I wonder if the Xizor pack would have done better if he'd been packed with Dash Rendar instead of Leia. Nice to see theres some hope of these being revived someday though, it was always one of my favorite sub-lines. I'd love to see them get a full run of Heir to the Empire. Still quite a few characters they could do from that.
I always felt that the set would have done better if they included Guri instead of Leia. The Leia figure in theory was sort of okay too, where it ran into problems was the horrible execution of the lower legs of the figure, giving Leia the appearance of "cankles". If you look at the second Clone Wars Padme figure that figure has the inset ball-jointed ankles and her legs are TINY. There's no reason why Leia's legs couldn't have been done small like that, and if they didn't have a way to do it at the time, then they should have just left the figure with knee joints and skipped the ankle joints.
The real shame is that the Xizor figure is pretty nice, from a modern sculpting point-of-view, but he's a modern version of a character that wasn't very popular in the first place.
So what you have in this set is a nice version of a not-so-popular character and a really lousy version of Princess Leia, in an outfit that I don't think ANYONE was really clammoring for.
If they were gonna include a Shadows of the Empire comic pack in the Blue/White Legacy line, they should have just gone with a Dash Rendar / Leebo set which would have appealed to a much larger audience - even to kids who have no idea who Dash Rendar is.
It's interesting that they made the comments that they did regarding these exclusive packs selling well. If you think about it there is something great about each of these sets:
Baron Fel and Ysanne Isard
- Two imperials - Imperials are always popular
- Popular characters from EU/Rogue Squadron series
- Take advantage of a great Imperial officer parts library
Darth Nihl and Deliah Blue
- A must-have for folks who love the Legacy comic series
- Add another Sith Lord to Darty Krayt's ranks
- Two completely new figures
- It's got a Sith Lord in it, what else is there to say?
Jarael and Rohlan Dyre
- A KOTOR-era Mandalorian
- A KOTOR-era female Jedi-like character
- Two completely new figures
Mandalorians Jaster Mereel and Montross
- Two Prequel Era Mandalorians - enough said
- Both figures are nice balance between a library of great parts and new bits and pieces to make them both new
So to me, not ONE of these sets are as bad as say the Marvel Darth Vader/Rebel Officer, Marvel Han Solo/Chewie, Marvel Luke/R2, Marvel Tarkin/Stormtrooper, Republic Clone Trooper/Clone Commander sets, i.e. a set that is nothing more than REPAINTS of previously issued figures.
There's also one VERY important thing about this wave too - if you buy a case, you get 2x each of four NEW sets. There hasn't been a Comic Packs case that offered that EVER - there was always either a pack with funky colors on the figures or a re-packed Comic Pack from the previous packaging iteration or wave.
Cases that feature waves of four/six/eight NEW figures/2-packs/etc... that are packed EVENLY two-per-case are always going to do well online because it is appealing to either the collector that gets one of everything to open and one of everything to keep MOC or it's appealing to two collector friends who want just one of each and they can EASILY split the case and not have any left-overs/un-wanted product.
The person who REALLY should be taking note, is the moron who comes up with the basic figure assortment pack-out ratios.