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2008 San Diego Comic-Con Wrap-up7-30-2008The 2008 San Diego Comic-Con ended on Sunday and by all accounts it was another success. The various Star Wars license holders were in attendance and all showed off new product of some sort. I'm going to do a brief review of some of the new product that was shown and that we can expect to see hit the market over the next several months or early into 2009. Acme ArchivesAcme started a new line of Character Keys in support of Star Was: The Clone Wars which will be opening in theaters on August 15th. The line showcases the new art style of the characters and kicked off with Yoda. While the Character Keys look to continue, Acme also expanded on their Sketchplate offerings with a C-3PO and introduced a new, larger sized metal art piece that we could see in the future. The prototype they showed off was a Star Destroyer etched on metal in a similar manner to the Sketchplates. This one, however, is about 10 times larger than what we've seen in the Sketchplate line. Rumors of a $400+ price tag put this out of the reach of many, but it's still an interesting piece. Diamond Select ToysDiamond is jumping into the Star Wars market with their new 1/4 scale figures. Some were shown off at Toy Fair this year while a couple, including Darth Maul, were shown at Wizard World Philly (I still wish I'd photographed them, 'no photography' card or not). Adding to the previously shown Obi-Wan and Maul we should also be on the lookout for Hoth Han Solo and possibly an Emperor Palpatine. eFxeFx picks up where Master Replicas left off with the license to produce lightsabers, helmets and a line of models which was previously was called "Studio Scale" by MR. The frist eFx model shown off was Luke Skywalker's Red Five X-Wing. The first helmet, which has already gone on sale, was the Stormtrooper helmet. Newly shown helmets at SDCC include Darth Vader, based on McQuarrie's artwork, and an AOTC styled Clone Trooper. Continuing the lightsaber line, eFx will be offering two styles; Limited Edition and Extreme Edition. In the Limited Edition line you can look forward to Ahsoka's hilt. For the Extreme Edition, be prepared for removable parts and internal detail. eFx showed off Obi-Wan Kenobi's lightsaber from A New Hope at the show. FunkoFunko started offering Star Wars Bobble-Heads earlier this year (or the end of last, I'd have to look) and they look to expand their offerings in the future. That included an SDCC exclusive Han Solo in Stormtrooper gear. Gentle GiantGentle Giant always brings big, if not always welcome, news to SDCC and this year was no different. They showed off multiple products in all their various lines as well as a couple new areas. Mini BustsMini Busts are always a big draw for GG and they brought probably their biggest announcements to this line for the year. There are several exclusives to look forward to and some that haven't been announced yet where they're going. I posted these to the front page the other day but I'm listing them here again.
A couple of them, including the TIE Pilot and Airborne Trooper were announced just before SDCC but were really being shown off for the first time in San Diego. MaquettesGentle Giant's line of maquettes which began with animated versions of the Clone Wars characters and expanded to movie characters will get back to basics with troopers from the upcoming The Clone Wars movie and TV show. The Troopers have different colors but were listed as "pending approval" so they may change. The red trooper appeared to be in the style of Command Fox' troops from the Hasbro line. We should learn more about these as they get closer to production.
Statues & Other
Bust-UpsAlthough the Bust-Ups line hasn't had many Star Wars offerings in a while, GG showed a new set called Armada 2 which includes several Clone Troopers. This appears to be a sequel to the animated set with Saesee Tiin and Clones that came out last year. KustomzI think the items shown at SDCC had been announced previously, but they showed a Jawa with Sandcrawler and Darth Vader with Star Destroyer. Scaled HelmetsThis is a new line for Gentle Giant and they pick up where Master Replicas left off. Actually, based on what was shown, they may be covering some of the same ground as MR, at least at first. The helmets shown included;
Bronze Mini Busts & StatuesThis appears to be a new line for Gentle Giant and they were showing off a bronze Obi-Wan Kenobi bust from his appearance in A New Hope and a Yoda statue from Empire Strikes Back. HallmarkThe newest releases from Hallmark debuted a couple of weekends ago but they are already looking forward to 2009. What we can expect are the following pieces;
HasbroMost of what Hasbro showed off will come in before the end of the year with a handful of items expected in the first quarter of 2009. I'm not going to cover all of them here, I tried to incorporate most of them into the 2008 Checklist. So, take a look at the checklist for most of Hasbro's announcements for the coming months. KotobukiyaKoto showed off their ongoing releases of the Bounty Hunters and the build-a-figure Darth Vader as well as new items in support of The Clone Wars. Although it debuted at Celebration IV, Koto also had their ARTFX Statues
LegoWith the launch on Saturday, most of the items from Lego are now on store shelves, including the exclusives at Toys-R-Us. However, Lego did show off their newest sets, including the upcoming Brickmaster exclusive Republic Assault Cruiser mini set. I'm going to list them here just because Lego doesn't seem to get a lot of coverage from some of the bigger sites.
Museum Replicas LimitedMuseum Replicas Limited has been in the business of creating period costumes and weapons for several years now. With the loss of the prop license by Master Replicas, new companies were brought on board to fill the gap. eFx picked up helmets, models and lightsaber hilts while GG got the scaled helmets and Hasbro snagged the FX lightsabers. Museum Replicas came in with costumes. Showing at SDCC were complete Jedi outfits including everything from the boots to belt pouches, tunics and cloaks. They also showed off an Imperial outfit with pants, tunic and hat and at least two different Padme outfits. It'll be interesting to see where they go from here. I know that armor was a rumor for a possible expansion to their offerings. Sideshow CollectiblesPretty much everything that Sideshow had to show off for Comic-Con also went up for pre-order over the weekend. Included in that list were the 1:6 Darth Vader, Stormtrooper and Rebel Fleet Trooper as well as the 1:1 General Grievous bust and the imported Jawa VCD from Medicom. Pre-orders for Star Wars: Frames also began over the weekend. In the Premium Format line they showed off a Tusken Raider which is also available now for pre-order. SDCC did, however, give people first looks at the 1:6 versions of Ki-Adi-Mundi and Obi-Wan in Clone Trooper armor. While not new for the weekend, they are recent additions to the Sideshow lineup. The only new items that I think I can find to point out are Medicom items that will be imported to the US by Sideshow. They include an ANH version of Han Solo in the Real Action Hero line and a new VCD Darth Maul. Super 7Super 7 appears to be a new license holder and they displayed a Stormtrooper Jumbo Sacale Edition prototype at Comic-Con this weekend. According to the information posted with it, the Stormtrooper will be made in Japan of blow-molded plastic with a vinyl head. It will have wheels in the feet and a "secret missile firing mechanism." No price or release information was included. Hopefully we'll hear more about this as it gets closer to release. Wrap-upOut of all the announcements made over the weekend, the ones most interesting to me were the Gentle Giant AT-AT Driver mini bust and some of the upcoming Hasbro toys in both the Clone Wars and Legacy Collection lines. In general, it's more of the same from the various companies involved with Star Wars product. No new lines or were announced from the big three of Hasbro, Gentle Giant and Sideshow, just continuations on their existing lines. It will be interesting if the new animated television show eventually opens things up for new ideas or if we'll just continue with what's already established. Other than some fall toy fair events the next big announcement venue will be Toy Fair in 2009. Obviously other stuff will be out, we don't yet know about all of Hasbro's plans for Christmas store exclusives, for example, but there are some interesting items coming in the next few months to tide us over. |
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