MOTUC General News

[He-Mullet]

Why I believe I won't see at least half of PoP and NA:
As stated we have 26 Vintage MOTU Characters and roughly 8-10 of them could be considered "Heavy Hitters"
We all know that the Original Line's roster is a huge attraction for selling subs. Hence the vintage heavy roster on this line. I mean look at this year's roster. Most of the vintage characters in it are among the most wanted:
Sorceress, Fisto, Stinkor, Spikor, Kobra Khan... and we don't know what's coming from September to December!
(There could be 1 or 2 more vintage characters thrown in...)
Sadly Mattel used the Vintage Roster as a crutch for too long. Now the well is drying up and it worries me.
a sub full of PoP and New Adventures characters with very little Vintage MOTU won't sell as well as Mattel would like. (While I prefer PoP, that's a fact that I can't ignore) Maybe THAT's the real reason for the Filmation Rights deal showing up at the "right time". Maybe they WILL BE the booster shot this line needs. At the same time they also COULD spell doom to NA characters. With all the Shokotis, Melakthas, Sea Hawks, Octavias, etc. The NA characters keep getting pushed back... It was stated by Mattel (TG specifically) that most of the NA good guys were to be released between 2016 and 2017... How can a fan of New Adventures feel confident about getting at least the Core characters when Mattel is basically shoving them all the way to the back? We're a bit past the line's 3rd year and we've only gotten 2 NA Characters (and one on the way) while the Vintage MOTU Line is ALMOST complete!?

I HOPE that we can see at least the core cast of both POP and NA in MOTUC and keep supporting the line for as long as possible and my joy for the product outweighs the crap. Sadly, the numbers don't paint a pretty picture for PoP and NA... I Really WANT TO BE WRONG on this, but when the current year throws you: Sorceress, Fisto, Stinkor, Spikor, Kobra Khan and Mattel says that this has been the worst year for the sub... Well it kinda makes me doubt the "strength" of the line...

This is just looking at the roster, I'm not looking at the DR CS horror stories, Matty QC nightmares, or Toyguru's open mouth/insert foot comments towards the customer base.

[DrRampageo]

wrote up a little something baout the 30th sub line
http://www.plasticgraveyard.com/?p=4321

[PrfktTear]

As I mentioned before I created a spreadsheet a long while ago. I was pretty anal about keeping track of all the Masters releases and essentially using it to budget my funds so I knew exactly how much money I needed.

I also had a list of all potential figures too, with all the good guys, bad guys from all the lines, MOTU, POP, Snake Men, and NA, etc. Sue we can make lists and sit here and dwell on all the characters that still have yet to be released but I think that’s just a waste of time. It used to be fun to speculate about whom you thought would be getting released, but the line is at a stage where we are so far in it’s probably more like who WON’T get a release.

Personally I’m not going to get hung up on that stuff. As I said before I’m just a few figures away from being content. For those who are just dying for Twistoid, Multi-Bot, Rotar, Stonedar, etc. I don’t know what to say. I’d love to see them get to the ancillary characters --- I don’t think a POP collection would be complete without Queen Angella or Glimmer. I would LOVE to see Hydron, Artilla, Butt-Head, Flogg, etc. but if we don’t I’m okay with that actually, but I know there are most likely those who would be a lot more disappointed than I am about it.

About the MOTU fanbase. It would be great if there was a way to take some sort of census. Who is out there buying these toys? Who is buying up subs, who is just cherry picking from Matty Collector, who waits for eBay, etc. It’s naïve to assume that every single MOTU fan is a member at .Org. Some (but not all) of the folks over there seem to think that they are the center of the universe and Emiliano Santalucia is the second coming of the Christ. To say that Val Staples and Co. haven’t played a huge role in championing this property would be a huge misgiving. When I first started going online sometime in ’96 or ’97, I remember one of the first things I ever did a search for was for He-Man, and lo & behold, I found the .Org. I was blown away that people still remembered and still had so much love for the property. Those were the dark days too, before the Commemorative Series, 200x, and of course Classics.

The line is really interesting in that its sole reason for being is that of fan support. From the first preview figure the Horsemen snuck in a display, to the overwhelming responses on sale dates. For those who love it and those who hate it, MOTUC has been one of the most talked about lines of the last decade. I’ve been on board almost since the beginning. I never did get that first SCDD Grayskull, but I ordered my He-Man and Beastman as soon as they were available. I ordered the mini-sub for the remainder of ’09, and full subs for ’10, ’11, and ’12 (correct me if I’m getting my timeline wrong here) and even the 30th Anniv sub as well.

Believe me I certainly do want to order a sub for ’13. I’ve been able to manage these last few years but it is becoming a burden financially. I’m okay with twelve monthly and four quarterly figs. The large beasts and “expensive” packs are whats killing me. So far it hasn’t been so bad because I would have bought up most all of them anyways. I question Shadow Beast and Star Sisters though. Even the Griffin, as cool as it is and as much as I am looking forward to it, I’m not sure that I would have picked it up on its own. I did however pick up the Wind Raider on its sale date.

Taking a step back and looking at this hobby in general a lot of my priorities and focus has changed. I don’t pick up as much random stuff as I used to, but there is still a LOT of stuff out there vying for my money. I realize I’m not the only person who has this issue but I can only speak from my perspective. One thing I have really come to loathe about this hobby is the hunt. There was a time I enjoyed it, spending a few hours on a Saturday afternoon hitting up as many Targets, Wal-Marts, and TRUs as I could. Now I just feel that it’s a waste of my time, my energy, and my gas. I’d rather pay a little markup and shipping and not have to deal with that. That’s not even taking into consideration the case assortments, other collectors, scalpers, useless minimum wage employees, and a myriad of other factors involved here.

One thing I know I am tired of is the incessant chorus of those who complain about how the line should be brick & mortar, how it should be sold in stores, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I remember what a pain it was to collect 200x and to what great lengths I had to go to in order to complete my collection. So the fact that they pretty much deliver these figures to us on a silver platter wrapped up, tied in a bow is almost a godsend. So yeah, a $20 figure (now $22) then became a $30 figure, but to me the ten bucks was worth it. I don’t know how other people feel but my time is valuable the thought of having to hunt for each and every figure in this line ties my stomach into a knot.

So again, the fandom. Everyone talks a good game. It’s easy to sit behind your monitor and say what you’re gonna do but how many of those people put their money where their mouth is. I know I’m occasionally guilty of it myself. You see something that looks cool and, “sure, I’ll buy that!” but then it just never happens. Those who buy the subs certainly put their money where their mouth is, but it seems to me that there are a lot more people out there who are more than willing to fork over their opinion on every single miniscule detail, but when push comes to shove they don’t order. If you want to feed off of scraps at the table, then fine so be it. But otherwise anything you say I take with a grain of salt.

Okay, introduction, body, and now the conclusion. As I mentioned before it would be great to have some sort of MOTU fandom census. Get all the subbers, the lurkers, the cherry pickers, etc. out there and let’s find out once and for all what the numbers are. I don’t expect Matty to release their sub numbers but its interesting food-for-thought type of stuff. I don’t know what their minimum requirements are for the subs, but it seems to me that those die-hard fans who want every single figure from Oolar to Malektha to Castaspella continue to support the line it should keep going.

At the very least the “power” literally is ours. It’s in our hands. The onus is on Mattel to continue to make a line which we can all support.

[dayraven]

Completely agreed that Classics isn't the ideal line for everyone - but it is the only choice we have if we WANT new MOTU. The fanbase doesn't HAVE to buy them, but if they want new MOTU, what is the other option?

First things first - my previous post is a reply to the "line will never make it!" thought that continuously pops up on .org and in comments like the one above. This is one of the first times where the fans actually have a say in the line continuing. If we want MOTUC to continue until 2020, all we need (based on the information we have at hand now) is for the current level of subscribers to continue to want 16 new figures and four "expensive" packs per year. We don't have to think about Walmart saying they don't want another assortment of Dark of the Moon and chopping four "anticipated" figures, meaning a scramble for Japanese stock of the same item long sold out; we can have as much MOTUC as we want. That level of collector interaction is unprecedented. In the last two decades of toy collecting, how many times did we have to let the Skeleton Warriors/Darkstalkers/unproduced items go by because "kids didn't want them"?

The current collector market is a strange thing - really much more segmented than about twenty years back.
We're living in a time when a section of the fanbase can sell out a $200 Christopher Reeve Superman from Hot Toys, while the other end of the fanbase thinks a $30 MOTUC figure is expensive. Online has really evened the playing field on toys. When I look at the days of 199X, I remember McFarlane figures that were so impossible to get in my neighborhood that not even the scalpers had them; seeing the Invisible Woman from Toy Biz in a store - two of them on pegs at the same time! - buying one, and never seeing one at retail again while my friends paid $50 to the scalpy store at the Jersey Shore for one. Things we thought were rare turned out to just be tough to get in our neighborhoods; the whole scale of "worth" shook out in different ways as we were exposed to eBay and online retailers blowing out stock for pennies.
Applying this specifically to MOTUC, we have seen that almost every character can be sold out in a three day time span (I know there were a couple, the most notable example being that Hurricane Hordak needed a reworking, lol). Is there a portion (or portions with specific wants) of the current subscriber base who wants all of NA/POP/200X/other to keep it going once we have Ram Man out of the way?

As part of this segmentation, we deal with the hyperbolic statements of people being cemented in forums everywhere with a casual ten-second thought process involved - my personal favorites being "I'd buy FIVE Gi Joe Tactical Battle Platforms if the re-released them!" as the justification for such an act; "Thundercats would TOTALLY RULE THE AISLES if they brought them back!"; "that figure is an abortion/holocaust/armageddon".
A forum like .org wants to have an argument with TG when he unwisely marginalizes what are probably his most...fervent fans by saying that there are only the infamous "200" active posters over there. They state that there is a massive collector group at .org that buys Classics which surely has to be a massive part of the overall MOTUC customer base, right? It's unknowable, because many people who lurk on their forums don't want to interact with the 200 guys who essentially run the forum by posting in every single thread.


Tying things together, I go back to the original post. You take a reasonable fan like He-Mullet and he thinks he won't get to complete his teams because the line is going to end before that? Why? If he and every other fan who wants those characters continue to subscribe (and the day of sale buyers do their part), there is no reason for the line to stop.
If we find out that the majority of characters beyond this year are all Hurricane Hordaks, so be it. But we'll decide that, not Toys R Us or Walmart. And MOTU will be finished for real this time for at least another five years, if not forever - unless the magical movie finally appears. I wouldn't hold my breath for it though.

John K.

i disagree here that what we're doing on matty collector is unprecedented, or that we have some magical sense of control... we don't. we ultimately decide to buy or not buy, so the retailer side of the business is out of the equation, but come on man... what we had going a decade ago w/ SOTA was FAR more interactive and participatory for the consumer base. mattel decides what to sell, at what price, when they want, and we line up to buy or we don't... how is that any different than what best buy is doing?

SOTA gave us pre-order numbers, so we had to commit to a publicly available number of figs purchased before production began... matty doesn't do that.

SOTA told us exactly who was getting made in a given cycle and often times gave fans the ability to vote for members of the roster beforehand... matty doesn't do either of those things.

SOTA was running largely off the numbers available from online pre-orders, but was also able to move product in B&M stores. so they met online demand, and met casual demand at the same time... without resorting to a price hike by packing in a largely over-produced, market saturated garbage figure. matty doesn't do this.

SOTA was pretty well known for it's well spoken and reasonable online presence. jerry was as honest and straightforward as you could ask a salesman to be. he was never disrespectful, nor dismissive, nor willing to pass the buck... matty doesn't even know this paradigm exists.

SOTA ran a competent web store that shipped promptly and carried items in stock all day, every day... matty doesn't do this.

SOTA did have their issues, eventually, when jerry was pulled out of the lion's position, but even w/ the darkstalkers thing you mentioned, those protos were shown and solicited and the online sign up was available to us to guage exactly how many "i'll buy five of those!" guys there were, and there was flatly not enough interest to make those items. i blame the fanbase for that, for talking a talk that wasn't supported by a walk, but at least we knew what we were buying, at what price, and how many we needed to buy to make production work out for them. that's a lightyear ahead of where matty's business model is w/ motuc. (or DCU... or ghostbusters)

they're asking us to sign up for a locked in, year-in-advance subscription on a line w/ spotty QC, worse customer service, and no idea what we're getting past the first four months. that equation isn't equal in any way, where we and matty are sharing responsibility for the health of the line... this is their prerogative and we're regarded as little more than walking wallets. i for one don't rent a prostitute till i've peeked at the goods.

your suggestion is that i should continue to spend money as if it had no meaning, while filling my home w/ possessions i don't want, in the hope, the illusion that i will get the two or three items i feel like i do want, and that if i don't, i'm not entitled to get the two or three items i'm looking for. the same arrangement exists in retail, i can keep buying marvel legends till they make that morg figure i really want, but how many thousands of figs and tens of thousands of dollars will i have to spend to do so? so i cherry pick, and i hope that other people in the fanbase like the figs being offered enough to buy those to keep the line going so i can get what i ultimately want, just as they hope that i'll like morg enough to buy one when he comes out, cuz they don't want one. that's how a toyline works. matty's model doesn't change that at all. i refuse to "sub or die" i'm just not handing them my wallet. they certainly haven't earned it thusfar. that doesn't diminish my love for the property, it makes me want the line to tank so someone else can bid for the license. someone who will do things the way i'd like to see them done. if the next guy doesn't do what i'm after, i'm patient, i'll wait till that one dies, and try again. or i'll make customs. or i'll get the mangosteen over myself and move on... but i sit here and play w/ the motu and motuc i have, i write stories about the characters, i play w/ my kids, i buy the DVDs and watch those... i'm a bigger fan than TG is, cuz i want the line to continue without spite for my fellow fans or a need to push my personal agenda on everyone else.

the example you gave

"$200 Christopher Reeve Superman from Hot Toys, while the other end of the fanbase thinks a $30 MOTUC figure is expensive."

is kind of erroneous too, as the toy you get for the money is vastly different. i've paid 30 bucks for a rib eye and savored every bite w/ no regrets, and then dumped two bucks on a sonic chicago dog and cursed my foul luck... because a ribeye and a hot dog are two entirely different things.

to finish this out, on the subject of the motu fanbase... firstly, there are clearly more than 200 guys interacting on the org... 200 guys don't make 10000 hits a day. so yes, there is a huge silent or mostly silent population over there, but the org represents more than 200 customers, regardless of how much fan interaction the board gets. talking starfruit about your customer base, even if it were only 5 guys, is just bad business. word of mouth will kill a product of almost any type very quickly. mattel's product is erratic, sometimes it's great, sometimes it's crap, and that has nothing to do w/ character selection nor is that the fault of the fanbase, whether there's 100000 of us or 10000. i quit buying largely because of that, not because there aren't still characters i'm interested in, but because the characters i was buying were showing serious of fatigue in the construction w/ little to no play time to blame. when i spend thirty bucks, the same 30 i spent on that aforementioned rib eye, i expect at least rib eye level of satisfaction from my purchase. when that doesn't happen, i don't repeat the 30 dollar crap buy. i'm not required to, and it doesn't make any sense for me to ask others to either... i want everyone at least ribeye happy w/ their 30 dollar purchases. how many folks are there who are willing and able to subscribe? who knows, i don't, and honestly, i don't think mattel has any better idea than i do (or you do) but i'm not conning anyone into a purchase they're less than 100% enthused w/. so like, in motuc, if they expect us to continue to subscribe, they need to:
1) start revealing 100% of the sub figs
2) be upfront w/ a schedule of release and friggin keep it.
3) get their QC in order
4) get their CS in order
5) start providing a sale system that gives me more than 15 minutes to buy, and that considers a 100% sellthrough of stock a success, regardless of the time it takes.
6) stop berating their customers
7) stop blaming the horsemen
by all means, let me know if they do all this, cuz then i'll help y'all out by subscribing. but i'm only 1 fan.

[PrfktTear]

I don’t think what we have at Matty is unprecedented nor am I under the impression that we have any “control” of the line --- but I do feel that we have a lot more input with MOTUC than say DCUC or Transformers with Hasbro.

I don’t know why everyone has vilified TG like they have. He seems like an ok guy, I’m not sure I’d be best friends with him, but I’ve always thought he seems pretty sincere about the line.

I think the point of mentioning 200 posters over at the .Org is that they are the most prevalent (read: loudest) ones who post while you might have another.

10,000 hits in a day? Are you just throwing a number out there or is that a fact that the board gets 10,000 hits from individual IP’s, not including repeat visitors. You can easily have the same 40-60 people posting dozens of times.

I agree though with the statement that if you spend money and you’re not getting satisfaction then it’s a no brainer that you’re going to stop.

I’ve been quite content buying Lego Minifigs at $3-$4 a pop, and every time I’ve gotten my money’s worth.

As far as what I am looking for out of Matty:

Revealing 100% of the sub… it would be nice to know what I’m getting into, but I’m not hung up on this one.

They keep doling out these reveals at SDCC, ToyFair, and PowerCon and everyone goes “ooh!” & “aah!” (Myself included). There’s no need to create any hype for the line because, well, we already bought in on the subs so it’s not like its going to entice us any more. I realize ToyFair and SDCC are mostly to generate buzz in the various industries, but since this line does not go out to brick & mortar they don’t need to “sell” it to any commercial buyers.

Release schedule… they have been… for the most part. Every 15th or in and around there your order ships. Of course it seems like they’ve been having trouble keeping up with their own schedule but from what I can tell that’s out of their hands.

Getting QC and CS in order… I wholeheartedly agree.

Sale system… I don’t know what they can do about that. If they make an extra thousand units to sell on the web site how can they control whether or not it sells out in fifteen minutes or fifteen days. The answer that seems obvious is to make MORE products. But every character is different so its hard to tell what’s the sweet spot.

[dayraven]

http://toynewsi.com/news.php?catid=13&itemid=19291

for those who haven't seen it yet, a new iOS game for motuc!!! on the one hand, i personally lack the requisite devices, BUT it's a huge new market for he-man... that's just not a bad thing. i think motu is a property that is designed to shine in game world, much better than say, in live action film. in video game world, you can destroy hordes of bad guys without "killing" them, you can do all the fantastical nonsense you like and no one blinks, and the best part? costume swaps and power upgrades are an expected feature of the medium. for me, for the longevity and health of the brand, this is the biggest news of the last 2 decades, bigger than the comics (all 3 of them!) bigger than the toys, and bigger than toy guru's "stewardship."

[Lay Ze-Man]

Looks fun, and I particularly dig how Beast Man is rendered in an appropriately threatening size.

But I can't really give that much credit to something that is so long overdue.

Those mangosteen gears at Mattel are more stubborn to get moving than the frozen donkey wheel from LOST.

[DrRampageo]

I reeeeaaalllly hope the game gets ported to XBLA

[dayraven]

http://news.mattycollector.com/blog/201 ... m-415-430/

evidently, they're re-opening the sub period... the odd thing is, minus the sub fig... so on the one hand, it's kind of a guage of how the sub would go without a bonus offering but on the other, it's not, because so many people were lead to believe this was their only buy-in period and bought! seems kind of a haphazard decision to me.

[Tekwych]

The sub text I get is that so many have walked away that they need to shore up the ranks and 'get their numbers back in line'. Too many collectors have hit their point of no return and this is Mattel's idea of to fix it.