Recon Ravage, Robot Heroes Reviews, and Hasbro vs. Mattel

You're listening to the GeekCast Radio Network,

a podcast. Cliffjumper, commence countdown. Five.

Four. Three. Tune in next week for a much better

episode. For now, though, courage. Hello, and

welcome to the 48th episode of Toycast, sponsored

by BigBadToyStore .com, where you can save from

2290 % on over 1 ,000 items. I'm your host, GFG1Mike,

and joining me is GeneralTechno. Hello. Hello

there. How are you? I'm pretty good, yourself?

I'm pretty good. I, see, we've, we just released

episode 47. This probably won't go up until Monday

or Tuesday. Episode 50, obviously, is fast approaching.

I will say it here and I will also say it whenever

I record Episode 49. Because of the deadline

of the voicemails that I've made for people to

call in, once we record and release Episode 49,

Episode 50 will not come until after March 21st.

That's perfectly fair. It may not come until

April. I don't know yet. It just depends on um...

on how many people call in right now we've had

one calling for that uh... so far and as far

as the call -ins basically what we're looking

for is uh... you know if you guys want fans wanna

call in wish us a happy fiftieth episode or having

fifty episodes of the show or if you want to

do a toy review that's fine uh... there's no

real time limit because i mean Last time in episode

25, I said, you know, keep it under a minute.

Well, a lot of people tell me, I don't know if

I can even talk for a minute. So just, you know,

as long as you don't go, I would say don't go

over five minutes, obviously. But you can send

the mp3 files to tfg1podcast .gmail .com or you

can call the voicemail number 502 -526 -5821.

Deadline is March 21st. reasonable enough? Yes.

You could always just slow down releasing the

48 and 49 if you're concerned about catching

up quickly. Well, no. I mean, hell, I'm actually

surprised that we've actually gotten to the point

where we're almost at 50 episodes because for

a while there, I had backlogged episodes 39 to

43. I mean episode 39 to 42 those weren't released

right away like normal so I think what I'm probably

going to do is once after episode 50 is released

I will start doing more backlogging getting you

know not really running out of toys but not releasing

them all at once like I have a crap ton of toys

I can talk about now Because I've gotten all

the Mighty Mugs and, well, not all of them, but

I've gotten a lot since, you know, since, you

know, when I first started the show where...

Fuckin' Silverbolt, you drunk bastard. Um...

But yeah. Which, Silverbolt, G1, or Universe?

Beast Wars Robot Heroes. Oh. Oh, cooking with

Silverbolt, Silverbolt. I hate that. I hate this

figure. The easy way to look at it is think about

it as if you've ever read Shane's comics on TFW

2005 for a while, well before this figure came

out he had a little segment in this photo comic

called Cooking the Silver Bolt. Silver Bolt would

essentially be an arguably insane TV show chef.

The figure works perfectly because it looks like

he's holding two chafes of wheat. Yeah, these

aren't even knives or swords or anything. They

look like two giant leaves from the Amazon jungle.

I know what they're supposed to be, but they're

not a very good likeness of them. No, not at

all. Oh, crap. I assume you saw those Iron Man,

that war machine that you linked to the other

day or whatever? The Mighty Mugs one? I have

it. Oh, you got that. Sweet. You didn't see the

picture? Okay, I didn't realize it was yours.

I think mmm Just posted the picture. That's awesome.

Oh when I mentioned John Favreau no I am no that's

mine cool. Let's see here Because it's a nice

-looking figure But yeah, he's uh he is pretty

awesome Michael Wilson asked me if the The guns

were interchangeable with other Mighty Mugs like

Megatron, and no, they're not. The holes are

different. Yeah, that doesn't surprise me. It

doesn't matter either way, because the, you know,

why would you want them to be interchangeable?

Maybe you could put a fusion cannon. No, I've

got the video up for you, but I forgot. I left

it on Zoom. The only reason I could think of

is maybe if you wanted a fusion cannon on War

Machine's shoulder. No. But yeah, that looks

like a really nice figure. Well, the fusion cannon

wouldn't fit on War Machine's shoulder. The reason

being because... Look how deep the hole is. Yeah,

it's pretty deep. Megatron's hole is not that

wide because this is War Machine's Gatling gun.

I tried putting this on Megatron. And this part

here, the little peg here, sticks out halfway.

It's like it's... it's like... I don't know.

I'll show you later. Didn't that mean it's possible

to put the fusion cannon on War Machine, though?

Fuck it, I'll go get Megatron. No, I don't think

so, because the Megatron peg is too small. Okay,

just because if it's too small, then I think

it would still fit in. See, look at the Megatron

peg. Yeah. That's way too small. And see, look

at Megatron's hole. Right, right. The hole is

too shallow. So if we put... Well, no. It's barely

in there. It's not even gonna... If I touch it,

it's gonna move. I mean the... The peg is just

sitting there, so no, it won't. Okay. Still,

you can kind of get pictures of it, so it's not

all that bad. Yeah, but, I mean, again, why would

you want, you know, I mean, I don't see the appeal

of having War Machines, or having Megatron's

fusion cannon on War Machine, I just don't see

the appeal of that. And the other thing I meant

to mention, well, I don't know if you've listened

to it yet, it's out, but, i meant to mention

in episode forty seven that uh... because we

kind of just i kind of just talked about war

machine i didn't he wasn't the toy that i reviewed

obviously because i'm doing a robot heroes thing

but uh... what the hell was i going to say about

oh his head it turns very well with with having

the weapons there at first i thought wait they're

going to put weapons right next to his giant

friggin head And it's not going to turn, but

it actually does turn very well. Well, that makes

sense. It's a cylinder. So just based off simple

physics, it makes sense that it would turn no

problem, because it's just a cylinder. Right,

but the other thing, OK, well, the thing is,

if you have, say, I'm trying to think, because

you only have the deceptive, oh, Soundwave. Soundwave's

arm, same thing with Megatron, well, not Megatron,

but the thing with Soundwave's arm, when you

have Obviously, this is Megatron, but when you

have Soundwave's arm up like this, his gun comes

right here to his head. That's true. So it's

like, you know, how are you going to do, you

know, when you look at War Machine, you're thinking,

holy crap, his head's not going to turn whatsoever.

But it actually does. OK. Cool. So yeah, he's

very, very, very cool. Let me see. What about

here? The way here. Oh yeah, and here's this

one. Best one ever. I kind of regret passing

on a lot of those G -1 robots. He's too damn

small though! That's the only thing, the picture

that I have, it shows him as being ginormous.

And of course, I know they're robot heroes, they're

meant to be small incarnations of the characters,

but when I got him I was like, wow, this is tiny.

Yeah, most of my robot heroes, I've got, of the

G -1 robot heroes, I think... Mean I've got all

the Beast Wars ones that I saw come up here,

but I think that all the the only ones I don't

have our cheetah and tank or the Beast Machines

ones North America right, but I I do the G1 ones.

I think the only ones I actually have our Blitz

we I've got shockwave Grimlock blitzwing and

hound and I think that's it for those so yeah,

I've got I've got a whole ton of the movie ones,

but Yeah, the movie ones I don't like. And it's

not just me not liking movie toys. I just don't

find them cute. I've said this plenty of times

before. Give me G -1 Robot Heroes Ravage over

Movie Ravage any day, because Movie Ravage is

nothing but a shit -brown piece of toy plastic.

That's just my personal opinion about that toy.

That's fair enough. Although personally, I think

that the standout for the movie robot The movie

robot hero's standard is definitely this guy,

I think. Who? Just the Fallen that comes in the

five pack. Because he's giant and he's a cute

version of the movie Fallen. I don't really care

for... Oh, it's nice that he's larger than...

He's like twice as big as the average robot hero.

Yeah, but still, I don't know how you can make

movie design cute at all whatsoever. It just

doesn't work for me. Actually, it's funny you

mentioned Hound and Blitzwing. I'm going to probably

do a toy cast at some point. I don't know which

episode I'm going to do it yet, but whoever I'm

going to have on this episode, we're actually

probably going to talk about three toys each

because I'm probably going to tie the G1 Hound

and Blitzwing robot heroes in with my G1 Blitzwing

that I have. Cool, so Cuz yeah, I may just do

it as a comparison I may just do the robot heroes

as the discussion and just do the the G1 Blitzwing

is a comparison and they Talk about him. I don't

know whatever So what's been going on with you,

sir? Not much not much just standard stuff like

exams getting stuff occasionally. I'm doing a

rabbit. I'm doing a Ravage drive right now to

help out all of the the non Canadians, because

as some of you may know, in Canada, for some

reason or whatever, we ended up getting the recon

ravage the mail away figure for the nest line

in the US. We're getting him as a Toys R Us store

exclusive instead. And he's hit retail now. He's

like shipped it's like it's cases of just ravage.

So he's showing up like in pretty good numbers

when he does show up. And yeah, I'm just helping

out a bunch of people south of the border and

getting them some ravages that they don't have

to get all those toys and jump through the hoops

and get the Bumblebee Soundwave 2 -pack. I've

got like three ravages sitting in shoeboxes waiting

to get wrapped up and sent out. Right, yeah,

you know... I don't know, I'm really, really

hesitant on the repaints of Revenge Ravage because...

I like the first one because it's black, obviously.

I like the first one because it does have a purple

eye, because my two favorite colors are black

and purple. The repaints that I've seen, they

just don't do it for me, so I doubt that I'll

be getting Recon Ravage. Honestly, the purple

eye is my least favorite aspect of the original

Ravage because he had a red eye in the movies.

And I like my Decepticons with red eyes rather

than... purple that uh... doesn't really quite

well and it just blends in too much compared

to like a bright red of some sort so i actually

have some red paint i added to his eye to rectify

that a bit some red gundam marker paint but i

guess i'll hold off mentioning much about recon

ravage because i'm going to discuss them a bit

more once we get the main part of the show underway

not really that much else going on i don't think

Another thing I should probably do is I want

to just give a quick shout -out to Twitter user

Malunas for getting his hands on both of the

Toys R Us exclusive RC and Ratchet animated figures

for me. Lucky bastard. Well, I've sent him a

bunch of stuff. No, I meant just the fact that

he found them. Yeah, I know. It's lucky indeed.

Hopefully I'll have those in a few weeks. That'll

be a very nice thing indeed and thanks again

to him because it doesn't I figured that we probably

get those but given we've gotten ravage and I

Can't I'm very skeptical at this point that Ken

is gonna see those animated figures given we

got the ravage instead Well, you know the thing

is, you know, you know you guys about whenever

I have you and pro man on the show You guys always

and you know, it's it's dead on but you guys

always complain about the shipping costs to and

from Canada or whatever and that's probably why

they released it as a Toys R Us exclusive for

you guys so you wouldn't have to worry about

the mail away thing. You know that's true I also

suspect that because the way on my understanding

of the way it works is that Hasbro Canada takes

the exclusives and then they shop them around

to the retailers up here. It might just well

be that Toys R Us Canada had no interest in animated

exclusive. and they wanted something movie related

instead so Hasbro thought we can kill two Hasbro

Canada thought well we don't think we can pull

off this mail away promotion so let's kill two

birds with one stone and make these available

in Canada because everyone's eaten up movie stuff

like addictive candy or crack cocaine not me

I'm referring to retailers because that stuff

sells yeah true Don't know. All right, who are

you gonna be talking about? Well, I've got a

couple things I want to touch on but I'm mostly

gonna talk about one particular figure and that's

the Recon Ravage mail away exclusive that as

I mentioned is available through Toys R Us at

Canada to Canadians at just retail and it's going

to be a mail away in the nest promotion where

you get the bumblebee 2 -pack and two other nest

figures and collect all those stickers and you've

got yourself a ravage if you send them the shipping

money. Right. Anyway the big selling point on

this ravage as we've seen pictures is his chrome.

Now we haven't seen, I don't think we've seen

chrome on a Hasbro release transformer for quite

some time. Now Proto Man can probably correct

me on this if I'm wrong, but I don't think that

we've seen this since Beast Machines at least,

so. We might have had, there might have been

some in RID for all I, actually no wait, there

is some in RID because my Omega Prime has some

Chrome on him. But yeah, I think the last time

we saw Chrome in a Transformers line in North

America was the, excluding any masterpieces or

anything of the sort, was the RID line. So it's

been a while. And the chrome here is in a lot

of pictures early on it looked kind of haphazard

people thought but and The real leave the biggest

complaint that people have had which I don't

disagree with it All is that he has a back legs

aren't chrome. Where's the front legs are? When

you actually have them in hand the first thing

I noticed was just holy crap He has so much more

chrome than I first thought from initial pictures

Because he's really like they really did a very

good job in chroming him He's got in terms of

chromed parts. You've seen the pictures I post

fun if you want to see some pictures I posted

a bunch on my twit pic account, but he's got

The whole back the whole back shell there, you

know the separate piece that screws over top

the back that's The front legs are chromed. The

insides of the upper front legs are also chromed.

You can't see that from the at first but because

the outsides are painted with our black plastic

with painted red. The bottom jaw is chromed.

The little wings that fold out for his re -entry

mode are chromed. The guns are chromed and also

the pieces that his rear legs are attached to

that let the legs shift for when you transform

him. Do you know what I mean there? Yep. Like,

those are also chromed as well. So he's got a

lot of chrome on him. Like, seriously, he's...

This is a lot of... I don't think we've seen

this much chrome on a Transformer since, like,

the Transmetals line. Mm -hmm. In terms of, uh...

I mean, excluding anything Henke, like, even

Henke doesn't do this much chrome. They might

have done as much on the Galvatron, actually,

but... But it's... still a lot of chrome that's

why i'm trying to drive home and it accents and

the chrome accents paint scheme which is black

with a bunch of red and like some of the red

being faded red a gradient of red rather than

just straight on red so it looks really cool

in that sense and then a smattering of silver

and yellow highlights so the colors really pop

like if you look at the original the colors the

colors are kind of drabbed by comparison because

on this one the colors all complement themselves

really well and there's nothing that really blends

in so blends in for a boring so to speak like

it's just like you look at the figure from a

distance and it stands out right and that's like

there's some figures you want to you might want

to blend into the different distance but it's

always great to be able to look and glance and

have one figure that's just standing out there

That's just sitting out in the open waving. Right.

So it's like shattered glass ravaging the spirit

almost if not in colors in that you can clearly

see him there in the middle of your toys just

standing there waving at you. Yeah. But yeah,

he's that he's got yellow light piping as well,

which actually has a very interesting side effect

to it in that because they molded the because

all the gearing mechanisms were molded in yellow

plastic, including the little switch on his back.

Because it's clear yellow plastic, that means

you can see through it, unlike the purple clear

plastic on the original Ravage. So you can actually

see the little gears in there move when you open

and close his head. So you can see his working

one -track processor. it's a very nice very nice

deco just as posable as the original i did transform

to alt mode just to see what it looked like on

a whim and alt mode also looks really nice because

he's got a lot of chrome showing in alt mode

so a lot more chrome than not than not chrome

showing it almost seems so he again he looks

really nice in alt mode he looks nice to pose

the red stands out well and for those of you

who are voltron fans It sounds like this figure's

color scheme was modeled after the black lion

from Voltron. Yeah. And I like the nostalgia

factor for Voltron. I know what it is, I didn't

grow up on it though. But it looks, it's a very

nice color scheme. The red and black go really

well together and the chrome just makes it shine

and stand out brilliantly. The weakest part about

this figure is the gray plastic. And I honestly

think that the reason that they did that was

because that plastic is likely on a different

sprue than the stuff that they chromed. All the

stuff they chromed was originally black plastic,

I believe. So it was probably on its own sprue,

so they just said, let's just chrome all of this

stuff here. Right, yeah. Yeah, it looks really

nice. And there's something else I want to touch

on as well briefly, but I'll just let you do

your stuff first. No, you can go ahead. Okay

Okay, but I also want to touch on something else.

I got today. That's not transformers related,

but it's also pretty neat For those of you who

are into getting Japanese collectibles and stuff

There's a number of the stores online that have

sales on right now on different figurines and

such and I took advantage of one of those through

AmiAmi .com, their Japanese store, and they had

a big sale going on as well as 50 % off EMS shipping.

And I got something that was on my list of things

to pick up for a while, which is the Revoltech

Yoko figure from Gurren Lagann. It's the movie

version of the figure. And it's in their Fralline

series, which is basically just different anime

girls sort of thing. anime shows. And yeah, I'm

very impressed with this figure as well. I mean,

it's the first time I've had a Revoltec that

isn't a Gerd Magen robot and it looks pretty

good. She comes with a lot of accessories. She's

pretty poseable. She's got, it's the movie version,

so she's got an alternate hair piece which represents

her hair let down as we see in one scene as seen

in one of the scenes in the movie. Yeah, she's

overall she's got like she's got she's almost

got a dozen hands to swap in and out Because

you know the Japanese and their hand swapping

yeah and like a bunch of weapons and as with

Yoko in the series a skimpy attire which doesn't

really come up doesn't come off aside from the

scarf, but still I mean like it's Pretty much.

It's very accurate to her to her character design,

and pretty poseable. The only criticisms I really

have of this figure is that A, it's got only

two faces, because it has swappable heads, and

it would be nice to have more expressions. And

the other criticism is that one of the arms on

mine is a bit loose in the Revoltek joint. I

think it's a bit shallow, so it pops off a lot.

So it pops off really easily. It's something

that's probably fixable on my end, but it's still

a bit of a minor pain. Right. And she looks very

awesome, and she also looks... It's also very

awesome to take pictures of her doing stuff like,

say, petting Recon Ravage. And I'm planning on

doing one of her slapping Zap Brannigan later

on, once my camera's recharged. okay since I've

got the Futurama toy of him uh huh yeah I can

I used to watch Futurama it was okay I never

between Futurama Family Guy and American Dad

I don't know I just haven't really paid any attention

although I haven't really paid any attention

to any Fox animation in a long time Well, that's

fair enough. Although Futurama, what makes me

really excited is that it's coming back on TV

in June, so. Yeah. And yeah, big Futurama fan.

I got the DVD, all the DVDs for the re -released

direct -to -video movies. I don't have any of

the seasons, but I've seen like the episodes

on TV, pretty much all the episodes on TV, and

I mean, yeah, it's a fun series. It's good sci

-fi humor. You get a lot of... You get some pretty

cerebral jokes at times, which, like, you only

get if you actually know something about that

stuff, which are always great. I just find it

very hard to believe that Peggy Bundy is a one

-eyed wonder. You mean Leela? Yeah. Okay, well,

I mean, I... No, because Katie Sagal, who was

Peggy Bundy and married with children, voices

Leela. Well, I've never seen married with children,

so... Well, look it up on YouTube. I've heard

of it though. Well, look it up on YouTube when

we're done recording this, you'll... It's very...

Fox 90s, but it's... I don't know, parts of it

are funny. It just depends. So I will be talking

about continuing my robot heroes discussions.

I was going to do Megatron and Silverbolt from

the base storage line, but I'm going to actually

save that for whenever I have Steve Megatron

back on the show, because he is a Megatron fanboy.

But I'm willing to be doing G1 Thrust and Blaster.

Cool. I've seen those ones in the stores. Passed

I passed on them, but I mean we pass on the g1

ones I mainly got it for blaster thrust really

sucks Doesn't blaster have his Marvel comic head

If memory serves correctly yeah, he has like

this big cheesy grin on his face I Don't know

look it up on the wiki Yeah, I'm just looking

right now. Anyway, I'm going to start with Thrust

because he's the bad one out of the two, I think.

Much like last episode, no, episode 46 when I

talked about Waspinator and Rhinox, Thrust is

sitting on a giant tree, something, whatever.

He's molded to a stand. and it looks like he

has a giant stick up his ass. I think the only

good thing about this figure is the fact that

they did include obviously the Conehead. I do

like his color scheme. At least his Decepticon

symbol is not on his ass like some of the Beast

Wars ones are. I don't like them on these...

these posted these posted stains it just doesn't

uh... it doesn't really do it for me so anyway

uh... blaster i wish they would have packaged

him with soundwave it would have been much better

i think uh... but yeah he's uh... he's very cool

on mine his head doesn't turn that much it can

turn but it doesn't like go three sixty uh...

at least on mine anyway. But he's very, very

cool. For some strange reason, all the robot

heroes, especially the G1 ones, they're all in

some sort of crouching position like they're

gonna shit in the woods or something. Blame Pat

Lee. Well, I think we can blame Pat Lee for a

lot of things, but, you know... Like, stuff like

not painting Alex Milne? Well... Alright, I'm

not gonna get into semantics on on on that kind

of crap But one of the things about blaster is

his his right foot For some strange reason his

toe Where his his foot should be yes his toe

and his right leg is pointed upwards I don't

know if that's because it's just oh, I know why

it's kind of like you standing on his tiptoes,

okay? Okay, yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, it

makes sense. Well, it makes sense seeing him

once you're, you know, once you have him, you

know, standing on the desk, but just holding

him in your hand and looking at his right leg.

It looks like, holy crap, his foot shouldn't

bend that way. Yeah, I'm just looking at him

in these press photos here, and, like, that's

what it looks like it's supposed to be. Yeah.

Like him crouching. Yeah, I mean, he's really,

really cool. I wish they would have done... more

cassette characters for robot heroes like obviously

Ravage you know and I mean I'm not really going

to talk about Ravage in this episode because

I'm actually saving him for another episode but

I mean you know he's not one of these ones where

it's oh my god he's on a stand he's not he just

his hind legs make up a more solid base for him.

But anyway, I do wish they would have released

more cassette characters like Ram Horn or Steeljaw

or some of the other animals. Not really Eject

and Rewind. Well to be fair, I mean Ravage and

Lazerbeak are easily the most famous And Rumble

and Frenzy are easily the most famous cassette

characters Especially because I mean well Rumble

Lazerbeak and Ravage were the first ones so everyone

knows who they are actually no you're incorrect

Well, it wasn't late is there be the first one

that showed up in the series No, there's buzzsaw

That's buzzsaw on Seriously, that's buzz on the

Cybertron. Oh, I'd have to go you tell what in

more than meets the eye Yeah, I have to go back

and well, okay I'm pretty sure that I'm talking

about that like laser beacon ravage for the first

ones that premiered on the cartoon. Oh, right

Yeah, and then rumble rumble was I think rumble

has his following be simply because he wasn't

handled as a cassette He was handled as another

character who happened to go inside sound waves

chest. Yeah occasionally yeah yeah but um you

know overall I really dig the robot heroes they

are nice little mini incarnations of of characters

that we know and love for the most part I think

they could have done a better job with thrust

but I think that damnit Megatron stop being drunk

and falling down do that was horrible don't do

that again uh... better impressions in the past

yeah that was horrible uh... but you know i'd

like i said i wish they would have package who

does soundwave come with i don't even know soundwave

i think he comes with bumblebee off the top of

my head okay because i haven't seen because i've

mainly been getting these from bigger bucks soundwave

was like one of the uh... first waves so right

yeah Mainly I've been getting these from big

lots other than the optimus prime and ravage

to back which I had to get off of Amazon or eBay

or no, I got enough eBay actually well by the

time of the ravage one of the Thrust and blaster

one like that was when the g1 robot heroes were

in their last throws like right I've still seen

that at retail like at Sears. Yeah Yeah, I mean

they're everywhere. Actually. I was very shocked

to find the the Rhinox Waspinator and Beast Wars

Megatron and Silverbolt because I The other big

lots I had gone to because we have like two in

our area So I had gone to two different stores,

and I only saw the g1 ones that That were there,

and I had never seen the Beast Wars one so when

I saw them like oh I gotta have these lucky like

I picked the Beast Wars ones up as soon as I

saw them in stores like I I think the first place

I actually saw them was Sears. The first place

I saw some of them anyway was Sears actually,

which I only went to because someone said, hey,

Sears has these. Because I never go to Sears.

Yeah, it's funny. These things are showing up

in stores you wouldn't normally think that they

would show up. And I think that's part of the

reason they do is because of their... very different

than what we traditionally get for a Transformers

product. They're cheap and they're easy for other

places to pick up because they're not very expensive.

Very true, very true. Yeah, I really don't know

anything else to say about these guys. Do you

have anything else you want to talk about? With

those, no. I mean, but just a quick addition

to like just the thing with stuff that's in the

final throes of a series, I mean... It's like,

for instance, it took Canada forever to get Shockwave

Skywarp, and apparently we're now getting Rekgar

Atomic Locknut, like a year later, from what

I've heard. Not that it matters because I've

got both of them already, but anyway, with Shockwave

Skywarp, though, those are figures that took

forever to get up here, and now I can think of

a couple stores I can go to and just walk in

and buy a Shockwave and Skywarp because they're

just sitting there warming shelves. Yeah, I mean

if it was one store I could see but I can think

of a couple so I went to my local Walmart and

They it was the day it was March about four or

five days ago March 1st Obviously March 1st was

the launch of the new Iron Man 2 toy line for

Hasbro. I've got the crimson dynamo I'm not really

interested in the... I mean, I like the look

of the Iron Man 2 toys, but it's not something

that I'd care to start collecting because, yeah,

no. I don't have anything against the toys. It's

just, it's not something I want to start spending

money on. I know exactly what you mean. The Iron

Man 2 toy line, when I saw that and then started

seeing... There's someone on one of the fan groups

I go to online that is a big that's a big Iron

Man fan So he's getting these and like posting

pictures of them. I'm going damn you you're making

me want these now I just got myself off I just

kicked the Star Wars bug for the most part once

I got hit saturation with clone troopers. Yeah,

the only um The only other Iron Man toy that

I want right now is the Mighty Mugs Comic Con

Exclusive metallic movie version of Iron Man.

But no, when I went to Walmart, they had like

a very small set, well, probably half of one

wall of one shelf system that was all Iron Man

2 stuff. And then they had a big gap, and then

more Star Wars stuff, and then another big gap.

They pretty much removed almost every single,

at least the one in my area did. Outside of like,

some Revenge of the Fallen stuff, they pretty

much removed all of the Transformers stuff from

my Walmart. Well give it time, if they've got,

you said they had big gaps there? Yep. That probably

just means that they're restocking inventory.

Well I know that, but I don't know, it's just

disheartening to see toy shelves empty. Oh, yeah,

I've seen that I tend to see that more at Walmart

than other stores though because Walmart does

that Walmart empty I've noticed that Walmart

will let shelves empty before they get more stuff

and where's Toys R Us? Because that's what they

do like you never see shelves quite as empty

at a Toys R Us because they're always restocking.

Yes Yeah, speaking of Toys R Us Masters of the

universe are gonna be put back into Toys R Us

stores soon um... the uh... dc uh... man as the

permanent versus human for some inexplicable

reason well the reason why they're doing it if

you look at uh... if you go over to pop culture

network dot com it's the home of that new toy

smell which is a a series on youtube okay uh...

with pixel band of all and dirt how man was the

other guys name killing uh... scottie cash those

guys they uh... you know and pixel dan is a huge

masters universe fan as am i uh... he i saw his

review of the the superman he man in the lex

luther skeletor two -packs uh... the reason why

uh... motel did this was number one dan thinks

that you know it was kinda like hey we're gonna

get masters the universe back in stores because

for a long time now, they've just been where

you can buy them online. They're actively on

toy shelves. And it's combining their two biggest

universes, the DC Universe toys and the Masters

of the Universe toys. The Skeletor for this one

looks amazing. It just does. I can't wait to

maybe hopefully find that. It just looks so awesome

because the the coloring on him is more it's

not chromed But it's more of a deeper purple

than the classics Skeletor currently out It's

just very very very cool What comes across to

me just from the perspective this is just from

the perspective of someone who isn't a Masters

the universe fan I know very little about the

series other than it's got he -man and Skeletor

in it and from whatever else like glean through

osmosis on the internet but I think their motivation

is probably similar to what Hasbro did when they

snuck Matt Tracker from Mask into the 25th anniversary

G .I. Joe line in that they're not convinced

that He -Man is going to sell in stores for whatever

reason so they're trying to sneak it in through

other lines just to it's probably just a test

to gauge demand and odds are curious how this

test is going to succeed because of the fact

that, well, one, they're packaged with Superman,

Lex Luthor, who are probably among the most pop,

common figures that come out. So a lot of people

have Superman anyway that would be getting those.

And the other thing is a lot of the He -Man fans

probably already got their Masters of the Universe

figures by all the while swearing at Maddie Collector.

Are you there? Yeah, you know, but you're kind

of wrong on one aspect of it as, you know, they

could be testing the waters for stores for Masters,

but you know, Pixel Dan pointed out in his review,

which you can see here, that they are, you know,

one of the things he likes about it, and I agree

with him, is that He says that, you know, you're

walking down the toy aisle and Toys R Us, you

see a Superman figure, and then holy crap, there's

a He -Man figure, it's a 2 -pack, wow, He -Man

in stores, and oh, I remember that from my childhood,

and people are gonna wanna pick it up. Yes, but

from a kid's perspective, given Masters of the

Universe has very little exposure, I can see

why this would, this is a Toys R Us exclusive,

you said? I don't know if it's wide release cuz

I think it's a Toys R Us exclusive because the

thing is is again with kids I mean Masters the

universe it was on in the 80s. They had a brief

run in the early 2000s There's a certain generation

that is completely unfamiliar with Masters the

universe to the point where they'll look and

go He -Man that's a blame name They might think

Skeletor that looks pretty cool, but they'll

go he then Wow really original name -wise Well,

you know the thing is though The Masters of the

Universe classics line, it's not aimed towards

kids. It's aimed towards us collectors. And it's

not for kids. There was obviously the original

animated series in the 80s, then you had the

new adventures in 1990, and then the 2002 series.

But for the collectors market, Mattel is going

to rake in, outside of the whole Maddie collector

debacle, uh... you know and like i said before

i agree with pixel dan when he said that you

know thinks that you know a lot of people are

going into toys or us maybe say say you're i

don't know a thirty -year -old guy going in there

looking for a toy for your knees your nephew

like say you're looking for a transfer or something

and you have to go down this island you see a

superman in a human you like oh well i remember

that from my childhood that's the whole aspect

of it it's not yet here it's not like say uh...

Transformers RPMs or power not power link crap

tell them the new crap Power core combiners.

It's not you know those are geared towards children.

These are not these are geared towards collectors

I guess honestly I come from the school of thought

when it comes to toys being being a collector

who's now an adult himself I suppose I still

generally have the philosophy that toys should

be made With that, toys should be made for kids,

and if you're a collector who likes toys, odds

are you've got a child. I mean, odds are, I'll

admit, I've got probably more child -like tendencies

in some regards when it comes to toys, so obviously

that type of stuff is going to appeal to me.

I'm just of the opinion that ultimately if you

want growth in that kind of industry, you target

the kids and you pick up the collectors as the

detritus. Right and I sell strategy I just look

at Mattel and I honestly I'm I honestly don't

quite get get them in that they managed to let

Barbie die as a brand as a brand in terms of

recognition and they have a couple of brands

which like they have Masters the universe which

to be fair the last time they tried to bring

that to mass exposure it kind of bombed I don't

know who's off all whose fault that was but I

can see why they'd be leery there But I look

at it from, you look at all Hasbro's trying to

market their old IPs again, and Mattel hasn't

pounced on that in the same extent Hasbro has.

And then there's stuff like Ghostbusters, where

Ghostbusters is popular enough to easily sell

in toy stores. Heck, they've got Jurassic Park

toys in stores now, and there's not even anything

supporting Jurassic Park toys. But yet, they

won't release Ghostbusters in stores, even though...

That is probably just as big a seller as Masters

of the Universe. If not bigger, because everybody

knows who Ghostbusters is if you're past a certain

age and even beyond that. True, and that's the

thing though. But the other thing is you've got

to realize that you have late 20s, early 30s,

mid 30s men and women who have children now.

take Michael Wilson he's a perfect example he's

got you know two boys and he doesn't know if

he wants to get them into the collecting because

he wants you know his childlike tendencies are

coming out no these are mine you know but the

thing is you know you have somebody in that generation

that has that remembers that they're going to

teach their kids what they grew up on and that's

the thing with the Masters of the Universe toys

If you're an adult collector and you grew up

on it, which I understand you did not, but if

you're of that time period and you grew up on

it, Mattel's gonna make a hell of a lot of money

from collectors on the Masters of the Universe

stuff, so gearing it and marketing it for collectors,

I think, is a lot better than marketing it for

kids that, as you said, may not know what it

is or may think it's stupid. uh... lou schimer

who created uh... who was part of a creative

team for him and said that he wanted a name that

sounded cool for the character and that's you

know he wanted like this big strong type of guy

and he wanted a name that that that invoked at

that and that's where the human character name

came from that's fair enough And also, you've

got to remember, it's the 80s, so there's a lot

of cheesy things in the 80s. Although I do think,

I do see, look at He -Man as a brand and see

it as something that, why Mattel, I just look

at the Masters of the Universe online and yeah,

I'm sure they're doing well off of collectors,

but I honestly look at that and go, wait, you've

got a property like Masters of the Universe which

is, you've got all these characters in this property,

all this fiction in this property. And so why

are you just letting it sit there and doing nothing

with it? Hasbro, I mean, you look at Hasbro,

meanwhile, and they've got properties sitting

on the shelf. But the difference is, is the property

sitting on the shelf, they've got those. But

that's because they've got already have a whole

bunch of other properties with rich fiction and

characters and stuff that are already occupying

their space. And I honestly think. I think that

this decade is going to be a resurgence for Hasbro's

fiction because since they've got their own channel

now, they're going to need programming for it.

And they're trying to monetize every single thing

they've done in the past. When they're looking

at doing Viewmaster and Stretch Armstrong movies,

I think that's a good sign that they're going

to be willing to revisit every single... property

from the 80s and revive it in some way for a

mass market rather than a niche toy line. It

would benefit from that by getting a whole new

generation of fans. But the difference is between

Hans Brown and Mattel. Look at Mattel. They've

got Masters of the Universe. They've got Master

of the Universe, Ghostbusters, Barbie, which

as you said Barbie's pretty much dead now. But

it's kind of their own fault for not catching

it early on. Right, but my point is, you have

Mattel, who has Masters of the Universe, which

is probably their single biggest line. They have

DC Universe, which is also another single biggest

line of theirs. So you got two large properties

there. You got Ghostbusters, Barbie, which is

probably the hottest, not really hottest toy

now, but the most sold toy to young females.

And you got Hasbro. who on the flip side of that

coin you got Hasbro who has Transformers, G .I.

Joe, Star Wars and Marvel. Those are four big

major lines. So you really can't compare the

two companies because of the simple fact that

Hasbro is going to win in the end when it comes

to large properties. Except I would argue that

DC is just as big as Marvel if marketed properly.

And I mean, Brave and the Bold has a lot of toys

in stores. Right, exactly. But what I'm saying

is comparing Hasbro and Mattel. Mattel has, like

I said, Masters, Ghostbusters, DCU, and Barbie.

I just think that looking at it realistically,

the difference between the two companies is Mattel

is, this is just my own opinion, so I don't know

how true this is, but Mattel seems to me, they're

just a toy company right now. They make toys,

like paste stuff and maybe past ideas and stuff,

but pretty much all they're doing is toys. You

look at Hasbro. Hasbro's looked and they've said,

look at all these properties we own, but we own

all these properties, but we want to have stuff

that's just as strong so that we don't have to

pay any licensing fees on really strong properties

that sell well. So they don't want to be beholden

to them. So as a result, they've developed like

they're heavily involved in Transformers fiction.

They're heavily involved in G .I. Joe fiction

as well. And if they're also trying to turn all

of their properties in the franchises, which

means and they're trying to shift into being

not just a toy company and being a media company

in their own right. Right. And owning more ideas

and being more an ideas company than a toys company.

Right, but the thing with Mattel is though, they

were always a toy company. I forget what else.

You know, they did have the cartoons with He

-Man and stuff like that, but you know, there's

only so much. Alright, the perfect example, I

don't know if the toys are made by Mattel or

not, but take Gem and the Holograms. That's Hasbro.

Okay, well, something Hasbro can't do is, you

know, there's so many rights issues with Gem

and the Holograms, we'll never see a live action

movie of that anytime soon. Really? What rights?

I'm just kind of curious, what kind of rights

issues? I'll have to go back and look at my Tooncast

script for it. I'll have to send it to you or

something. I'll have to look at that information

after off air. I've read that there's so many

rights issues with, I think it's re -releasing

the DVDs or whatever, because there were original

releases. Far as maybe creating a new show or

something like an updated version of Jim There's

so many rights issues going on right now that

it's you know, the the status of Jim is it's

currently in limbo Yes, but I imagine Hasbro

would love to revive it to get themselves back

and take another go out to getting the girls

market and see That's the thing with Mattel even

though they let Barbie die. They've had the girls

market for the last 30 years Hasbro, I don't

think outside of Jim when it was hot in the 80s

Hasbro and you know Stupid Starscream fans. They

really don't have you know a girls market. They

don't have a line dedicated to Young girls and

in females like Mattel did with Barbie, right?

But anyway, you know, it's it's just one of those

things Although what one last foot and it'll

say on Barbie that's kind of off -topic is that

Because is that there is one Barbie they're making

that I think that everybody Who is involved in

technical profession should own and that is computer

engineer Barbie? Because they didn't online They

did an online poll for what job should Barbie

have this year. Yeah. Computer engineer was one

of the options. And naturally, computer engineers,

this got mobilized all over the internet to us

to vote for Barbie as a computer engineer. And

she won. I'm sorry. That's creepy. She's got

a pink laptop. Oh, that's fine. But that's creepy,

though. The reason why I say that that's creepy,

that you have, now I don't know how many computer

engineers are women or men. Okay, well the majority

of us that are geeks and nerds and and and have

all this fandom stuff we are guys, okay? You're

going to make a call out to those nerds who are

stuck in their mom's basement I know can these

computer engineers would all have typing would

all have jobs Okay, but I'm saying that take

the you know okay, but still you know You're

gonna market that to those people that are all

men, of course It's gonna get the come, you know,

I mean this is the no -brainer The thing is it's

not marketed that the idea with these because

they've had some other job Barbies The idea is

like the whole role model idea for kids like

girls in terms of you know Like Barbies with

this job this year or something like that. So

like just the whole idea that yeah Barbie can

be this too that they're trying in terms of,

I think it's really just them trying to answer

the demands of Barbie being a sexist toy, even

though Bratz is probably far more sexist than

Barbie ever was. Yeah, yeah. Alright, thank you

for joining us here on Toycast. There are several

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you would like to do a toy review, you're more

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you enjoyed this episode of Toycast. Wish you'll

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needs as well. For now, I am TFG Mike with GeneralTechno.

Say no more words of Optimus Prime, Transform

and Roll Out, and thank you for listening. Until

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