1. Why do you think Hasbro got away from (if they ever even ascribed to it) the Kenner-esque, Bernie Loomis-led philosophy/doctrine of STAR WARS being a "toyetic" property and of making product to embody "play value" for its main line?

Or is that a wordy, meandering question of dubious merit?

I have long-since given up on the idea of waves or environments ever being "complete." World-building feels like a pipe-dream in 2025. But I often wonder if I still collect toys or just things/knickknacks.

I am a devoted fan (since 1978), but I tend to view the 3.75 and Black Series lines in 2025 as near-totally geared toward collectibles, tiny statues, things for dusty curio cabinets, and loads of tote storage. Apologies if that sounds jaded or cynical.

I will always love STAR WARS and the GFFA. Even if I were to quit collecting new products all together.

As an aside, I really just want a C-3PO on an ANH card. They could even do a dirty and clean variant like R2-D2 VC149.

If Hasbro actually fulfills my Pulse order of the Cantina set, the Landspeeder, and the Bantha, I'll have 99% of everything modern I ever wanted from the OT. Maybe a new dewback and some sandtroopers … *crosses fingers*

I miss mass retail. I know that's never coming back.

Even at only 52, my health is quite dire. I *hope* to experience the 50th anniversaries of ANH, ESB, and ROTJ, though my expectations couldn't possibly be lower.

Disney and I simply don't see eye-to-eye on how to properly celebrate such milestones.

Heck, even JAWS has underwhelmed me so far in its 50th anniversary.
-- Allen

There are a lot of things to address!

Since Disney took over Star Wars and Marvel, you can see their marketing ideals passing through - more emphasis on main characters, top-of-the-line faces, and a reduction of freaks and weirdos. It makes some degree of sense in the short term. In a movie year, you sell a lot of who's on the poster - but to keep adult fans interested, you have to give them new things. Balancing both is difficult, and Disney doesn't like to go very far down the roster. Compare The Clone Wars toys (George era) to Rebels (Walt era) toys - you can see a difference. (Rebels did do a nice job with vehicles, though.) There's a bit of an exception for The Force Awakens, which I think was an exceptionally good line filled with almost everything I could possibly want. Sure not Vest Leia but for other movies, they've been playing things a little more tightly. Disney's not about the deep dives, and you're kind of seeing what that looks like. I mean, these guys opted out of doing 1980s DuckTales action figures.

I don't think you're wrong about the "collectible" state of the market. My favorite things are the Epic lines - cheap vehicles and figures for kids, that are fun, and fairly priced - and Retro which are just remakes of old toys. Win win. A $17 posable figure, I can't do much with other than pose it and never touch it again. But, people love those too. I think Hasbro would make more money making a line that could appeal to a toy-buying audience as well as us, but very loud people online seem to have a lot of sway.

When it comes to 50th anniversaries, I think we need to look at other properties and see what we got to better temper expectations. You've been here forever and I hope you'll continue to be here forever! But Jaws had a few things... not a lot, but the kids that saw that movie are older now. The Wizard of Oz turned 50 when I was a kid with a modest marketing campaign - nothing huge for such a landmark movie. The audience is getting older, they don't spend as much money on toys, and so far nobody has gotten the bright idea of selling to grandparents despite certain someones bringing it up a bunch. What did Star Trek do when it turned 50 in 2016? I remember a pin.

G.I. Joe debuted in 1964, and turned 60 in 2024. There wasn't much to be had for the 60th or 50th salutes, but I remember the 30th anniversary product line being small but very appealing. The Outer Space Men and Major Matt Mason also turned 50 and 60 without much fanfare. For most properties, their best days were behind them. Marvel and DC may be exceptions to the rule, and Nintendo is very modest with more focus on its future. This is the 30th anniversary of Pocket Monsters, which came to America in 1998 as Pokemon. They don't need to pretend to celebrate - it's still shockingly relevant. Heck, I bought Pokemon Red the day it came out!

The Planet of the Apes is a favorite of mine, it turned 50 in 2019, and I think that's when the license expired at most companies. Super7 already made great figures, NECA has good stuff too, but there was no big marketing celebration. Toyetic movies are a pretty new thing, so there aren't a ton of films that are going to experience what we hope from Star Wars. Universal Monsters movies are pretty old, but the product isn't exactly ever as deep as it could be. Wouldn't Renfield and Fritz figures be cool? Well, too bad, nobody seems to make those.

I think there's a lot of money to get from making "collectibles" in the form of "toys." That's how we did it in the 1990s, and it worked well - $5 action figures ($10 today) with vehicles, playsets, and a one-size-fits-all approach. They don't have to make them super-buff anymore, and there are opportunities. With a new movie for Star Wars in 2027 (we'll see!) I'm worried that the last great attempt for a nostalgia line might not get to happen, because they're going to have to push a new movie which we're all going to sit here and hope is really good. I kind of hope they kick off a product segment with high-quality remakes of all the original toys - distinct from the originals - because that would be a lot of fun. I don't think adult collectors will ever allow for a slow-paced toy line like the old days, as they hate action features and demand more expensive products. Thankfully we have a few throwbacks available to us, but nobody seems to want to put out some amazing toy line and I can't imagine any launch will ever surpass Episode I of 1999.

My big hope for Star Wars turning 60 is an appeal to grandparent fans, collector parents, and collecting for their kids. Masters of the Universe Origins from Mattel is an amazing thing - old vehicles and playsets, updated. Old figures and new, with almost super articulation. Everything on the shelf looks gorgeous and are priced fairly. This is what everybody should be ripping off.

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2. [snip - editor] I think the fiasco with Target and the Evazan-wave of retro figures will actually spell the end of the retro line. Conscientious collectors pre-ordered promptly only to have orders cancelled, appear within days in the store, appear in a limited window online for a few folks then go on clearance in stories in a couple weeks. Now it is on eBay for $200. You have been vocal about rejecting FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) as an advertising ploy. If in fact, this wave is never made available at MSRP this will turn collectors off the retro line and that will be start of it withering away.

I know that you found a set and are a retro fan as evidenced by your many Figure of the Day posts and the detailed retro action figure database you created. But it may be a short-lived satisfaction if it comes at the expense of the whole line. What do you think about that reasoning?
--David

I disagree. David's question came in 5/29, when you could buy-it-now on eBay for $120 delivered. Scalpers are rotten, but $20 for a Retro figure is more or less market standard. And it's $85 today. If you go to Target.com it's been going in and out of stock for a couple of weeks - it's in stock as of Sunday afternoon. If you're vigilant you could have one on its way to you.

I don't think one product availability will determine the fate for the future of the line, especially in a case like this where you can go buy one right now. Also, distribution has always been a little slower than we'd like. Take me for example - when Retro started I got Tarkin with the board game at Target since they had an early-out. But I didn't see the main six figures, ever, and assumed I'd just not be collecting them because there wasn't an opportunity to buy them. Then Entertainment Earth had a chance to sell them in the summer of 2019, everybody was excited, and I bought mine. It worked out. In the 1980s, Kenner discontinued the entire line - to add to my toybox, I had to keep looking for years. It worked out. Heck, I learned Vlix may exist way back in 1989 and I'm still chasing that one. Did I quit? No, I started writing on the internet in 1995 and a lot of you stuck with me.

Ever since the line started in 1995, fans hated waiting for new toys. And that's understandable - we're excited, and we don't get a lot of all-new Kenner-style figures from the 1977 movie. The last one was Grand Moff Tarkin in 2019. Before that, arguably, it was Stormtrooper Luke and the Imperial Gunner in 1985. It makes sense that we're laser-focused on the one, single, solitary new item made available for this audience in 2025.

Hasbro has been pretty good making The Retro Collection available to fans who want it. Nothing's ever 100%, but with 102 releases, I'd say about 7 were a genuine hassle for me. I never saw (or had a second online chance at) The Empire Strikes Back wave from 2020 - the set of 6 seems to sell for over $150 now. That first wave at Target that nobody could find? They offered it to Entertainment Earth within months, and then rereleased it at ShopDisney, Hasbro Pulse, and yes, Entertainment Earth later. The Prototype figures required some hoop-jumping and I would likely not have Darth Vader were I not literally working at the booth at Comic-Con that sold them.

Is the line withering away? We got 36 Kenner-style figures in 2023, 18 in 2024, and 6 in 2025. If Hasbro ends the line, that's OK. I see 102 figures as a success. I'd love it to be 204 figures, but the original Kenner line (counting generously) was about 116 3 3/4-inch humanoid action figures. (6 Ewoks cartoons and 10 Droids cartoons, 3 Max Rebo Band, 1 Blue Snaggletooth, 2 R2-D2 variants, 1 C-3PO variant, 1 Yak Face, and collect all 92 others.) If you throw out 6 prototype figures and 4 accessory variants, The Retro Collection has about 92 unique figures - that's pretty comparable to the original line.

I've love all the lines to last forever, but if they don't? We've got some great stuff. If the line dies because fans didn't want to buy it, that's a really good reason to end a line. One of my favorite lines is the 2010 relaunch of The Outer Space Men, which is over 100 figures based on about 21 characters and about 100 repaints. The molds are being used as building blocks for other new figures, but the last time we got a new, complete body release was 2022 and the last new character (a repaint with new head) came around in 2018. It's still a great line, it might be dead, but I don't love it any less. I won't be angry if or when The Retro Collection ends either. What we have is good, and if it ends before we get Carbonized Collections or Santa The Armorer Holiday Figures, I'll probably remember it more fondly.

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FIN

Hi everybody! If you enjoy this column and have a dollar, could I direct you to the Galactic Hunter Patreon? In the past ten days, I've had to pay to renew the domain for this here site for a few years, and also got in a car accident that rendered my 2003 ride inoperable and am now grousing my way through looking replacements. If you've enjoyed this site and wouldn't miss a dollar a month, I sure wouldn't turn down any support. And if not, that's fine too, thank you for your readership.

On the bright side, my favorite Star Wars toys are often the cheapest ones.

I'm old enough to remember a time when Star Wars was abundant at stores, and then quickly went away, and was almost completely absent from 1987-1993. Maybe you could find RPG books or models, novels and comics, even some video games, but there were no toys in toy stores by the time the NES started swinging for the rafters with Metroid and Zelda.

When people talk about the line dying, as a fan, I don't see this as a concern. Since 1995 we've gotten at least 13 figures per year every year. I've seen the line stumble a few times, but it's been going for 30 years. No big movie toy line has ran that long, and one of the great things about it ending in the 1980s was you actually had time to catch up, to take stock on what exists, and to obsessively read about prototypes and variations and other stories you didn't have time to learn. You could write books about it, and set up a "complete" collection of figures. You won't, though, because it's a time sink.

I really love these things, but the influx of rerelease variants and new product in all sizes makes it extremely difficult to appreciate these things. Retro and Epic Hero are exceptions due to their small size - the line can fit in a shoebox each year, therefore, it's easy to get my hands around it. I can tell you Retro had 18 debuts in 2024. I couldn't begin to tell you how many were released in The Vintage Collection in 2024 with all the variations, rereleases, tweaked reruns, exclusives, and so forth.

If a line ends, it is sad. Somewhat. I kept up with Fighter Pods and Galactic Heroes, and both turned into pretty good, pretty small collections. Galactic Heroes feels underrated, in that it offers a pretty good "greatest hits" of the Kenner era, the prequels, and The Clone Wars. While there are many Clones in it, it's also packed with vehicles and aliens and heroes galore. It's even got a Slave Leia. A Slave Leia for preschoolers. The figures are small and durable, and display nicely. The entire out-of-box collection might fill a BILLY bookcase from IKEA... if you add some risers in there. It's probably the last great "kid line" and it offers just so much - it's a little light on non-battle droids, sure, but but it's got a Jabba and pooping Rancor. If it had a Bantha I'd say "just collect these."

I wouldn't be saying that if Galactic Heroes were still running after 20 years nonstop instead of a roughly eight year run. Hot Wheels are nice, but with 350 basic cars a year? It's exhausting. Any toy line that gets too big stops being fun eventually, be it from fan discourse, or repetition, or realizing what it has done to your life.

If you have the time to really dig into it, I'd suggest giving the late, pretty good Galactic Heroes line as your next collecting diversion. It's got a Cantina Band in it, and cardboard dioramas, and Garindan, Cad Bane, Aurra Sing, Shadow Stormtroopers, Porkins (and his X-Wing!), Jabba, Max Rebo, and a small side dish of Ewoks. You can wrap your head around it. You may love it. And that's sort of how I feel about Retro, too, what with 102 figures (plus or minus variants) to date. If Hasbro can dish out a line of figures that can stand on their own two feet and not flop over, that's a pretty good line.

You can get the entire The Retro Collection line - opened - on three DETOLF shelves with risers. I wish there were vehicles or playsets, but that's what The Cardboard Galaxy and 3D Plastic Playsets are here for. I'm still finding figures for $5 or less on closeout shelves, having bought Dune Sea Boba Fett and Sabine Wren (again) in May. Most of the figures are still cheap - under $20 a pop. There are frustrations with new products, but there always are. They're my favorite line, but when it ends I can just sit back and enjoy the figures I have. I mean sure, I might be out of a job if Hasbro stops making these toys - that would be bad - but as a collector I don't need to be running around chasing things until I die. I can enjoy the things I have, instead, because I also appreciate how unlikely it is that we're all still here talking about these toys after so many years. And we'll keep talking about them.

--Adam Pawlus

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