Most of us didn’t think there would be a lot of new information about Marvel Legends at this year’s Toy Fair. But we were wrong!
Here’s the scoop from the mouths of the horses:
Marvel Legends “officially” returns with Marvel Legends figure #0 at San Diego Comic Con this year! The figure is Thor in his modern costume and will be a Convention exclusive. It’s not clear whether he will be available for order at HasbroToyShop.com, but I assume that is the case because most of Hasbro’s con exclusives are.
He looks good, folks. I can’t show you any pictures here, but I’m sure there are some grainy, bootleg shots from the presentation somewhere on the ‘net.
The first wave of new Legends is meant to hit in early January of 2012, but it is possible that they could start hitting a little early, just in time for Christmas.
They will return to the Build-A-Figure expression. There will be 8-figures per wave which should allow for some good sized BaFs. Terrax is the BaF from the first wave, and he should be over 8″ tall.
Two other figures from the first wave will be “Bucky” Captain America and Ultimate Hawkeye.
We were shown images of unpainted prototypes for these three figures and from what I can tell they look pretty nice, with a good amount of new tooling.
A lot of us have been wondering what we can expect from “new” Legends; would it be a reboot? Continuation? I was told that it is being thought of as a continuation.
Jesse Falcon tells me that the quality, sculpt and articulation that we saw in the recent two-packs is what we can expect going forward. As far as tooling and parts, they will continue to pull from the existing library where appropriate, but Josh Lamb says they are anxious to introduce new tools and expand that library. But I do get the impression we should not expect body re-use in the vein of DC Universe Classics. In other words, they’re not re-inventing the wheel. Your new Legends are going to be a lot like the old Legends. (or at least the newest old Legends).
As for character selection, Falcon tells me they want to continue to move forward with characters they haven’t done. They’re not thinking of it as a reboot where they would start over with a lot of A-Listers again. They’re not interested in re-visiting characters they’ve already done unless they can bring something new to it. He said, “We’re not going to do another Spider-Man just to do Spider-Man”. That said, there will be A-Listers (like the new Cap) and undoubtedly some re-dos of characters they’ve done, but they will always try to have a good reason for a refresh; like an updated costume, etc.
What about characters we all wanted for years, only to see turn up in Marvel Universe (like the Wrecking Crew, Klaw, etc.)? Josh Lamb says the lines are completely separate and character selection from one line will have zero influence on the other. So just because you’re getting a Gladiator in Marvel Universe, doesn’t mean they won’t do him in Legends.
Overal, they are very excited and upbeat about Legends. Marvel Universe has sold EXTREMELY well for them, and so retailer interest in Legends is strong. Marvel’s prolific movie schedule has occupied a lot of Hasbro’s resources, but now that most of that product is through the pipeline, Legends is getting a lot of focus and attention.
That’s the nuts and bolts folks. I’ll see you on the boards for discussion!
-Hagop
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