The tone from some sites definitely got belligerent at times.  With some of the Q&A participants there was this air of nastiness plus a sense of entitlement that was all wrapped up in a not-so-subtle undercurrent of "we know how to do your jobs better than you do".  All things considered, that must have left the Hasbro management team wondering why they were taking part in what had become an abusive relationship.  Forums are a great place for venting.  But that tone doesn't translate well when you're asking questions of the manufacturer.

In the grand scheme of things, Hasbro needs to keep coming up with new & good ideas that will appeal to this customers.  It's a business, and you constantly need to work to keep your customers loyal.  But what does a business do when someone gets unruly?  If you're a local business owner, you ask them to leave your establishment.  In the case of the Star Wars Hasbro Q&A, you let it slowly fade.

Maybe they'll revisit the concept at some point in time.  But frankly, if they do, I could see them making some very targetted exclusions of some of the past participants.  It's not difficult to write a probing question in the interest of getting answers.  But when you add all sorts of invective to it, why should anybody want to bother? 

Quote from: Nicklab on June 16, 2012, 06:39 AM

Got the EE cancellation email, too.  I suspect that these may wind up being offered in the next CW line look.  Especially since the Mando's were featured prominently in the CW season 5 trailer.

Wouldn't even bet a nickel on that. In theory that and the Droid gunship should return, but with Hasbro's lack of faith in CW toys and their inability to get their #$^% together...I doubt it.

The tools exist.  Hasbro is going to want to recoup some of that investment.  That means selling units.

The Droid Gunship showed up in trailers, too.  The tools for that exist as well. 

Hasbro made the bulk of their investment in tooling for both vehicles, and the only way to see the rewards of those investments is to sell the toys. 

You say that there's a lack of confidence in Clone Wars toys.  Really?  Because I see plenty of OT & PT vehicles from the SOTDS line still lingering on shelves, too.  I can still get an AT-AT pretty easily at retail.  The same goes for the Trench Run pack with the X-Wing & Darth Vader TIE at TRU.  Sales across the whole boys toys sector are DOWN.  Attempts to pin this just on the Clone Wars line are misdirected, and you're simply not looking at the bigger picture.

It seems far more likely that this was the scenario:  Entertainment Earth took orders and submitted them to Hasbro.  The number of orders must have been such that they did not meet a target number for orders that would factor in production costs, shipping & profit for Hasbro.  As such, the order was cancelled.  It seems far more likely that this vehicle will make it into the CLONE WARS (Yoda look) general vehicle line simply because the number of vehicles ordered across broader brick & mortar retail will hit that profitability number Hasbro needs to meet.

Star Wars has the benefit of a brand recognition that's tough to match.  I mean, we're STILL talking about it 35 years after the release of the first film.  The only other franchise that has had that kind of longevity is James Bond.

Rick McCallum really hasn't been saying anything crazy about what's holding up the show.  Simply put, it's money.  And advertising money in TV is down because of both the economy and the dillution of the audience by cable TV, Direct TV and services like NetFlix.  Disney might be the right fit if the show can get onto the ABC television network.  That might lead to big enough ad revenues that could cover production budgets of $5 million per episode.  But other networks could make just as much sense.  NBC Universal brings together the resources of a film studio, a broadcast network and multiple cable properties.  If they could set up a schedule where the episode premieres on NBC, and then it has repeat airings on a network like SyFy, they might be able to generate enough ad revenue to make this show happen.

And then there's the creative control issue.  McCallum has said that HBO would probably sign on for the show, but the degree of creative control and show ownership that HBO wants is a deal breaker.

Thanks Brian.  I can pass on that one. 

That seems to be the general sentiment on the Skrull.  More often than not the Skrull figure is an indicator that Black Widow and Hawkeye USED to be hanging on the pegs.

So because they didn't sell at $10.99, we'll raise the price to $12.99. They will probably clearance it back at $10.99.

So far I've only seen the $12.99 price at a few TRU stores.  Notably in some really high traffic, and semi-well-to-do areas.  I've seen the $10.99 price at other stores a scant 10 miles away.

The Iron Man 2 line was able to pull off a 3.75" figure line with a minimum number of characters and still put out a line that was in reasonably good demand, and made it to a figure range that's gotten up into the 50's in terms of figure numbers.  Considering that the movie came out 2 years ago and the figure line still seems to be alive and kicking?  That's pretty impressive.  Especially considering that other Marvel movies like Thor and Captain America and their respective toy lines had a considerably shorter shelf-life.

The Iron Man 2 figure line has probably been one of the better selling Marvel 3.75" basic figure lines.  Are we going to get plenty of different versions of Iron Man in this line?  Sure.  That's always been something that's come along with Iron Man....different versions of the suit.

The one thing that's been pretty disappointing with the Iron Man 2 line?  They should have offered more basic carded Hammer Drones as well as the Movie Whiplash armor.  I liked the Army Drone, but the only way to get that was in the TRU 4-pack with Iron Man Mk VI and Nick Fury.  And the Navy Drone was cool too, but you could only get that in the Target exclusive 3-pack with Iron Man Mk 5 and unarmored Whiplash.  This is where this line let a lot of people down.

CORRECTION - Make that price $12.99 per TVC basic figure.  It only seems to be in effect at certain stores, because I hit some other NJ TRU stores today that still had TVC figures priced at $10.99 each.