plasticfetish
08-09-2007, 05:53 AM
Okay, this one's going to be vague, and mostly I'm throwing this up for the purpose of quiet speculation, but let me begin by telling a quick story about something that I saw at Comic-Con a few weeks ago...
While wandering through the Hasbro booth for probably the 300th time, I just happened to be wandering by as two gentleman from Takara Tomy were unwrapping some (what I'm assuming were) prototype figures, in order to show them to the crew (http://photos.sirstevesguide.com/showphoto.php?photo=24721&cat=5416) from Hasbro. Also in attendance was the merchandising guy from Lucasfilm (forget his name now.)
So... here's the deal and what I saw. The Takara Tomy person removed two carefully bundled figures from a bag, unwrapped them and laid them out on the counter for the Hasbro people to see. One was a highly articulated roughly 8-inch (?) figure of Darth Vader, and the other was Boba Fett. They also laid out and presented a book with images of other figure that they've been working on. Mostly I was able to look at the photos of clones... all sorts of colors, deigns, etc. They also had some "human" characters, but the Hasbro people commented on the complexity of doing "skin", and preferred armor/metal.
These figures seemed to be based around an articulated diecast body (I think. I only saw a photo of the naked body, and it appeared to be metal.) that would include all kinds of parts and pieces for you to add and assemble. I interpreted this as being something like a model kit/Medicom figure, but in a smaller scale. Highly detailed though, and from what I saw, they looked amazing. I'm remembering the Fett figure in particular as being really stunning.
The marketing/design people from Hasbro seemed pretty blown away and excited by what they were seeing, and if it weren't for the fact that I was pretty much looking over their shoulders -- feeling like a peeping Tom -- I'd have shot some photos. I got the impression though that this wasn't something they wanted photographed.
There was also a box out on the counter with a Vader in it. I'm not 100% sure if it was something that had been there, or if it was set out by the Tomy guys... a prototype box or something.
In the end there was talk about setting up distribution, then the Lucas marketing guy stepped in, and they all talked a bit. I think I overheard talk of a price at around $100 per figure, and then about how the Takara Tomy guy wanted Hasbro to distribute it, and not Starwarsshop.com (or something like that.)
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I'm curious to know if anyone else was wandering past and saw this little meeting, and if anyone else picked up any info.
Other than that, I suppose we'll just have to wait and see what turns up in time, if anything at all.
While wandering through the Hasbro booth for probably the 300th time, I just happened to be wandering by as two gentleman from Takara Tomy were unwrapping some (what I'm assuming were) prototype figures, in order to show them to the crew (http://photos.sirstevesguide.com/showphoto.php?photo=24721&cat=5416) from Hasbro. Also in attendance was the merchandising guy from Lucasfilm (forget his name now.)
So... here's the deal and what I saw. The Takara Tomy person removed two carefully bundled figures from a bag, unwrapped them and laid them out on the counter for the Hasbro people to see. One was a highly articulated roughly 8-inch (?) figure of Darth Vader, and the other was Boba Fett. They also laid out and presented a book with images of other figure that they've been working on. Mostly I was able to look at the photos of clones... all sorts of colors, deigns, etc. They also had some "human" characters, but the Hasbro people commented on the complexity of doing "skin", and preferred armor/metal.
These figures seemed to be based around an articulated diecast body (I think. I only saw a photo of the naked body, and it appeared to be metal.) that would include all kinds of parts and pieces for you to add and assemble. I interpreted this as being something like a model kit/Medicom figure, but in a smaller scale. Highly detailed though, and from what I saw, they looked amazing. I'm remembering the Fett figure in particular as being really stunning.
The marketing/design people from Hasbro seemed pretty blown away and excited by what they were seeing, and if it weren't for the fact that I was pretty much looking over their shoulders -- feeling like a peeping Tom -- I'd have shot some photos. I got the impression though that this wasn't something they wanted photographed.
There was also a box out on the counter with a Vader in it. I'm not 100% sure if it was something that had been there, or if it was set out by the Tomy guys... a prototype box or something.
In the end there was talk about setting up distribution, then the Lucas marketing guy stepped in, and they all talked a bit. I think I overheard talk of a price at around $100 per figure, and then about how the Takara Tomy guy wanted Hasbro to distribute it, and not Starwarsshop.com (or something like that.)
-----
I'm curious to know if anyone else was wandering past and saw this little meeting, and if anyone else picked up any info.
Other than that, I suppose we'll just have to wait and see what turns up in time, if anything at all.