1. Mild rant coming... Does Hasbro think collectors don’t have jobs? Why do all the pre-order windows start at 1 PM EST? What congressman do I have to write? I’m now up to the fifth or sixth collectable that I’ve miss out simply because I had to work. Furthermore, how can a pre-order be sold out? Is not the whole idea that one gets a count before making the call to manufacturing?

--Dan

I've asked around about some of this, and the general reason was to try to have a pre-order time that works globally. (This is the problem when multiple bigger, multinational companies have to coordinate.) 1:00 PM Eastern means the USA is awake... but also Australia and the UK. I wouldn't be at all surprised if they assume everybody can take a bathroom break, or lunch break, or whatever at that time, but I have no idea what the consideration is there. I doubt Hasbro expects things to sell out in 30 seconds, as if increasingly common.

I've missed a few pre-orders even though I was sitting there hitting "reload." It's infuriating. Heck, it's part of what caused my completist nature to crumble - you have to work really hard to give them money for premium-priced repaints of figures you may already own one, two, or more times over. Also some stores like GameStop are marking down exclusives pretty quick - I saw Boss up for less than I paid for him at GameStop mere weeks after mine arrived. That's no good.

Lead times are tough. Late last year, it was a minimum of 90 days for an item to get put on a boat in China, swim across the ocean, and arrive at its final retail destination. We've seen items take as long as six months on the water, to say nothing of manufacturing delays. So consider this - if Hasbro gives Target an exclusive with an ETA of July right now, in theory the production has been completed and it's on the way. If it's October, that means manufacturing could be starting in a month or two - but you still have to ramp up to production by sourcing your plastic pellets and cardboard so you can make the stuff. Also you have to allocate resources at your factory - if Target ordered figures, and Walmart needs figures too, you can't just tell Walmart to wait so you can keep the line producing more of Target's exclusive. (Or you can, but you probably shouldn't.) There are a lot of factors at stake here that can make it difficult to make changes to production run sizes on the fly, many of which I can't talk about for various reasons (for example, I don't know all of them.)

If Hasbro only make (I'm making up a number that I know is incorrect) 10,000 of a collectible for Walmart, remember that Walmart has to allocate some to its stores and some to its web site. If each store wants 4-5 figures, that may only leave 2,000 or so for the web site to sell, and those can sell pretty quickly as people order 2 or more figures each. And they want those items to sell through - collectibles that don't sell out are a liability. Since 1995 the rule seems to be any figure a fan owns and sees is a pegwarmer, while any figure they can't find means that it was underproduced and there are terrible distribution problems. This fan definition will never change.

Now when an item is a year or more out, I assume there's no reason they couldn't increase the size of the order. With sick factory workers, missed shifts, and other complications, you've still got regular, normal product to crank out with reduced capacity. In a normal year where COVID doesn't exist - and that's not where we are now - things could be smoother. We're in a weird era now where toy sales are more online than ever, and both production and delivery are more disrupted than any time in my life. I don't expect it will be fixed. I mean, look at this hobby - we've been collecting Kenner figures in the current era since 1995. Distribution and nailing production numbers has always been difficult because you can't predict hoarders, scalpers, kids, or a total lack of interest. Stuff may get dumped. Stuff may oversell. If I or someone else could predict exactly what the market wants, I assure you, we would be much better paid.

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2. I think Hasbro has done a good job recently producing playsets to manage costs (the $50 point), leverage modularity (most of them) and optionally offer immersive detail for those who want to pay (e.g., Razor Crest). None of them quite hit the value/price ratio for me, but I thought maybe the Navarro Cantina would be it. Looked like it would be fun to put the retro figures in there. I found it fair but annoying the way the first promo picture has TWO of the sets. Realizing that the "back side" of the walls is basically open-grid mold lines was disappointing, especially considering the scenes in the show with Gideon outside and Mando inside (the best use of "moldside" was in the Kenner Well of Souls set mummy wall, the whole set a great example of the minimum amount of plastic with the maximum play features). But what pushed it over into officially lame is that the changeable window (a great idea) and the door are both cardboard inserts and look awfully cheesy from the back. So close. I would much rather have had plastic doors/window, or another half-wall with a grate in the bottom, or a cardboard floor with plastic foot-pegs, than the pack-in trooper. What's your take on this set?

--Michael

I kept putting off opening it. So I guess I'll just open that Cantina now.

It's not what I wanted - but I bought it, and that's how success works. A lot of us continue to purchase things that aren't necessarily exciting, so stores say "we want more of that kind of thing" and Hasbro says "you got it, boss." I don't hate it - but of all the playsets (including Walmart's relatively small Jabba's Palace) I would say the Nevarro Cantina is my least favorite... and I really wish they tossed in something like The Client to make it compelling. Compared to what Hasbro has previously sold us for $40-$50 - 6-inch Tauntauns, leader-class Transformers, G.I. Joes with big animal friends, and so on. This is walls, cardboard, and some glassware with a repack of a figure we've already got. It's not interestingly complex and there's no floor or base.

I thought Razor Crest was more or less fine for the asking price - it's an expensive toy vehicle, but a very cheap high-end prop replica. It hits a weird sweet spot that's just fine, much like the pricey Sail Barge. But when you start selling a couple of walls and stools for $50, I do start to wonder if an inspired fan could make something better for cheaper.

Hasbro has been paying attention to Etsy and fan-made accessory packs (see also: Transformers King Starscream in 2022, 2020's Centurion Drone with accessory pack) for fan-made gear spat out of 3-D printers or whatever low-run steel molds get cut. And they want a piece of it. Hasbro's Nevarro Cantina is a lot like some of those barstools or walls fans buy and profess to love on other fan sites. You get a bar, 2 1/2 walls, 2 stools, and a smattering of barware with two hateful small accessories - tiny shotglasses that are completely clear and will be lost by you before you sell them. Trust me on this. You're going to lose them.

The walls are reconfigurable so you can buy two and make a bigger set - and maybe for $35, you would. They bundled a repack of a Death Trooper in there so you can't get it for that price, which is disappointing. As is, it's just a couple of walls you can throw in your IKEA shelves to stand some figures around. There are no play features, nor are there figures to sit at the bar. Nor a The Client to hang out there. It doesn't serve a whole lot of a purpose beyond being a background, but compared to comparable fan-made items it's a fair value. A similarly priced item from a fan on Etsy is significantly smaller with fewer parts and features. Hasbro's Nevarro Cantina is somewhat comparable to some Playmobil items for the price, but those are more durable. Hasbro's offering has a cardboard door that falls off its mount, plus another cardboard piece to add visual flair. For $50 I don't want cardboard, but, again, this seems to be what the market charges for this kind of item nowadays.

If the Nevarro Cantina is the format all future playsets will take, I'd hope Hasbro stops making new ones. If it's just another iteration in a series of things that looks different every time - which has been the case thus far - hey, nothing is so good everybody, all the time, always loves it.

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FIN

Be sure you send in your questions for next time. The mailbag is out of on-topic questions, so if you got some, send some in.

One of the things I look forward to is regular updates from Jayson over at Yakface about how many pre-orders are still open. Right now, it's 77 items (mostly figures) - and that's quite a bit, with a tsunami coming up between unannounced Obi-Wan stuff and May the 4th and goodness knows what other pre-orders. What's particularly funny to me is "collect all 77" is what Kenner had for us back in 1984, just before they rolled out Paploo and Lumat at the end of Return of the Jedi (and of course The Power of the Force stuff.) Now this also includes some prop items, but that's a pretty huge number when you figure out that the cheapest things on the list are about $12 and the most expensive are around $250.

What's also kind of interesting when you go over the list is just how much of it isn't really new... there are loads of repacks, repaints, and retools with very little in the way of 100% new never-before-made stuff. Looking it over now, do you know how many of the figures are from the original (or prequel, or sequel) film trilogies that haven't previously had an action figure made from 1995-2022?

One.

So if you're a movie completist and are bored, or feel like things aren't to your specific tastes, that may be why.

Everything else is from streaming, expanded universe/comic, or a new take on something that's already in your collection (or buyable on eBay). That isn't to say there's not some good stuff in there - I'm very much looking forward to my retro Kenner-style figures, and the Droids cartoon figures, but it's kind of amazing that we are in a space where things are more expensive but somehow also increasingly removed from the film series we all started loving in the first place. The new stuff ain't bad - new Figrin D'an, a remake of a Bespin Guard, these are all interesting enough. But the photoreal repaints are getting a little thin. Thankfully there's only so many you can re-re-redo.

It's a pretty good time to be a new collector, a streaming fan, a comic or video game fan, or someone looking to do some upgrades, but seeing as how there are more new things from Battlefront than there are from nine movies, well. That's where we are right now. I'm glad a lot of this is The Mandalorian stuff, but it's also pretty vexing that fans still can't go to the store (or a dozen stores) and find a Darth Vader, a Boba Fett, or a Mando right now. (Unless you want the 6-inch kid line or Mission Fleet, that is.)

There's still a lot to like coming up, but when you look at the whole completism thing - and soon to be the whole packaging shifts, and possibly another new movie line (but I am starting to bet against a new film in 2023) - I guess there's never been a better time to take stock of what you have and ask "well, what is it I don't have and really want?"

And then say, with a proud, unified voice, one word. Vlix.

--Adam Pawlus

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