Whither modern Red Tornado?

The only official variant announced by Mattel for DC Universe Classics wave 1 (DCUC1) was a modern version of Red Tornado (a character I, admittedly, know practically nothing about–but I like his action figure). But though the line has arrived in comic shops and retailers across the country, the mythical modern RT has yet to be found. Since I know little about the character anyway, I was hoping to get the modern version.

Some background: initially, modern Red Tornado was going to be the main figure, and the “classic” Tornado–with big gloves and buccaneer boots–was to be the variant. But fans on the major collector sites (Fwoosh/AFI) expressed far more interest in the classic version, so Mattel adjusted their case ratios to reflect that. From what retailers could tell, there would be two case types–one that would have one of every regular figure and two Batman figures, and one that would have one of every figure and two Tornados. The assumption among fans was that the latter would contain one modern and one classic Tornado, but so far, all we’ve got is classic.

So, the question is: what’s the deal, Mattel? Will we see the modern Tornado in later case pack-outs or alongside a future wave, or is he destined to become an exclusive or, worse, never see the light of day at all?

Coming up this week: My long-overdue comments on The Transformers movie (which I saw for the first time this weekend) > Cleatus, the Fox Sports Robot > Michael Crawford and the Poppies > and at last, my review of DC Universe Classics Wave 1 > Plus: PGPoA’s very first contest!