1. How can the new Vintage Collection INT-4 and Black Series AT-RT with driver be the same price? My conclusion is; Hasbro throws us aging collectors a bone once and a while. But, since there is like 4, the cost of the tooling amortization is like 50% of the price of the unit. I.e. we are the luckiest 4 collectors in the world. But, it comes with a price. Because, we have to split the production costs thickly.
--Dan

I've never seen a cost breakdown on manufacturing a The Vintage Collection vehicle, but typically I assume a few bucks are because it's in "collector" packaging, and $20 of every vehicle's retail price is probably the figure. With that in mind, remember Hasbro sold the Speeder Bikes for $50 each a few years ago and those had a little less bulk. Given the fact that you get a very expensive figure, a stand, and a vehicle, it's a lot to swallow when the Epic Hero Series ones were $20 around the same time. But you pay for what you get - ankles, wrists, a few extra deco hits, and more pieces cost money. I think Hasbro could probably deliver a sculpt pretty close to The Vintage Collection at a price pretty close to Epic, but you'd lose out on some of the detail and joints. I'd be fine with that. Many fans would not be. I'd rather spend $90 on 2 lesser deco vehicles than $80 on the fanciest mini-rig money can buy.

It may have to do with amortization, but I doubt it. It's an exclusive, with what may be a "deluxe" figure (coat), and it seems to have an abundance of deco in the interior that you'll never see on your shelf. (I'd lose it, personally.) The Landspeeder was $68 after the price increases, and I would consider that Luke a deluxe pack-in because of all the gear. If that feels right, then the INT-4 is $12 more than the Landspeeder, and given that this will probably sell fewer units I assume someone could have said "let's round it up to $80 and see if it sells at a lower run." But I don't know that to be a fact.

Hasbro can and probably will make a few more AT-RTs down the road for The Black Series - in their shoes, I would.

We haven't seen sign of Hasbro wanting to do cheaper stuff, either. Fans demand more detail, and Hasbro is too happy to make it for us and charge accordingly. Fans wanting a more moderate, cheaper experience may be legion but they're silent. They just ignore an item and don't write about it, and a faction of moderates is unlikely to ever change public opinion on toys.

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2. You have mentioned in some of your Star Wars retro reviews that some of the sculpts look "too digital". Is this the reason that the ReAction+ GI Joe figures don't look right (to me, at least)? I think the Operation: Recall figures are closer to actual Joes.
--David

Digital sculpting lets you take any design and make it perfect. You can put in the joints exactly, everything lines up, and everything can be smooth, straight, round, or whatever impossible-to-sculpt shape you want. This runs counter to how most of us remember our toys as asymmetrical, sometimes lumpy, with hunched-over posture and generally riddled with imperfections from the sculpting process. A bent ankle or a twisted wrist might have come out of a break and a repair during the analog creative process. Digital can always be perfect. You can flip one leg over 180 degrees and have a precise copy, and that would have been more or less impossible 30 years ago.

I had an extended conversation with someone (well, someones) in the biz, one of whom had much to say on this very topic (as well as some interesting ways to work around it.) The long and short of it can be attributed to experience and equipment. A pre-digital sculptor with digital tools can probably make something that looks like it wasn't designed in a computer pretty easily, as they may be less likely to mirror-flip an arm or just use a perfect cylinder to make ammo on a figure (cough cough Retro Cad Bane.) Many digitally sculpted figures are very good, but I've seen a few guys that start to be the same pose, with the same posture, and shapes that seem a little too perfect. (Also, some of Kenner's original figures seem to be built over other figure sculpts. It happens! People are busy! Look at Han Classic and Hoth, or Bossk and Blue Snaggletooth.) The Retro Collection Rebel Fleet Trooper and Captain Antilles have pockets and elements that seem more or less layered on top of a basic buck, and while they look OK they seem to be missing something from the original Kenner Rebel Commander or Rebel Soldier.

The imperfections you can really only get with a knife or other tool are difficult but not impossible to replicate in a 100% digital environment. We see a mix in Operation: Recall, most of those figures were sculpted by hand, scanned, and refined. If memory serves the story for Glyos Infinite Pheyden was that he was sculpted digitally but given an analog post-production to get the details right, and many of those indie Glyos figures are given a lot of love by multiple hands to get them a distinct texture that feels a bit more at home next to other toys.

I'm generally very fond of Operation: Recall but every now and again there's a tiny texture or piece that looks a little too perfect. (And if you watch their production videos, sometimes you can prove that it was indeed added digitally later.) They're still excellent and have their own little weirdsies, like they're overly glossy and it looks like some of the detail was lost in the conversion from a hand-sculpted 2-up to a digital final product. They're still some of my absolute favorite retro-style figures of any kind, and are worth a look.

No shade against Super7 - they make incredible stuff. Some of their G.I. Joe figures are a little too straight and perfect, but my complaint is that they're too good in spots. I've only bought a handful (OK a few hands full) and have generally been very pleased with the stuff I've got. Their O-Ring Joes, Micronauts, and Universal Monsters are totally worth your while, and I'm very keen on their Kenner-style Planet of the Apes, Universal Monsters, Godzilla, and many other lines. Who else would make you Svengoolie? Their head sculpts are, across the board, entirely excellent. But I wasn't crazy about Vincent Price's posture and limbs - I'm nitpicking, of course, but their Cornelius is an absolute treasure. I should add, I do not know which technique(s) Super7's many sculptors use but I know one of the guys is an old-school Kenner guy and one of the guys uses more modern techniques... and there probably a great many others I haven't stumbled across personally or through friends yet. Nothing is 100% perfect and as adults we're going to spend hours nitpicking everything anyway.

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The Mandalorian and Grogu is streaming on Disney+. If you missed it, go watch it. You probably have the day off.

Got a burning question? How about a writing prompt with a question mark at the end of it? Email me with Q&A in the subject line. Due to work travel, I may skip 9/14 Q&A unless I can get it wrapped up early. (Can you believe I used to get so many questions we did 5 updates of 10 questions each some weeks? Crazy.)

Got a buck you won't miss? I could really use it if you feel like you might kick in $1 to my Patreon. I just found out that a significant source of support is being lost and Patrons have been declining (but I thank anyone who's ever given anything, even just a like or your eyeballs.) Big bills in October: 2027 hosting bill has gone up. If you have $1, or $10, or anything it all goes back to the site or buying things to take pictures or write about on the site. (Who am I kidding, I don't get enough extra to pay for toys from this site.)

I'm also all ears if there's anything you guys want to see or read about - like I said, this project doesn't make me any actual real money... but it should be entertaining for me and for you. That's why I review two figures every week along with this Q&A - the more figures I find, the more questions I get, the more stuff I'll write when time allows.

One thing you didn't ask for: I am doing a The Retro Collection Info Dump with lists and tallies because I find it amusing to do so, and handy to have answers to questions like "how many droids have they made?" or "how many figures have lightsabers?" at a glance. Did you know that 66 of the 108 figures were store exclusives, at least at first? It's true! If you have any questions like that you think others would like answered, just let me know. I'm not saying I can do it, but I'm super curious what people find useful.

I realize this is all very self-serving, but I need questions and I'm actually curious what all you guys want to know more about. I'm working on another Retro-style page for another Kenner-flavor toy line I've been low-level obsessed with as of late, although it's not nearly as big yet. I'd love it if more fans put stuff like this together so I can get answers to whatever questions I have, because it's insightful to realize the original The Transformers 1980s line was way bigger than I remember (thanks, Greg and TFWiki!) or that Retro is actually more or less getting the same average of figures per year as we got in the 1980s. Can an AI do that for you?

...It can? Well... is it fact-checked and grammatically dubious? Ha-ha, the human spirit triumphs again.

I've been up to writing reviews of new figures - actual, new figures - for The Vintage Collection so we'll be shifting hard into those (and some Disney droids) now that we're almost done with Retro reviews for the year. There are some reused elements, but the results are generally very good. This doesn't mean you should junk the old ones - with rising prices, you might find yourself happy with what you already own. I'll have more on that over the next month and change.

--Adam Pawlus

Got questions? Email me with Q&A in the subject line now! I'll answer your questions as soon as time (or facts) permit.

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