In what must be one of the biggest screw-ups in pre-SDCC history, Digital River has inadvertantly leaked the names of several figures included in the 2012 subscriptions, including the existence of a possible DC subscription. It has to be real, but the names are going to have you doubting the authenticity.
Okay, I don’t know if there can really be Spoilers for a convention panel, but for the sake of argument, if you want to enjoy this weekend unmarred by the poor soul at Digital River who’s guaranteed to have a bad day at work tomorrow, then turn back now. Seriously, it’s your last chance…
Here’s a screenshot of the Club Eternia Page if you’d like to see it for yourself. This page specifically reveals the identity of the first three 2012 figures – Sorceress, Fisto, & Kobra Kahn – as well as giving us the identity of the $60 item, a Star Sisters three-pack that will include Tall Star, Jewel Star, Starla, & Glory Bird.
But the real shock is easily the Subscription Exclusive: Shadow Weaver! Not only does that indicate some development on the Filmation Rights front, but it’s also sure to make even the most ardent subscription naysayers quaking in their boots. Shadow Weaver will include a Preternia Map – which may be an indicator that she was present at that time instead of her being a later addition to the Horde as per the POP canon.
UPDATE: Things have gotten really juicy this morning with a lot of [expected] changes coming to the Mattycollector site. The pages listed below for Infinite Earths, Voltron, and Ecto-1 have disappeared, but in a strange twist the MOTU one is still available. It appears though, that the names were changed to protect the innocent. Sorceress is now listed as the sub figure with the first quarter rounding out with Frosta, Clamp Champ, & Rattlor. Granamyr is now listed as the $60 item.
So which is the real list? Maybe neither, but definitely not the second one. Mattel wouldn’t “correct” the list two days before the Panel. Everything is far enough in the future that some changes may be afoot though and the slip-up at DR may indeed cause Mattel to jig things up a bit before the panel.
Click here for the Club Ecto-1 screen shot. There’s not as much information revealed and it sounds as if it some of may be incorrect.
First, it appears the subscription exclusive will be “The Rookie” from the recent video game and will come packaged with the Taxi Cab Ghost (which was really more of a zombie). The only regular figure it mentions as shipping in the first quarter is the “Ready to Believe You” (more commonly referred to as Labcoat) Peter, but it also mentions that he will also come with the Taxi Cab Ghost. I haven’t played the game, so I don’t know if there are two possible decos for the Taxi Cab ghost or if this is a misprint.
Next up is the screen shot for Club Lion Force.
This is the one that I knew the least about going in, but from the screen shots, it would appear that Mattel intends to complete a 23″ tall Classic Voltron in one calendar year which is really cool! The subscription includes the 5 Lions and 5 Pilots all sold separately. While the lions will combine to form Voltron, each pilot will include a piece for a collect & connect, light-up sword. The prices will vary based on the size of the lion, but, in all, it sounds like a great deal. I don’t know much about Voltron, but it’s a mighty tempting subscription deal.
Finally, the sub exclusive will be Sven, the original pilot of the Blue Lion.
Of all this information, perhaps the most surprising is a DC Subscription called (DC Universe: Club Infinite Earths). There were rumors of this, but I’d dismissed them since Mattel had previously announced the Voltron sub. Looks like I was wrong, but this subscription sounds up in the air.
If you take a look at the larger screenshot, it explains that this subscription will be contingent on people signing up. If not enough folks sign up, then nothing happens. Think Kickstarter.
To help encourage interest, Mattel appears to be borrowing a page from the Four Horsemen’s successful Fantastic Exclusive program. The subscription exclusive figure will be chosen by fans through online poll. Now, you know my feeling about online polls, but this program does sound cool… though I start to wonder how much money I’ll be giving Mattycollector next year… ouch!
This subscription page doesn’t name names, but it does state that Mattel intends to release 12 DC figures starting in April 2012. There will be nine regular figures and three oversized figures, in addition to the oversized subscription figure. So that’s thirteen figures coming to us direct from Mattel should they get enough subscribers.
Okay, I think that covers it. My brain is about ready to explode trying to sort it all out. If the pages aren’t removed as of your reading this you can see them at these links: Club Eternia, Club Ecto-1, Club Lion Force, Club Infinite Earths.
i wonder when mattel is going to get wise and dump DR… cuz they just blew fri. i mean, it’ll be nice seeing the figs, but given the line up for motuc, for example, i can pretty much tell you exactly what those figs will look like and what they’ll come with… so interest blown. same w/ the ecto and voltron clubs. thanks DR, heey, why don’t you guys do me a real solid and tell me what i’m getting for giftmas?
Well at least DR screwed up Matty’s day for once. Hey Matty, Sucks don’t it now you know how 80% of your customers feel . Maybe something will finally happen to those Bastiches.
Man, people are going to be pissed off about Shadow Weaver being a club exclusive. It doesn’t bother me as I was going to get the sub anyways.
Club Lion Force, now that I know what it’s going to be, sounds awesome. I may get it with the MOTUC sub as well.
The Kick starter for DC doesn’t surprise me as Mattel likes to blame the fans when a line doesn’t sell enough at retail. Announcing/showing what figures will come in this sub could increase or decrease interest in sub sales.
Happy Birthday, by the way!
Thanks!
The subject of Exclusives gets me extremely hot under the collar, the worst being Location-Specific (like Disney World) or Convention Exclusives, which are almost always American, and I cannot justify the expense of flying at least 4,000 miles and all the tickets, hotel bills, etc. just to fill a gap in my collection with something extra-cool they’re never going to release again.
At least I was going to sign up for the MOTUC subscription anyway. Hang on, do we have to renew those year-by-year, or do they automatically renew existing subscriptions?
You have to renew them every year.
Thanks, Vault!
They still have a lot to reveal for the MOTUC sub, so while the surprise is blown for a lot of these, that does not make me want to get it any less and with the way Mattel does things with this line and others, I can never presume too much. Looking forward to seeing the actual toys soon!!! Is tonight preview night?
I forgot to add…was this a mistake by Digital River or a way to get people who cannot SDCC attend super-hyped before hand (all the toy board talk is focused on Mattel now)? They could have easily had empty slots where the names are in the MOTUC sub but had the names there. Also, couldn’t they have pulled the page once Matty on Facebook started blowing up? Very weird but Mattel will be getting quite a bit of Money from me. For my wallets sake, I hope they spread out the release of the retail stuff for DCUC more evenly. I got killed in a 3-4 week period with the last few waves…
I think I have a handle about what is driving the Club DCU, at least in part.
This whole upcoming nonsense reboot of DC Comics.
It appears that Warner Bros is REALLY pushing the revamp crap and it sounds like they don’t want any ‘legacy’ character imagery hanging around to cause ‘confusion’ in the marketplace. So that’s likely going to require all new bucks to be tooled up, wouldn’t surprise me at all if a size change was strongly suggested as well.
(See, calling a character Superman but dressing him in a muscle tee and Doc Martins makes him MUCH more accessible to today’s youth, don’t ya know. and Batman, we’ve GOT a Batman movie style that works, why confuse matters?)
So Mattel has big money sunk into the tooling for DCU and the existing buck system, and I give them credit, they seem to have a clue that this comic reboot event is just not going to have ‘legs’, and since it’s the geeks that are going to complain anyway, why not nab them for a sub, get more use out of the existing tooling, AND finally make profit by taking 100% of the MSRP instead of the crumbs they have to suffer with by selling to retail?
Makes some sense to me.
(and yet, look at all the logistics and development that went into the Avatar line and I don’t see any attempt to re-use or re-purpose that. So, huh.)
The Voltron sub, yeah, if I had money I think I’d buy into that.
The site is still up, but the names of the figures are others!
Wow once again some idiot revealed our surprise! I’m happy for the new 2012 lineup but dame Mattel has to officially dump DR after this year. Can’t anyone keep a secret anymore!
Matty is messing with all of us..the Jan to March 2012 reveals have changed again 🙂
Again? How many times have they changed?
So far I’ve seen the names listed in this article, and checking just now (18:13 GMT, 1:13 EST), MattyCollector lists the following:
JANUARY: Frosta
FEBRUARY: Clamp Champ
MARCH: Rattlor, Granamyr
SUBSCRIPTION: Sorceress with Horde Empire Map
Have there been yet other names listed, and who are they?
Anywho, I hope we eventually get ALL the characters mentioned so far. Granamyr. Heh, heh, heh. Sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeet.
Noisy
For the DC screenshot link, you’ve got it going to the Voltron screen shot
Looks like you did post it to your site, http://www.itsalltrue.net/newsimages/matty/dcshot.jpg , just the link above needs to be directed to it.
TSR
they’re changing it now to cover their asses… but i don’t buy it. we’ll see, it’s only a couple days till the matty panel and then we’ll see who they debut. either way, they gaffed.
Matty better bring their A game this weekend if they want my money next year. I’m getting back into Transformers (not the movie-verse) and not just the Hasbro stuff, if you know what I mean. Wallet… being… stretched… to maximum!!!
Okay, so given that it’s changed again (the first three months are now Snakeface, Slush Head and Mosquitor, the CE is Photog and a Tri-Solar System map, and the $60 item is the Grayskull jawbridge)… I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest Matty’s deliberately messing with us.
I fully expect a message on Friday running along the lines of “Ha! That’s what you get for trying to second-guess our surprises, lowly toyfans! Now you’ll never ask for details in advance again!!! Mwahahahahahaaaaa!!!!”
Either that, or it’s some hacker intent on industrial sabotadge.* If it’s a hacker, I say we petition for his hanging, drawing, and quartering. If it’s some schlub at Mattel or Digital River, I say we petition to get them demoted to the complaints department.
* In the words of the great William Shatner: “YOU . . . say ‘sabotaazh’ *I* . . . say ‘sabotadge.’ DON’T . . . tell me how to act. It sickens me.”
A thought occurs: we could probably sue them for false advertising. That’d learn ’em! };D
I’m just glad to see they’re finally releasing NAME and NAME in DCUC!!!!
Been wanting those forever!
More fun from the MattyCollector / Digital River folks:
January: Eldor
February: Sweet Bee
March: Stinkor
Multi-Pack: Kevin, Julie, & Lubic
Subscription: SDCC Fan’s Choice (Rokkon, Ram-Man, or Sorceress) w/ Future Eternia Map
Oh, and the subscriptions aren’t up for sale yet, despite being past the announced start time.
Seriously, This could classify as cruel and unusual punishment.
And now, the subscription’s up for sale (a wee bit late, I might add), and the list is back to
Sorceress
Fisto
Kobra Khan
Shadow Weaver / Preternia Map
Star Sisters w/ Glory Bird Multi-Pack
Actually, if they’ve gone an listed the entire product line for 2012, that wouldn’t be so bad. But if they’ve lied . . . . Well, they’ll soon learn that beneath this playful, boyish exterior beats the heart of a ruthless, sadistic MANIAC.