The Action Figure and Toy Collecting and Discussion Thread!

BREAKING NEWS FOR STAR WARS COLLECTORS:

Been waiting for those Walmart-exclusive Gungan Warriors, Naboo Pilots and Destroyer Droids with the energy shield bubbles to come down in price? Waiting for those slowly fossilizing pegs to get cleared so brand new product can soon be stocked?

Just bored silly and would get a kick out of seeing a Wally World bin piled full of action figures with 3-D glasses attached to their packages?

Head on down to your local Walmart and see if you can score the Discover the Force 3-D action figure deals:



Many of them look like the repacked Jedi that nobody wanted in other packaging when they were newer, but you never know. You might find that stunning new Aurra Sing or Mawhonic you've been looking for, and with the Vintage Collection carded repacks of those characters being online exclusives and harder to get it wouldn't hurt to take a look at your local stores' selections if you've been wanting them.

 

I can just barely spot a couple of Naboo Pilots and Gungan Warriors in that bin but a lot of them look like Qui-Gon Jinn, Obi-Wan Kenobi and the repacked Yoda.

It's a shame because most of the 12 figures in that Walmart-exclusive assortment sold well and were pretty good or even excellent. It's the leftover stinkers that made the entire line look like a crashing flop that nobody bought.

 

Major Holiday markdowns in effect at Walmart, guys, and not just on those exclusive 3-D action figures I mentioned and showed a couple of posts earlier.

Some of the post-Christmas deals on 2012 product.

A couple of extra Dewback lizards would be cool, but unfortunately my area's Wally Worlds seem to be fresh out of their exclusive Dewbacks. There's also an exclusive Vulture Droid that's part of the sale but that one never interested me enough to buy it.

Now if they can just mark down and liquidate all the Clone Wars and Movie Heroes figures that nobody's wanted for the past ten or eleven months. Nobody wants to pay nine or ten bucks for a Super Battle Droid or animated Mace Windu, guys.

 

Good that they're finally moving it out. Bring on the 2013 stuff!

Man, I've been quiet in this thread for a bit. I haven't picked up anything new the last week or so. I'm hearing reports of DC Unlimited hitting stores, but sadly none around me.

 

I'm hitting one or two local stores this evening before the New Year's Eve festivities begin in earnest so I'm gonna see if they stocked anything kind of cool on the last day of the year, but knowing how most retailers are immediately after Christmas I'm probably just going to see leftovers that I already have or don't want any more of.

Oh, I forgot to mention (I think) that Walmarts are currently selling the MTT Troop Transport for 50% off ($65), so if anybody was holding out on the vehicle because of the hefty $130 price tag and your local Wally Worlds carry it then now might be the time.

 

Happy New Year from Hawkeye, Black Widow, and Hulk!



Oooooooo! Watching fireworks via Tumblr.



NOW KISS!

 

Happy New Year, guys! Have a toyriffic January 1st with your favorite ”dolls.”

 

May I just say how hilarious it is that Hulk has joined in the adventures of Clint and Natasha?

Sideshow has revealed their Prequel Trilogy Yoda figure. It comes decked to the nines. I'm not really in to collecting the prequel trilogy any more, but this makes me reconsider a bit.

 

I saw that over on Galactichunter and Rebelscum! He's amazing, isn't he?

I'm wondering if the interchangeable heads are so you can customize your Yoda to look like the CGI Yoda from the Prequel Trilogy or the Frank Oz puppet from Empire and Jedi. At first glance one head looks more like the classic puppet than the other.

 

I'm wondering if I should add Thor to the mix.

 

As promised- Bilbo and Mirror Bilbo!

 

Here are a few figures I have recently got. They are the reissues and the Masterpiece versions. I got the last Masterpiece for my birthday:

 

Those are very cool, man. I had quite a few Transformers as a kid and the ones that turned into jet planes and other military vehicles were always the most interesting and fun to play with.

 

The brand new Yoda design/green packaging Star Wars mini-vehicles with figures are showing up in bigger quantities at Toys "R" Us stores all over the country. Prices range from $23.99 to $26.99 depending on your location and store but all four vehicles in the new 2013 case assortment are surfacing and even cropping up on eBay for inflated prices.

The new 2013 carded action figures are still a little ways off but the very first Hasbro 3.75" scale products of the new year are out there if you want them. A couple of the sets are wonky and not worth buying if you ask me (the Yoda in the Yoda's Jedi Attack Fighter set is an all-new figure with no recycled parts but the paint job on his eyes just looks terrible and borderline laughable) but the MTT Droid Fighter and AT-RT Scout Walker look amazing.

 

Hasbro has cancelled the 2013 Droid Factory/Legacy Collection line before it even got started.

Way to go, Hasbro. You guys have really been banging on all cylinders lately.

 

Eh. I don't care. The Build-a-droid concept was never great in the execution. This last year was the worst, but Hasbro's distribution has always been too spotty to do BAF lines. Just ask any Marvel Legends collector.

 

Sad thing is, the 2013 Legacy/Build-a-Droid line was supposed to be a significant chunk of the coming year's new sculpts and figures while the Clone Wars and Movie Heroes lines got most of the repaints, repacks and figures to promote Episodes II and III in 3-D.

The brand new Mara Jade, Yavin Ceremony Luke and other much-needed updates and resculpts were going to be in the Legacy/BAD line and now the whole thing's been scuttled. Were this just a one-off subline of figures with just a handful of characters then most collectors could just shrug, go "meh" and get on with the other lines.

Unfortunately, Hasbro piled quite a few eggs into the Legacy/Droid Factory relaunch basket and we were supposed to start seeing them in stores soon. Now everything's up in the air and new figures might be held up for a good long while.

 

Sad, but I'll live. I'm not trying to sound like I don't share your pain. It's just, a lot of my Star Wars enthusiasm has been killed this last year. In fact, my 3 3/4" display didn't even survive my last shelf rearrange. Half of them have gone into a box, and the rest are just sitting unarranged on a shelf. I wonder to myself why I even continue to pick up new ones. My collecting focus is shifting away from that line.

Honestly, I'm feeling retail fatigue. Hasbro and Mattel both had horrid years for distribution. It was impossible to find the figures I wanted whether it was Star Wars, DC, or Marvel. I've gotten tired of knowing that I'll never find the figures I'm looking for, and will have to resort to online.