful each campaign was and what kind of feedback it received. (Three projects or more is usually pretty good.) That being said, I’ve pledged toward 82 other campaigns and I’ve never been screwed-- but I believe it’s because I check the creators previous feedback.
One last thing that always gave me pause about Betty and Barney Hill’s tale: When they gave their abduction story under hypnosis, they drew a “star map” that they claimed the aliens showed them. Critics used that map to debunk their account because the map didn’t match the constellations in our skies. Years later, however, a computer analysis of the map indicated it showed the stars as they would appear when approaching Earth from outside our solar system, rather than the star patterns we see looking up from Earth. How could anyone make that up?!?