Questions for April 7, 2006
Q&A Archive

1
In question mark 208 you were asked about the Endor AT-AT. You said it was a Target exclusive, the photo archives has it listed as a Toys ‘R’ Us exclusive (rumor list 06 saga collection vehicles) and if I remember right the early report put it at Toys ‘R’ Us. Was it confirmed for Target? - talon

No, that was my mistake, as far as I know it has not been confirmed yet and is still only rumored for Toys ‘R’ Us. My apologies, I must have been drinking heavily that day – won’t happen again.


2
Are there plans for Gentle Giant to produce Count Dooku Animated Maquettes? –William G.

I ran this one by our friends at Gentle Giant and the official word is that there are no plans for an animated Dooku Maquette at this time. Still, Gentle Giant went on to say that the lack of current plans doesn’t mean the piece won’t ever be offered. I’d say give it some time, the maquettes appear to be doing very well for GGS, as soon as they see how well this year’s line does they’ll likely be back with more in 2007.


3
Do you know if the Lucas Stormtrooper is going to be a carded figure or is Hasbro going to mail it in the plain white box like the Luke/Han Stormtroopers?

Well, up until a day or so ago I wasn’t quite sure, but after Dan posted this report, it definitely looks like the figure will be carded as part of the Vintage line. If you missed his report, be sure to check it out.


4
Question far ya, many of the vintage ROTJ and POTF bubbles have a major yellowing problems. While the majority of the older carded SW and ESB figures do not have this yellowing issue. Do you know if Hasbro is using a higher quality plastic for the newer bubbles? Will we expect the bubbles to yellow on our newer figures too? -THE MAN

Expect them to yellow. As a matter of fact many collectors have already reported yellowing bubbles on their Power of the Force II figures, and I’ve noticed it on some of my Episode I figures as well. It’s an odd thing; it doesn’t appear to be 100% consistent, but every once in a while I’ll come across a figure with a bubble that’s starting to turn color. It could have something to do with a particular run of bubbles, could have something to do with conditions during that shipment, but until it starts to happen there’s no real sign that it will or won’t. As we start to look back at our collections in the coming years we might see some kind of patter to this problem, but for now all we really know is that the modern figures are just as susceptible to this as the vintage figures are.


5
I know most of your questions are toy related, but I have a non-toy related Star Wars question. I know there are a few comic-dedicated sites, but is there anywhere on the net that has a complete checklist of all of the various Star Wars published material that has been released? Or at least a complete list of the novels and stories and/or their chronology? -Tia

I’m not aware of a site dedicated to this type of content (though I believe theForce.net has a decent section on literature – including a chronology), but I do know that our own Jovial Jay is working very hard on completing a comprehensive section for Rebelscum. Looking back over the nearly thirty years of Star Wars publications and literature it may take some time, but I know this is in the works. If you have a specific question or category you need help with, email Jay and he’ll probably be able to give you more information.


6
I apologize in advance if you've addressed this question in previous Q and A articles, but I'm wondering about the small hologram figures that come with the latest "Saga" waves. How many variants are there? By variants I mean how many different characters are available? Is there a checklist? I'm aware of the UGH silver-painted variants, but I've never seen a list of characters (i.e, Leia, Chewie, etc.) -Brett Gray

No need for apologies… There are (so far) twelve ‘hologram’ characters randomly packed with the Saga Collection figures; six light-side, six dark-side. Depending on the affiliation of the action figure, there are essentially six possible package variations. The list of hologram characters is as follows:

Light-side:
_ Queen Amidala
_ Obi-Wan Kenobi
_ Yoda
_ Han Solo
_ Luke Skywalker
_ Rebel Fleet Trooper

Dark-side:
_ Darth Maul
_ Count Dooku
_ Darth Sidious (Emperor Palpatine)
_ Darth Vader
_ Boba Fett
_ Stormtrooper

As you mentioned, silver versions of all these hologram characters ‘should’ be available with the Ultimate Galactic Hunt (UGH) chase figures (good luck finding them by the way…), but that’s not all. Apparently starting with the Tatooine wave, basic figures will start to ship with red holograms. Will we see red and blue holograms shipping side by side? Will figures from the Carkoon, Hoth, Geonosis, and Coruscant waves re-ship with red holograms? These are the questions now, no clear answers yet, it looks like we’ll just have to wait and see what happens. At least for now it doesn’t look like any new characters have been added… Yippee!


7
Can anyone tell me when Hasbro intends to make a super-articulated Snow Trooper? I can't believe the crap Hasbro threw at us with the ultra rigid Saga Snow Trooper. Yes I'm BITTER! -dizzyrizzy

Oh how I wish I could tell you this was coming up… Hopefully in 2007 when Hasbro releases another batch of Vintage style figures the Snowtrooper will make the cut. Considering what’s been done with line, I’d really like to see an all-new version with soft-goods ‘belt cape’ and ‘breath warmer cover’ (hey, that’s what they called it in the visual dictionary…). Yeah, I’m a little bitter to see this Saga Snowtrooper sculpt dragged out for the umpteenth time, but now that they’ve gotten it out of the way they should have no excuses for next year… Yeah right.


8
What is the best way to store ROTS Episode III carded figures? I have mine stacked vertically in standard supermarket plastic tubs. Will they be ok over time or am I storing them incorrectly?

I’m assuming you have them in a single layer standing vertically in the tubs, not stacked all over each other… I suppose that will be okay, but given time you may start to see the edges and top portion of the cards start to curl in. If you can justify the additional cost and possible storage space, clamshells would probably be a good idea. Store them in the shells inside the tubs if you’d like, but you’ll be much happier in the long run if you can find something that will keep the cardbacks flat, as well as giving your figures a little extra protection from dust.


9
Is there a rundown on what Hasbro will be offering for Battlestar Galactica, will there be any classic vehicles or figures as well? Will this also be under the Star Wars banner? Also, if this goes well, could there be a chance other classics may be offered as well (i.e. Buck Rogers or even maybe some 3 3/4 Lost in Space)? -Jon, MA

At this time the Battlestar Galactica offerings appear to be limited to the Die-Cast Titanium Series, there’s been no indication we’ll see anything outside of this range. Coming up we can look forward to an Ultra Battlestar Galactica, a forged Cylon Warrior figure, and six 3” vehicles from the new Sci Fi Channel series (including: Cylon Raider, Colonial I, Raptor, Battlestar Galactica, Viper Mk VII, and Viper Mk II). So far nothing Hasbro has announced is from the classic series. There’s a good chance this is the only portion of the overall Galactica license that wasn’t spoken for, and the thus the only category Hasbro could get a hold of. There are other Galactica lines currently running, Joyride is producing figures and vehicles from the classic TV series, and Majestic Studios has a collection of classic 12” figures. It could be that anything Hasbro might do outside of the Die-Cast range would be in conflict with these other licenses, but without knowing for certain I suppose anything is possible, just not known at this time.

As for items from other sci-fi properties, I thought Johnny Lightening had some Lost in Space items a few years ago, not sure if that would be available to Hasbro, but Buck Rogers could be up for grabs. Hasbro seems to be focusing on the sci-fi genre with their Titanium line, if all goes well who knows where they could end up going with it.

10
Hi, my name is Diego Panay, I’m from Panamá City, Panama. I’m wondering is there any plan to release any deluxe figure for the Saga Collection and I want to know if there’s any hope to see again clone wars action figures with better articulations ?

According to both official and non-official sources, there doesn’t appear to be any plans for deluxe figures this year. Similar to what we saw with the OTC line in ‘04, the new Vintage Style figures will fill that price point for Hasbro, and that’s about as close as it’ll get. As for more Clone Wars figures, Foul Moudama is the only CW figure that’s been confirmed for ’06 so far. At one point snow bunny Padmé was tagged for later this year, but we still don’t have official confirmation on that yet. There’s been absolutely no indication more animated style figures are coming, while it would be nice to see this line return with a higher level of articulation, it doesn’t look like this will happen – at least not this year.


Until next time...


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