Toy news roundup, 2/9/09

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  • NECA wasn’t in attendance at NYCC, so there are no updates on the status of their Ninja Turtles line.  It’s not looking good though, folks.
  • However, Playmates is going forward with their Mirage-based line. Here are some photos of the Turtles, Shredder, Splinter, and a Foot Soldier. The Turtles and Splinter look all right, but Shredder and the Foot Soldier look terrible. But then, Playmates seems to be having trouble with human figures lately.
  • Captain Collector has photos of DCUC series 6 and 7 up. Lovin’ that Flash. Kid Flash is way too small, though.
  • In case you missed it, Mattel announced how you can redeem those Anti-Monitor points you’ve been getting from your Infinite Heroes figures. 50 points gets you a 3 3/4″ Anti-Monitor figure at SDCC (alternatively, you can buy him for $10); while each 25 points gets you a raffle ticket for a titanic 30″ Anti-Monitor figure with light-up eyes (one will be raffled off each day at the convention). Before you ask, Mattel apparently told reporters “the figure is so large that mass production tooling was too expensive to do. Mattel instead hand-made each and every 30″ Anti-Monitor to be given away.” At least you do get two raffle tickets when you purchase a 3 3/4″ Anti-Monitor for 50 points. I can’t help but feel like this is another (unintentional) kick in the teeth from Mattel, though. They don’t seem to understand how annoyed, stressed and sometimes downright angry it makes collectors to know there are things out there they’ll never own, even if they were willing to spend the money on it.  I know if this was a DCUC thing, I’d be really annoyed. Part of me thinks it would be better for Mattel not to make the 30″ Anti-Monitor at all…what do you think?
  • Hmm…there wasn’t as much toy news as I thought there would be out of NYCC. I suppose Mattel is ahead of the curve in making NYCC their primary collector’s con. We’ll have to wait until SDCC for all the cool toy-related panels and so forth.

DCUC Joker reveal

AFI has a video up from NYCC. Included are some pics of figures not on display at the booth, including the Wave 10 9 Deadshot and the DCUC Joker, who looks Super Powers-licious. Oddly enough, I think these are the two DCUC figures I’m most looking forward to right now (outside of a black-and-gray Batman repaint with the black bat symbol and a pouch belt).

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Toy review roundup (via Fanmode), 2/4/09

fanmode-copy Poe Ghostal reviews the NECA Bionic Commando Nathan “Rad” Spencer figure. Excerpt: “… a great action figure.”

Shocka reviews the SOTA Street Fighter Revolution Zangief figure. Excerpt: “This will be the only Street Fighter Revolutions figure I’m reviewing for OAFE because the others all had the misfortune of breaking before I got them out of their boxes …” (more…)

Review > Hawkman (DC Universe Classics)

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I’m still waiting on my case of Wave 6 to ship from an online retailer, but in the meantime I did score a Hawkman (thanks Mom!). I’ve been a victim of Hawkmania recently and have been attempting to sort out his history, which is a mess. But that doesn’t detract from a great action figure. (more…)

Ask Mattel, 2/3/2009

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Better late than never!

1.) Please pardon this extremely pedantic question: starting with DCUC Wave 6, online retailers can order solid cases of figures to be sold as sets. Are these specialty cases packed at the beginning or end of the production run, or is it done randomly?

They are produced as orders come in during production and are not necessarily always at the start or beginning of the production run.

2.) Matty’s Facebook page appears to be quite a success. How does it fit in with Mattel’s overall online marketing and PR strategy?

Matty’s Facebook page is just an additional way he can communicate with fans. We will still continue to do Q & As and Toy Guru will post on websites. We found we were getting many of the same questions every month submitted by different websites, so Facebook will hopefully act as a central place (along with MattyCollector.com’s news section) to get information straight from Mattel.

3.) One thing collectors have often requested for Mattycollector is weapons packs. Are these financially feasible at this time, and if so, would they be more likely for DCUC or MOTUC?

The trouble with doing a weapons pack is it costs the same amount to tool a new weapon as it does a new head. So doing a weapon pack of all new weapons would be expensive as each accessory would need to be tooled and that winds up being a lot more expensive then a single figure costs. So if we did offer this, it would likely include previous accessories bundled together.

4.) There are some characters, such as Galatea, the Justice Lords or the Gray Ghost, who were created just for the DC animated universe and have never appeared in DC comics. Does your license agreement allow you to create DCUC-style figures of these characters, if you wanted to?

Well, we did do Batman Beyond in 6 inch, so anything might be possible, but all of the figures in every line is handled and approved on a figure by figure basis and in the end we work with our license partners at DC and WB to find the best line up possible. If there are enough fan requests to do Gray Ghost or Galatea in 6″ we could look at that, but it is likely we would choose to do Power Girl over Galatea first in 6″.

5.) What’s the status of the proposed DCUC two-packs, such as Lex Luthor/Supergirl and Superman/Brainiac?

We are waiting for retail customer’s to place orders for these before we can go into production on these.

Mattel news and Q&A roundup

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Mattel has posted a couple updates on their Facebook page.

Due to Feb 15th falling on a weekend, and that being followed by a holiday (in the US), Stratos will therefore go on sale Tuesday the 17th at 12:00 eastern.

and

So we’ve asked our official research group to get some numbers behind collector interests as we move forward with even bigger and better figures both online and at retail!

Check out the link below if you would like to voluntarily tell us a bit about what you want from Mattel in the future!

Matty

https://deploy.ztelligence.com/start/index.jsp?PIN=13AWQ2NC598UD

Calling All Action Figure Collectors!

We’d like to invite you to participate in our new action figure research survey. As we strive to best meet your needs for action figures and collectibles, your responses are very important to us and will help us in our development of future products. Please take a few minutes to complete this survey and all of your answers and information will be kept strictly confidential.

I’ve filled out the survey, and it’s quite in-depth. Here’s hoping it has some significant effects on the future of DCUC and MOTUC.

Here’s a round-up of all the Mattel Q&As from yesterday:

Mattel also put up a new ad for Stratos.

Toy review roundup (via Fanmode), 1/31/09

fanmode-copy yo go re reviews the DC Direct Watchmen Rorschach figure. Excerpt: “This figure is only slightly above mediocre’ by 2009 standards …”

Jeff Saylor reviews the NECA Gears of War 2 Marcus Fenix vs. Locust Drone two-pack. Excerpt: “… the best Marcus Fenix figure ever released.”

Philip Reed reviews the Mezco Toyz HB II Hellboy San Diego Comic Con exclusive 3.75-inch figure. Excerpt: “As nice as some of the other Hellboy figures out there look, I really prefer this 3.75″ version …” (more…)

Review > Adam Strange and Starfire (DC Universe Classics)

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Starfire and Adam Strange might seem an unlikely couple for Mattycollector’s first exclusive DC Universe Classics (DCUC) two-pack. Other than the fact one’s an alien from outer space and the other one spends a lot of time in outer space, what do they have in common? Turns out they both hung out a lot in DC’s 52 maxi-series. That’s about it. (more…)