Superman’s long 80 year comic book history celebrated in the NZ Mints new six-note cover series

We’ve already seen a huge increase in the number of precious metal coin notes being released lately and one of the prime movers in the market is the New Zealand Mint. They themselves run several ranges based mainly on size. The most common is a format also employed by others like MDM and CIT, and one that apes traditional banknotes quite closely – 150 x 70 mm. In addition to that, the NZ Mint has recently been issuing much larger 35 gram ‘premium foils’ that come in at an expansive 262 x 170 mm in size. Star Wars movie poster coins and DC comic cover foils have led the charge, but we don’t doubt that more are on the way.

What we’re looking at here is a little different. The 5.0 gram notes are dimensioned at 148 x 98 mm because they’re reproducing comic book covers and that’s the approximate ratio of sides of the paper that comics are printed on. In addition to that, the six notes here are only being sold as a complete set rather than spread over a few months, as with previous issues. Selling for $230.00 USD, the price mirrors that of the individual notes, so there’s no real benefit for buying in bulk over the $39.00 cost the individual notes go for. An extra $10 off would’ve been good.

As for the designs, it’s hard to find fault with what is a good selection of comic covers from the hundreds available. Every fan will have their own favourites, but these do a decent job of representing most of the classic iterations of the character. Starting way back with Superman’s debut in 1939, the last cover depicts art from the DC Universe reboot called ‘Rebirth’ and is quite recent.