Toy Bender

I’ll be honest. The last round kind of sucked. Everyone let off on the nerd gas pedal, but this week there’s a few uber-geeks that decided to floor it. There’s also some great questions that have some informative answers, but let’s be honest. We’re only here for the cringe inducing questions.

Let’s get this party started with Imperial Shipyards:

Imperial Shipyards: Dear Hasbro, is there any chance there could be some new figures from the Droids and Ewoks cartoon series coming out someday? As one of the first Star Wars multi-media events beyond the movies, (consisting of TV shows, comics, toys and more) I think these should warrant some attention. It would be nice to see a tribute to the very first EU figures. Some good choices could be R2-D2 and C-3PO with a Droids color scheme, a realistic Princess Kneesaa from Ewoks, the three masters from Droids and Boba Fett with his droid BL-17 (which would have made a great two pack in the droid factory line!) Boba’s Silver Speeder would be cool too! Ok, enough suggestions. But please consider Droids and Ewoks! (image attached)

Hasbro: We have been thinking about these two series, especialy since they continue to be in DVD release, but just haven’t come up with the right idea or the right opportunity. We’ll continue to take a look at it though. You have some great suggestions there.

Dear Hasbro, you spelled especially wrong. Bring on the Droids and Ewoks fools! Both Droids and Ewoks have a special place in my heart because they were the last vestiges of Star Wars media and toys when almost everyone had given up on the series. I can’t even describe how excited I was to see Boba Fett make an appearance or the A-Wing.

Moving on, Galactic Hunter asks a really retarded question:

Galactic Hunter: Just wondering if Hasbro has a “green” initiative. Are the plastics used in the manufacturing of Star Wars figures recyclable? And if so would it be feasible to do a mail-in redemption using action figures instead of UPCs? I know I wouldn’t mind shipping off three or four figures to receive a new one, especially if it was helping to save the planet. (Question from MisterPL, resident hippie.)

Hasbro: We do have a green initiative related to reducing the materials we use whenever possible. On the figure question - while it’s a very interesting and appealing suggestion - there are many issues surrounding doing something like that. Foremost would be the overall carbon footprint of shipping back/providing a new figure for replacement, which would not result in a significant amount of material that could be recycled (figures in general do not use large amounts of plastic themselves). Second, since we do not do domestic figure manufacturing, we would need to get the the figures back to Asia which would further defeat the purpose. In short… it would consume more resources than would be saved. Very interesting thought, though… thanks.

Sending in action figures for Hasbro to recycle? Are you fucking retarded? If you really want to “recycle” action figures then sell them on eBay or put them in a ziploc bag and drop them off at Good Will. Can we agree to stop using the whole “going green” phrase? It’s a damn catchphrase invented by idiots to try to make you feel better while you do almost nothing to make any real difference. If you were really concerned about saving the planet you’d stop buying action figures all together, but you won’t. You want to make a symbolic gesture that requires almost no effort and will make absolutely no difference in the long run, Captain Planet.

The Private Universe turns our focus towards Indiana Jones for a moment:

Private Universe: We haven’t seen the Indy line at retail yet, and already interest is focusing beyond your initial offerings - specifically on vehicles. The ‘Last Crusade Tank’ and ‘Raider’s Flying Wing’ - are these something you’ve considered producing?

Hasbro: We are indeed considering the Flying Wing for the vehicle line and are looking at whether it can be done in our $19.99 assortment (if we did it, it would be in ‘09 at the earliest). However, the Tank is just too big to do in our $19.99 vehicle line. As we don’t have another, higher priced assortment in the IJ line, this one will have to be a “wait and see” based on the response to the IJ line, and possibly tied to future movies if we can’t get it done for this one. The entire IJ line will have a shelf-date of 5/1.

Yay! Flying Wing!

Sandtroopers.com asks about something that’s been on my mind:

Sandroopers.com: Since Hasbro was able to recently provide a nice “shield” half-piece for the Droideka, is it possible that someday we’ll see something like this for a basic-carded eps2 Clone Pilot where he comes with a half-piece for the Ball Turret of the Republic gunship?

Hasbro: We have looked at the turret, and it is simply not possible to include it on a basic figure card. Does that mean that it won’t be done? Not necessarily; it does remain on our list of things we want to tackle sometime, someday, but just haven’t been able to fit it in anywhere.

Damn, that would be a cool idea. It’s just too bad that the Gunship doesn’t have the ball turrets it needs yet.

If you can get through this next mess, 4-inches.de offers some insight in the crappy state of Star Wars collecting in Germany.

4-inches.de: In Germany we do have some problems refering availability, price and case-composition of the Star Wars Action Figure line that we want to pick out as a central theme encouraged by lots of collectors and likewise by a lot of retailers in Germany. The distribution of the Star Wars segment is nearly exclusively ruled by one single wholeseller. Formerly there were a handful of wholesellers but in the last years only one wholeseller had focussed on the whole sortiment of action figures. Last year that wholeseller has closed down and another single wholeseller has carried over the distribution of the Star Wars segment. Like each seller does this wholeseller even has to calculate his business. Within the last months it has turned out that this wholeseller is rather hesitant and cautious with his ordering policy and it had happened that more and more Star Wars items didn’t find their way to the German collector. Unfortunately retailers are not allowed to order directly from Hasbro and of course it is not allowed to import items that are not available in Germany from the US or other countries. So collectors do have to pay a lot more money for each single action figure than in other countries. Another point is the awkward case-mix that seems to be not balanced well in a nearly 100% collector market that Germany is. Retailers don’t sell Darth Vader figures as well as in the US but have to buy 3 Darth Vader figures each case to sell other figures at least one time that are asked for by the collectors. So retailers have begun to sell the whole case but single figures and collectors do have pay more and more money to get their desired figures and have to throw away their hundreds of Darth Vader figures. More and more collectors order their figures via ebay or direct from US retailers so more and more retailers give up the Star Wars segment. All these trends do spoil the party for most collectors. The demand is high to let Hasbro take more attention to the German market. Sollutions to these problems would be a) offer solid cases (the market is too small for bad case-mixes and retailers would better be able to buy exact those figures that would be selling and in consequence they would sell more figures as yet, b) prices should not rise over 10 EUR per figure, c) offer better availability of toys for Germany or at least advertise if and when some certain items would be available (even if delayed) and d) perhaps allow retailers to buy directly from Hasbro to avoid higher prices or less availability.

Hasbro: Thanks for the thorough update. In the U.S., where the product line is developed, we were not aware of the severity of changes to the German marketplace. Some of the changes you suggest are not possible (solid case packs of figures) or out of our control (retail figure pricing), but the others deserve scrutiny and we will look at them. The German market (and German collector) is very important to us but unfortunately things are no so simple as the German market by itself is not large enough to commend separate production; our releases must be synched up with the broader EU releases. We are looking at options to figure this out though….thanks for sticking with us as we work through these issues.

Hasbro’s answer? Sorry, sucks to be you.

I was wondering about what Jedi News asks about for some time:

JediNews: Have there been any further discussions between yourselves and Sideshow Collectibles with regard to the production of play-sets? If so, are you able to shed any light on this?

Hasbro: There is no new news to report on this front.

Crap! I really hope they do make this happen. A playset geared towards collectors would make all kinds of sense. Hasbro doesn’t think it’s worth the cost to produce a playset to market to mass retail and even if they did, collectors would no doubt be disappointed in many of the kid orientated features. Sideshow toys makes items that appeal to the heart of the most die hard collector and they could market playsets right for them.

Rebelscum asks this insightful question:

Rebelscum: Where’s Lumat? On the sticker sheet in the Action Figure Base Packs, Lumat appears on the list. While the “Graak” figure from 2007 appears to be based on the same Ewok photo that the vintage Lumat figure was based on, they apparently are different characters. Speculation was that we’d see Lumat in the ROTJ wave (what’s now been revealed as The Legacy Collection wave 1), but that turned out to be another Ewok named “Leektar”. So back to our original question….where’s Lumat? Has he been bumped in favor of lesser-known Ewoks, or are there plans for this long-lost figure to come out? Longtime fans want to know if we can look forward to checking off another vintage upgraded figure!

Hasbro: Yes, indeed. Lumat was originally meant to be the figure we were doing in the two-pack with Romba. Lucasfilm asked us to change him to Graak, but the sticker sheet was already out to be printed. Someday soon we hope to get to Lumat.

As stated in the last round of questions I like Ewoks, but this is just too much. Also worth noting is the fact that Lucasfilm didn’t want Hasbro to use that particular Ewok? What in the Hell would motivate that kind of change? Does anyone have the feeling that Lucasfilm has a machine that issues out random demands like that to keep their licensees on their toes?

Rebelscum also asks a question that’s Stormtrooper related:

Rebelscum: Another question on a mystery figure….in the latest issue of Star Wars Insider, there is a photo of a blue-striped Stormtrooper figure from The Force Unleashed. Wizards of the Coast’s miniature game identifies this character as a “Felucian Stormtrooper Officer” and the Unleashed Battle Packs identify him as a “Stormtrooper Commander.” While loose and carded photos have leaked (on a TAC cardback, no less), we’ve not heard anything official on this character. We understand the frequent delays of TFU has changed the release of some tie-ins, but it seems the bulk of Hasbro’s line is still on target, except for this one. Can you shed any light on this figure, and where and when fans can acquire him?

Hasbro: This figure, a Stormtrooper Commander, will indeed be released as part of an upcoming promotion dealing with The Force Unleashed. As the game was delayed, so too was the promotion. Details have still yet to be announced or finalized, but the figure should be out around the time the game is released.

Ahh those wondeful Force Unleashed delays. I bet Hasbro execs are mega-pissed over this debacle.

Again, Rebelscum has a great question for this round:

Rebelscum: In a recent Q&A session with our friends over at Jedi Defender, it was revealed that there will be another wave of Saga Legends repacks in the fall, featuring kid-targeted characters from the Clone Wars era. Without giving away the figures in this line, I’m wondering which characters you have listed as “kid-oriented”, meaning are there in fact specific characters that are primarily targeted towards kids? If so, who are they? Also, which characters do you consider targeted towards collectors?

On a similar note, are there any characters that are “must haves” when you are setting up a line for the year? Presumably the ones listed above would fall into this category, but are there any others that are shoo-ins?

Hasbro: Kid-targeted figures include heroes and key villains (characters like Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker, Yoda, R2-D2, General Grievous, etc) as well as core troopers and key droid opponents. In general these are figures that kids want in order to play out the major battles, which are also figures that we have a strong history with as “outperformers” because kids select these before anything else.

Since these are re-releases, with no changes, we consider these releases to be kid-targeted, even though collectors may be interested in the troops, or to some extent, the change to a new line. We don’t have room in the Fall assortment to offer any collector-targeted Saga Legends as we did for the 30th line (based on voting). It’s possible we could add that later for 2009, but for Fall ‘08 it will be all hands on deck to get the hero potential on shelf as quickly as possible for the movie and TV series.

To be fair, as much as people complain that there are too many Lukes and Darth Vaders and what have you, it totally sucked being a kid without access to the internet and not being able to get a major figure like Vader if you somehow missed him.

The Ultra-Geeky Award^TM

This week we’ve got a winner for our Ultra-Geeky Award! How awesome is that? It’s tenawesome. I tell you, Sandtroopers.com must be the geek hangout of all geek hang outs. They’ve consistently had cringe inducing questions since they started sending them and they deserve this award:

Sandtroopers.com: 2008 TAC sees a return to the pack-in stands last seen in 2006. What about the Legacy Collection and the Clone Wars figures? Will they also contain stands? And if so, will the Clone Wars come with a Clone Wars stand or the generic Expanded Universe stand? While I’m on the subject of stands… I know that in past Q&A sessions you have mentioned that revisiting the sticker sheet for a new set of names is not something on the horizon. But what about if you were to make a package that contained software and blank sticker sheets so that fans and collectors could print their own name stickers, similar to what Testors does with their car and airplane model makers? And what would be the chances of releasing the stands in small packs - say 25 or so - of a movie specific stand instead of the entire set, so that someone could buy 30 ROTS stands to display a Clone Army or 30 ESB stands to display a Snowtrooper army, or something like that?

Hasbro: The stands (which are still available on HasbroToyShop.com) have done OK, but not great enough yet for us to make a re-release from the first batch. It’s a nice item to keep availalable, but we wouldn’t be able to get near the forecast required to do dedicated packs by movie. At the rate of sales predicted for each, we would have to release years worth of inventory up front - not a prudent decision. Instead, we’ll continue to make available the current pack. When that sells out, we will release a new sticker sheet, but we aren’t really near that point yet. We have no plans to return stands to the basic figures for 2008/2009, because each of the basic figure sublines already have extra pack-ins that take the place of coins/stand: Legacy will come with a Droid Factory, Clone Wars figures will come with attachable missile launchers for the most part, and the new Saga Legends will come with a small packs of spare weapons.

How in the hell would hasbro make money on software for the three collectors that want to print stickers for their stupid stands? And why is the name on the stand so important to you? No tell me, really.

Anyway, congrats to you Sandtroopers!