Wow! We are all ones for this date in Ask Matty history! Even though today is actually the 31st, Matty is giving a treat, so with our intentional mis-dating we only provide tricks. Enjoy.
1. Do you have a standard way to determine what characters are appropriate for retail and what characters will need to wait of a subscription slot for release? I mean, we hear that the “big guns” will be at retail, but what does that really mean? Is there a list? Is it an instinct thing? Can teams like the JSA still get a presence at stores?
Our goal for retail is to appeal to retail consumers, which includes fans such as yourself. On Mattycollector.com our goal is to create figures that will excite collectors. So if you are a collector, both the retail and the Mattycollector.com offering will appeal to you. We just revealed the first of the 2012 retail figures at NYCC — Larfleeze!
2. Since the Ghostbusters lines are in a state of flux right now and fans REALLY seem to be demanding it – what would it take to get a Real Ghostbusters standard action figure lines with ghosts, etc? A lot of fans feel that this would be a very exciting and successful direction to go in.
It would take a huge increase in sales. We currently are working hard to keep the movie style line going. An animated line would be almost 100% new tooling for each figure and we just don’t have the sales to support that right now for a dedicated 6″ animated line. The movie line is easier to run due to shared tooling and common parts.
3. Matty, can you give us an idea of what you consider to be the top five (or so) A-List Filmation characters after Shadow Weaver? Who do you consider to be the big guns from newly-accessible corner of MOTU?
From Toy Guru:
“Just talking off the top of my head, some of the POP Horde females would be up there. After that you get down to a lot of one shot villains from MOTU like Shakoti, Icer, Strong Arm and others like that.”
4. The create-a-character seems to be really embraced already. Is there a chance you would consider making it a yearly thing? Not necessarily like the 30th line, but have one figure outside of the sub for a fan creation every year? There is plenty of room in MOTU for more new characters and I know a lot of fans would love to see thier character make it into the line.
It is always possible, but in the end the team only has so many resources and it may not be a program we can continue year after year. We may look at how the programs runs and look at modifying it for future years. Anything is possible but nothing official to announce right now!
5. Can you give us a rundown on how many points and what the specific points of articulation will be for the 2012 Voltron figure once it is completely assembled?
The number of articulation points can vary depending on how you count them, but we can tell you that the assembled 23″ Voltron is very close to the Toynami Masterpiece Edition in terms of articulation points.
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