News from The NY Times regarding the next volume in the series, A Dance With Dragons.  Apparently it is now in the hands of the publisher.

I counted 31 sites in that Rebelscum roundup.  Ton of sites I'd never heard of, either:  AllSpark, ASMzine, Awesome Toy Blog, JediNews.ca, Jedi Temple War Room (great, just what the world needs--another Star Wars nerd site with "Jedi" in the title), Kitty's Pride, Lichtgesundheit.de, Republic Forces Radio Network, and Sandtroopers.com.

Man, I'm glad I got out of the Q&A archive game when I did.

A number of those sites are offshoots from other sites.  I was involved in one of those, but that is no longer the case, as I've parted ways with the main site and only maintain a minimal presence there.  But some of these other sites were general toy blogs. 

The drive for some of these offshoot sites was due in large part because of the way Hasbro had been conducting the Q&A process.  The sessions started to slow down.  Then the number of questions per site became limited.  But when it became clear that numerous sites that were networks of a sort, with URL's that were independent of one another and Hasbro was willing to recognize those subsidiaries in the Q&A process, more sites joined the mix.  In the case of the site(s) I was involved with, the push was to pose serious, probing questions to Hasbro that would be newsworthy for our readers and the broader collecting community.  In the case of those sites I think we accomplished that (most of the time).

But the process got bogged down.  Too many sites got involved and Hasbro / Hunter PR didn't set limits on the number of sites involved from the get-go.  Answers came back slower and slower.  There were more instances of multiple sites asking questions about the same topic and Hasbro sending the same answer back to all of those sites, word for word.  But all too often Hasbro has been getting questions that they say they won't address:  "When are you going to make X figure?"

Very limited character lineup in the Thor 4" figures.  We've got what, 4 or 5 different versions of Thor in both the basic and deluxe lines.  Only 1 version each of Odin & Loki (and does Loki have his helmet?).  A couple of different versions of the Frost Giants in both the basic and deluxe lines.  But no Destroyer?  No Warriors Three?  Hmmm.  I hope this line doesn't fall into some of the same patterns the Iron Man line went through, with a BAJILLION versions of the hero and nobody else.

My checks were cashed, and I sent my redemption forms in either in late February or early March.  Even though I got the post card, I FULLY expect Hasbro to get my Sgt. Brics to me.  I cannot imagine that they would want to start sending out refund checks.  And with the timeframe that the post cards have given us, it seems that Hasbro is probably ordering another run of figures so that they can process the outstanding orders.

I got the post card today, too.  I can wait.  Clone Wars figures are generally a lower priority for me, so it's not that big of a deal for me to wait until July.  Bric was in what, ONE episode in Season 3?  As long as I get him before Season 4 premieres I'll be fine.

Sure enough, I found this yesterday.  And now it's in a pile of starfighter vehicles, waiting to be opened.  Oh, the woes of trying to get a collection room organized!

When I read this rumor list I had to go back and do some research.  Because I could've sworn that R2-A5 had been covered in the EE exclusive Astromech 5-packs.  Much to my chagrin, I was mistaken.  I'm glad to see Hasbro taking on this particular R2 unit, even if it ammounts to a glorified repaint.  Astromechs may not be as common in the line these days.  But they're like Clone Troopers - an existing sculpt/tool that Hasbro can apply some different paint apps to, and voila!  New figure!

Darth Maul?  It's certainly not a surprise that Hasbro would touch on him.  He's a popular character.  Will it be the kind of Darth Maul collectors want?  That's debatable.  Because I could see this offering being a slightly different offering of the Evolutions Maul on a TVC card, and the selling point would be "It's the first Darth Maul on a vintage card".  But with TPM coming out in 3D next year, I could see Hasbro getting more of Darth Maul to market.  Perhaps a kid focused one, and then a collector focused one.  Perhaps my cynicism on resculpts of main characters is showing, but Hasbro has had quite a track record of doing this with SO many main characters that I refuse to be surprised by that sort of thing any more.

Jar Jar?  This is one that I am genuinely surprised to see on a 2011 rumor list.  Perhaps it will be part of some sort of TPM preview wave?  We haven't seen anything like that since early 2005, and maybe it's an idea Hasbro would like to revisit.

As for hopes for a theatrical version of Sy Snootles?  Hey, you can definitely be hopeful, scockery.  My own optimism for that is low.  And this is coming from someone who thinks the new "Jedi Rocks" musical number sucks, and that "Laptinek" was much better musically, and fit the Jabba's Palace scenes much better.  I think since there have been some changes at the Hasbro Star Wars team I have lower expectations from some of the marketing folks in that group.  And they're some of the ones that help steer character choices for the line.

I've been finding the other vehicles that are in the same case as this vehicle, but not the Droid Gunship itself.  It's just a matter of time before I find it.  I've found the Plo Koon fighter, the Tri-Droid fighter repaint and the Plo Koon JSF.  They're definitely out there.  It just seems to be in high demand for now.