Sunday began just as predicted and feared: with all needed exclusives being sold out.
I hurried down to the convention center, arriving a few minutes before opening and was ushered upstairs to the cattle lines for entry. Fortunately they had already started letting people enter so my wait time was minimal. Once on the floor I rushed to Mattel to discover that contrary to what I had been told by multiple Mattel employees every day previous, Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man was indeed sold out (I arrived 10 minutes after the "official" opening of the Hall) and there was never any allotment set aside for Sunday! A quick rush over to Gentle Giant revealed much the same for Squirrelpool. Bastards.
The day then became a stroll-a-palooza in preparation for last minute deals towards the close of the show. The highlight was a lifetime grail - the Shuttle Tydirium for a mere $65 (this was the FAO Schwartz version), which I had been pining for since a childhood sighting at the local KB. What else? Nothing that sticks out in my mind at the present but clearly many purchases were had.
However, continuing with the Star Wars theme, Hasbro managed to sneak out two full series of "Vintage Line" figures - one Phantom Menace themed and the based on (mostly if not fully ROTJ) deleted scenes from the upcoming Blu-Ray release. I'm oddly pleased to see the additional/missing "Sand Storm" characters, and always a sucker for new Mon Calamarians. While I generally hate podracers I have developed a disconcerting and odd nostalgia for TPM so am pleased to see a bunch of new figures and two desperately needed redos ("desperately"? That's admittedly going too far). I also stumbled across the amazing Godzilla'n'Friends attack SDCC diorama at the Blue Fin booth - too damned amazing that Godzilla is super-articulated and promises to be a must-have import. Other highlights included the stunningly detailed $5,000 Enterprise A model, complete with lights and fully realized hull interior! Then of course there is the cool prop booth with the ZX-1 from The Fifth Element and the scale model of Spaceballs 1 from Spaceballs!
I had mistakenly thought the Hall closed at 4pm this year rather than 5pm, so I bought the Tydirium around 3:50, and by 4:30 I had had my fill of aimless wandering while toting that behemoth and decided to head back to the hotel/car even though the show wasn't over yet. Since I left early, and it turned out to be right on my way, I ended up swinging by the local mall that had the first release of the Future Foundation Minimates. I was somewhat surprised to see that they had just a small amount stashed back behind the counter, but got a set for myself and for yo before pounding some Panda Express in preparation for the 2-3 hour sojourn back to Los Angeles.
And thus concluded my 14th annual San Diego Comic Convention pilgrimage.
I did manage to get the Marshmallow Man off of Mattel's site, which is probably all for the best since the box is unmanageably hugantic.