I'm just not sure "No add-on figures" was the message that should have come from the Engine of Vengeance failure though.
100% this. No one complained about the add on figures for the Sentinel. Very few people complained about the add on figures for Galactus. One of the main reason people complained about the Engine of Vengeance is that the add on figures were characters that were in high demand from collectors which had almost nothing to do with the base offering. What did the Goblin Queen have to do with the Engine of Vengeance, how did she relate?
The choice with EoV was cynical by Hasbro - hoping that characters that fans who didn't care about modern Ghost Rider or his car but desperately wanted Mephisto and Goblin Queen, would spend hundreds of dollars to get.
Including something like Lab Coat Pym and a version of Wasp or even Jarvis, would be utterly and entirely different - at least those characters go with the base offering thematically and in context.
As I've said a few times, I think add-on figures are sticky business. People didn't raise a fuss about the Sentinel/Galactus bonus figures because they were able to walk the line between niche and desirable. It feels like most X-Fans backed the Sentinel, so many of them were able to get Bastion anyway. Galactus included a redo and two figures that were almost worthless without Galactus himself. Some folks were still left out, though.
You run into issues with collectors who cannot afford to back the project, collectors who don't want the complete package, or collectors like me, who can afford to back it but don't have space for the item. That forces me to either buy and resell the main product or buy the items I want on the secondary market. Neither are great positions.
Hasbro can sell about anything on Fan Channel (whether they admit it or not), so I think this is the best case for everyone. It also minimizes the bitching about the price. It's a luxury item, but it's bare bones. I'd bet this is how all future HasLabs (at least Marvel HasLabs) operate.
@fac I knew someone would come back with better math. Makes sense.
And Sepster's probably right, half of us complaining will be placing an order for this sometime in late October.
For the record, I never said it was bad, just really big and a bit expensive with a disappointing lack of extra goodies ...
@tsi I hear what you are saying - but I think there's a path to viability where included figures are fun but not 'necessary'. I sound like a broken record, but Lab Coat Pym and some version of Wasp - maybe not 1st appearace, the character changed her costume so often it could be a dozen different things - could have worked without ruffling too many feathers. And then still slate 1st appearance Wasp for Fan Channel next summer
Like I said, I'm not opposed to the approach they took but would have been even more excited if they had included thematically relevant 6 inch figures.
Lab Coat Pym seems like such an easy repaint layup that I'll be shocked if he doesn't turn up eventually.
Agreed. the sculpting on the suit is great. At first glance, I hated the hands/fingers, but they've grown on me. The potential for posing is pretty cool. Here I am talking myself into backing.
The very last pic on the Pulse page with him kneeling has me thinking more about it, I wish I could see a figure next to him in that pose. Assuming that gets his height on the shelf down to 16 to 18 inches it might work for me. I don't know, a version that split the difference between this and the old Toy Biz was my ideal, so genuinely unsure about backing.
I did briefly consider if I could display him horizontally, laying on its side kind of propped up on his elbow and one knee up, but might look too much like a beefcake pose... But if I could have it so it looked like he was doing that to hear Cap's instructions as part of a group discussion... same with the kneeling pose.
I had similar thoughts about putting him in horizontal pose. If he can be posed like that; I wonder if his head would be high enough to be fully visible if he’s basically the back row of a group picture.
Personally, I don’t think Wasp needs to be here, there are plenty of other ways to offer her. I thought Jarvis would have been a good fit, or an obscure villain like Living Eraser someone mentioned several pages back. I could even see “Sleepy Time Steve Rogers” in the tattered uniform the Avengers found him in. I know some people would complain about Jarvis but it’s not like he’d be absurdly expensive on the aftermarket, the Avengers Butler is only in so much demand, you either absolutely want him or not at all, so I could see people flipping him just to get some money back. But having said all that, I don’t blame them for wanting an easy home run after last year, and I say that as someone who LOVED the Engine of Vengeance. The car, the figures, the tiers, all of it. I’d buy that whole package right now if they offered it again. Sadly, the only tiers are just tears.
That wordplay works better in a non-written format.
We pretty much have to see Wasp at PulseCon, right? Inevitably there will be complaints that she's not included in the HasLab but I think more people than not will be excited by the complementary offering. Janet deserves this!
I think yes, for sure. Fan Channel release timed to hit just before Giant Man shows up. I'm curious to see if it will be as a single figure or in a 2-pack with FA Iron Man painted gold.
I wouldn't be opposed to them doing a full-on First Appearance Avengers box set, but it would be hard to make it not feel redundant having a full-sized Ant-Man in there, and only making mini-Ant-Man & Wasp would be no good either. Maybe a single-release FA Wasp, and separately a First Appearance 3-pack with gold Iron Man, green Hulk on the grey body, and Thor with a more classic headsculpt, + mini-Hank and Jan?
Working against that idea is the fact that Thor, Iron Man, and Hulk all sell fine on their own, so they probably aren't incentivized to bundle them. I've come back around to your gold Iron Man & Wasp 2-pack!
Rick Jones played a role in that original formation of the Avengers as well as I recall. I think that he was originally trying to contact that Fantastic Four about Loki controlling the Hulk and that's how Hank and Janet got involved. I haven't read it in years, but that's how I seem to remember it. So maybe civilian Rick could be included in that kind of multi-pack as well. Or even a classic Loki (again).
I do wonder if they could do the characters they refuse to make like Daimon or Mephisto in the ways they did Lilandra, King Thanos, or Shadow King-- Release a deluxe exclusive figure that includes the heads of these characters that they'll likely never make, so fans can fudge a representation of them using recent figures that match just enough to satisfy.
The add-on figures pushed me over the edge with a few Haslabs. If they put Jarvis or something in this one I'd be grumbling and typing my credit card number in. If they keep things strictly on-topic for Giant-Man add ons I honestly won't have any trouble passing, if only because I'm still shuffling the last two big guys around the house. (No negativity toward the Giant Man figure, I'm just struggling with two massive figures already.)
I don't know if it's a good business model, but I do think it's effective on some buyers.
Also, just to keep this in perspective, this board is probably far more likely to have people commenting who own the original Toybiz Giant Man. I guarantee you most people who are aware of this figure/campaign do not. I was around back then and even I didn’t, I never found all the pieces and I was trying, but I was in high school and working so my hunting time was limited and my budget didn’t allow for secondary prices, so for the majority of modern Legends collectors, I suspect this is the first chance they’ve ever had of owning a classic Giant Man.
As someone who has been collecting the line since 2001, this is something that I’ve had to remind myself of a few times lately. I can’t get excited over this HasLab because I already have the Toy Biz BAF Giant Man and it’s one of my favorite figures in my collection. However, if this was the first time a Hank Pym Giant Man was available in Marvel Legends, I would have backed it immediately.
So for me to say this is a disappointing HasLab would be completely unfair. This is GREAT HasLab. It’s great for those that don’t have the Toy Biz BAF, it’s great for those that do have the Toy Biz BAF but consider the HasLab a significant upgrade, and it’s great for those of us that are happy to continue rolling with the Toy Biz BAF. Hasbro managed to come up with a HasLab where everybody wins, and that’s quite an accomplishment.
I already have visions of Galactus holding up Giant Man's severed head in his hand (from the 2nd one that I'd put the Skrull head on). 😁
I find the topic of included figures fascinating. I too, like included figures, but am annoyed when it's something I don't want, like Silver Surfer in the Galactus haslab: A totally unnecessary re-release that was pointless to many of us. I see a lot of Hank in a labcoat and Jarvis speculation. Personally, I wouldn't want either of those. I'd take them for free of course, and there's this illusion that you are getting them for free in a Haslab, but this campaign pretty clearly proves that's not the case. Those figures ARE factored into the price no matter what nonsense they spin about tiers needing to be reached to achieve economies of scale. So if Hasbro is going to go this route of removing figures but ALSO drastically lowering the price, I'm ok with that.
If this funds (and I think it absolutely will) I think Hasbro will release a first appearance Wasp and Yellow Jacket to go along with them (as they did with Firelord). Then those that want those figures and Giant Man can spend $250 and get all 3, while those who only want the figures can spend $50, etc.
Can you guess the difference between Marvel's Giant-Man and Batman, Jurassic Park, and Darth Vader? The others may have slightly more brand recognition. And to be crystal clear, by "slightly," I mean a fuckton.
ML has been on the toy shelves for 20 years. Avengers changed the way studios make movies. The brand is recognized. There is no underdog here.
Can you guess the difference between Marvel's Giant-Man and Batman, Jurassic Park, and Darth Vader? The others may have slightly more brand recognition. And to be crystal clear, by "slightly," I mean a fuckton.
ML has been on the toy shelves for 20 years. Avengers changed the way studios make movies. The brand is recognized. There is no underdog here.
True, but Giant Man himself isn’t on that level, the Marvel/Avengers brand is, if anything I’d think they would be more likely to bite for something from the films, and they made a single packed MCU Giant-Man not long ago, I forgot all about it until last night. Of the big ticket Marvel items, I just don’t think Giant-Man is a must-have on the level of the brands you mentioned. If you want anything big from Jurassic Park, it’s the T-Rex, for Batman it’s the Batmobile, for Star Wars it’s something like the Falcon or classic TIE-Fighter, which they haven’t made in 6 inch scale, unless you count the heavily clearanced one they made for Force Awakens. The Rancor they tried to make failed even as a Haslab, although it was close. I think a lot of that was the “F-You” people felt they were getting based on the tiers. If you guys thought the Goblin Queen was a poor choice, can I offer you some bones?
if they were going to be brave with something from Marvel, it would have been the Sentinel since it’s an army builder, or Galactus. One has star power, one sells multiples. But the DOFP Sentinel they made for Amazon still hit discount prices, so I don’t know if it ended up being successful on the level they wanted or not. It was in my house, I bought several, but I don’t know the numbers on where it ultimately landed. But even then I don’t know if it would have been at the scale of what we ultimately got.
A few thoughts -
If they should happen to throw in another tier and it's a figure, the best possibilities should be any of the following iterations of Pym - labcoat over a suit & tie, labcoat over a costume, Pym as Wasp.
The only should'a, could'a, would'a's I will say about this HasLab is: including one regular size and mini-size Wasp should have happened as a tier. Any Wasp costume except the most iconic: 1st appearance, 1960's red & yellow, Secret Wars, Perez blue and white asymmetric, Under Siege, or anything modern, starting with the black suit with the yellow wasp abdomen. The iconic costumes should be in waves, 2-packs, etc.
I think we'll see 1st appearance Wasp soon, perhaps in conjunction with the Vision shown at SDCC. It would be a big misstep on Hasbro's part to not feature the only female founder during the anniversary, which also happens to be the 60th anniversary of her debut as well. I don't think they'll wait and do 1st appearance Jan in 2024, because they'll do Secret Wars Jan in conjunction with the 40th anniversary. One Wasp this year, one next year.
Yellowjacket has to be a lock in 2024, either in the annual Avengers BAF wave, or a Fan Channel offering in conjunction with Giant-Man shipping, like Firelord and Galactus, and whoever they may have had planned for the EOV release, probably sitting in the Hasbro vault, but that's a story for another time...
Nah, They have NEW classic Vision figure. He will be in some "Classic Avengers" set with Wasp, Yellow Jacket and another Iron Man.
If they smart...
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