Oh wow, dudes, its totally Matty's Basement!
God... Mattel fundamentally does not understand that we are adults do they? But yeah - that's "Matty's Basement" mentioned in all of the press releases. Two chairs and couch that are barely used because people cant rightly tell if they're for attendees, employees or display.
Mattel offered three non-exclusives for sale, 3-packs from JLU available here before distribution out to stores. Not sure how Target feels about that or what kind of distribution they'll get, but at $20 each its pretty much break even for collectors these days. Yeah, I got a set.
Young Justice
Looked better in person than I expected so I may be getting these. At the "Methods & Mayhem" panel Danielle said these are 4¼" so that they and the Hall of Justice, etc., will fit in with JLU. Um... what about the highly stylized look of each line? And I appreciate the idea of that shared scale, but I'd far rather see these at 3¾" or maybe even 4" than 4¼"
6" Red Arrow was unveiled, but I didn't get a chance to ask about ask about the different paint decos between the 2-up and the 1:1, nor the price point. Considering the accessories and bases, it's not going to be pretty. The 6" figures also look smaller than I expected in person, but I'm guessing that's because they're "teen" sized like the DCUC16 Robin.
W.W.E.
No interest so I didn't even bother. Sorry, kids.
DC Action League
Cool new figures, but we're already getting to repaints and re-releases in Series 3. Wouldn't be Mattel if they didn't skimp on the tooling.
Green Lantern Movie
Okay, so here's some good stuff. First up, let me give you the world premiere of the silhouette for the movie version of the Parallax Entity!
I also got a chance to talk to Mike, a designer for Mattel and he told me some really stuff that's either really juicy or completely off base (I'm tempted to assume the latter since some of it conflicts with everything I've read from Toy Fair and seen on pre-order websites).
Parallax will be 15" tall or more (he just held up his hands, didn't give a number), its the tallest BAF CnC they've ever done. A lot of the limbs will be bendy rather than articulated and the whole piece will have translucent elements. It'll also have two interchangeable heads! The studio didn't have a finalized design for Parallax when they need to start their production cycle, so the Horsemen worked with the filmmakers to finalize the design as they sculpted the figure - pretty cool.
Mike did say the Movie Masters series would include non-Lanterns in future waves, but they wont be doing "Pilot Hal" or anything, those kinds of "real world" variations will only be in the 4.25" line. I asked him if Hector Hammond would be in the line and he was evasive. I asked what non Lanterns we would see and he said, (inviso-text for possible spoilers)
Yellow Lanterns and Red Lanterns. He did at one point mention Yellow Sinestro. It would make sense as a cheap and easy repaint but be a bummer if that costume is in movie 1. Having read "Secret Origin" I could see Atrocitus appearing in the film, though.
So either he just let slip some major spoilers, or he is totally full of baloney. He did say there would be a Movie Masters Guardian. I also asked if there would be more Green Lantern Classics, and he said there would be one more series (but Danielle explicitly said there would not be during the panel the next day).
The 4.25" line is going to be available in multiple formats, for instance single cards and multi-packs (3 and 5 figure sets) and Mike said that there would not be duplicates throughout, so at least repaints in the box sets. We'll see... The single-carded figures each come with a GL ring. Target gets a series of translucent, light-up figures (Hal, Abin Sur, Sinestro) and Wal*Mart gets a wave of GL/Guardian two-packs, and the Guardians will come with alternate heads in those sets (he made it sound like they'll be packed with two interchangeable heads like the characters in GLC). The Guardians will come with a little hover base too.
He also said that Batman Legacy would be 4 to 5 figure waves, and that the videogame figures would only be available on single cards, not in two packs. So again... what?
Regardless of the confusion, it was a decent booth and having toy companies present is always far better than not, so it was nice to see them there. The GL stuff looks really good in person, so I'll probably be buying into that expensive nightmare.
"Oh wow, dudes, its totally Matty's Basement!"
I expected more bondage gear.
Basement? Huh?
It's really hard to imagine the GL stuff looking good in person, because it looks SO BAD in every photo, both press shots and pictures in the wild...
Some of the Matty press material hyped that "Matty" was bringing "his" basement out for the conventions... like he has some moveable man-cave that proves he's a rad fan like the rest of us.
What can I say - the GL stuff looks better to me. Abin Sur is not so good, though. I think its really the paint. In "real" life the metallic sheen really helps give more life to the sculpts and the collection.
First up, Matty is not "cool" like the rest of us. He's a bit of an ass, no?
With the way Matty mattels its fans it's no wonder he's got a fully bricked out basement whilst my basement man/geek cave is rafters and unfinished drywall.
What's up with the Castle Greyskull diorama? That thing looks awesome. Any word if Matty is putting that sucker out or should I just order up some modelers clay and go at it already?
you should get the clay - that's just the display they set up for the box...
OK I'm not a mathematician or anything but a 14-piece rubbery CnC movie Parralex at $17-$20 per movie master 6"er is like what...$300 or something. How long ago did I spend $50 to CnC my 5-figure DCUC series 1 Metamorpho Element Man? Not that long ago! I don't think there's enough vaseline and KY jelly at the corner pharmacy to get me through the Matteling that is the pending Movie Masters Parralex series.