Recarded rehashes up the ying yang!

[Scott]

The thing that torques me is that they had to have had more OT designs on the shelf then they are revealing.  Instead of including them they went ultra cheap on a hunch that this DVD release is going to bring in tons of new fans.  

History suggests they have no clue on how to gauge the demand for their products as there are still Episode I figures in some stores and there are boatloads of Episode II figures shipping.

Can't really complaing about the year totally, there should be some Episode III preview figs and Novemberish will be the release of '05.  And these first 5 months have been absolutely amazing IMO

I really don't think this line will make it out of '06 anymore.  And not due to lack of fan interest more so due to lack of retailer interest.  MOTU...The Simpsons...two huge lines bit the dust not because their fans weren't buying, but because retail stopped buying them.  This might be the final nail in the coffin

[Jeff]

I agree...

Summer 06 we'll see shelves with piles of unsold 05 Ep3 figures, which will lead to the brain trust for the retails to say, well, that's that.  SW is done, no more ordering.

I can't see it going much past Fall 06, when we will all be here huddled at the board trying desperately to track down those last few waves that only the e-tailers ordered and Hasbro dumped in Europe ( a la vintage Yakface).

As far as OTC, I'm starting to think that if they had just jumped on the OTC bandwagon earlier this year, mixing in the re-packs then, the situation might have been better.  At least that way, the 28 new figures and 31 re-packs will be spread out over 12 months,

Instead, we get spoiled with 21 new figures in the first 5 months, only to get 7 the rest of the year.

Not to mention those seven will be mixed in with 31 re-packs that will clog the shelves.

Jeff

[JediMAC]

Well, I've already made the comment in several other threads that I wouldn't mind if Hasbro recarded every OT figure they ever made into this new OTC designed card that we've seen with the commtech Han, and I'd still buy 'em all again.

Wow.  I didn't think Hasbro was actually listening when I made that comment...  $h!t!  

[Scott]

A little bit bigger picture of Luke

[Scott]

Looks to be cleaner and have a new head sculpt

[Brian]

If this Bespin Luke does turn out to be a "clean" variation, I'd be pretty happy.  I've always liked that version of Luke (although it would have been better without the action feature), but it would be nice to have a cleanish version of it as well.  Makes one of these repacks a little more bearable anyways .  Plus, it was a pretty good figure to begin with....unlike a few others

[Jedirhino]

Is the Bib Fortuna a repack...he looks like a newer figure...what do you guys think?

[Brian]

You're right Scott, although the pic is kinda small, it does look like there could be a new head sculpt on there.  Looking at the hair (part) it could be possible, that would be sweet if it was a change.

[JediMAC]

Wow, you may be right Scott.  That'd be a great change!  If they can clean up his face and outfit, give him some decent hair, and possibly exclude the action feature - that'd make for a mighty fine figure there!  Looks like that's just what they're doing, so hopefully that's the case.

If Hasbro just makes some nice subtle and worthy changes in a few key spots in some of these rehashed figures, it'd go a long way to helping them both sell better, and keeping the collectors out there a little happier with Hasbro for not just dumping the same ol', same 'ol on us.

[Muftak]

Could they have just borrowed the "non-handstand" head sculpt of the Dagobah Luke for the Bespin version? That would go a long way towards making it a different figure (and an idea I was going to try anyway.)

If they could just drop a few more subtle changes in with the figures, it really would make all the difference as far as the good graces of the collectors. I could go in for buying variants on paintjobs and minor details that make sense. I absolutely loved the improvements on the Momaw/Greedo/Ponda Cantina sets. But there just doesn't seem to be a lot of that going on here. Little stuff like the Jawa two-pack in slightly different colors (like reverse the dark brown/light brown scheme, help fill out that army of scavengers)...metallize IG-88 a bit...

...though I don't know how they could rehabilitate Bib or the Scanning Tech...

[SilverZ]

You must have been looking at EE at about the same time I was, Scott. Maybe that head is from the old CD-ROM Luke?

I had some time on my hands this afternoon so I started to look at the case breakdowns for the OTC waves. I have a feeling some of the recards are going to be hard to chase down, unless later waves correct these numbers.

Tentative case assortment breakdowns according to Entertainment Earth with added collection numbers from the Hasbro checklist, and ordered so first figure/card appearances are at the top of each wave:

Wave 7
01    2x Luke Skywalker – Dagobah
02    2x Yoda – Dagobah
03    1x Spirit of Obi-Wan Kenobi
04    2x R2-D2 - Dagobah Swamp
05    1x Luke Skywalker - X-Wing Pilot
06   1x Luke Skywalker – Jedi
07   1x Han Solo
08   1x Chewbacca
10   1x Darth Vader

Wave 8
18   2x Princess Leia - Bespin (NEW)
19   2x Cloud Car Pilot (NEW)
20   2x Lobot (NEW)
12   1x R2-D2 (New Packaging)
13   1x C-3P0 (New Packaging)
14   1x Boba Fett (New Packaging)
15   1x Obi-Wan Kenobi (New Packaging)
16   1x Stormtrooper (New Packaging)
17   1x Wicket (New Packaging)

Wave 9
09   1x Princess Leia (NEW)
11   2x Biker Scout (NEW)
01   1x Luke Skywalker – Dagobah
02   1x Yoda – Dagobah
03   1x Spirit of Obi-Wan Kenobi
04   1x R2-D2 - Dagobah Swamp
05   1x Luke Skywalker - X-Wing Pilot
06   1x Luke Skywalker – Jedi
07   1x Han Solo
08   1x Chewbacca
09   1x Darth Vader

Wave 10
21   2x TIE Fighter Pilot (NEW)
22   2x Greedo (NEW)
26   2x Luke Skywalker - Bespin Outfit (NEW)
01   1x Luke Skywalker – Dagobah
02   1x Yoda – Dagobah
04   1x R2-D2 - Dagobah Swamp
06   1x Luke Skywalker – Jedi
12   1x R2-D2 (NEW)
17   1x Wicket

[JediMAC]

Wave 9
09   1x Princess Leia (NEW)
11   2x Biker Scout (NEW)

Wave 10
21   2x TIE Fighter Pilot (NEW)
22   2x Greedo (NEW)
26   2x Luke Skywalker - Bespin Outfit (NEW)
12   1x R2-D2 (NEW)

I'm rather curious about these ones labeled "NEW".  Does that "NEW" label come straight from EE's site Jared?

Now that we've determined that the Bespin Luke's most likely got some changes to it, and is labeled "NEW" here, is it possible there's been some changes to a few of these other figures as well?  Probably just wishful thinking on my part, I'm sure, but do any of you with a keen eye notice anything that looks a little different on them?  We'll probably have to wait for some better sized pix to know for sure, but I sure hope there's more changes to some of these than we're currently aware of.  That would make this line a whole lot better in my eyes...

[SilverZ]

That's EE's description there re: (NEW). Since the Biker Scout is labelled that way, I assumed that the Leia is the recard one, not Bespin Leia. The order in which the figures were listed on EE's site correspond with Hasbro's numbering scheme consistently for the first couple waves, then get really funky by the later ones. It seems H had a nice systematic release slate for these, then went overboard. We need a few more breakdowns of later waves to get a better idea of how the year is going to pan out, availability wise, of those later figs.

That's a great thought if that meant there were alterations to the figure. We should have imagined that it was possible, now, in hindsight, since the Hoth Vader is obviously a repaint figure, not just a recard.

[Scott]

I'm trying to place that headsculpt

Sort of looks like this



Its definitely not the CD-ROM version

[Jedirhino]

I guess I sort of got my answer