cultshock

Oh yeah, Mattel Shogun Warriors vs. Popy Jumbo Machinders, Mego Micronauts vs. Takara Microman, etc. That would be awesome! (but unlikely). Hell, just an episode covering all the cool toys that Japanese kids got in the 70s and 80s would be fantastic. All the Godzilla toys, the amazing Star Wars toys that Takara put out in 1978 that never saw the light of day outside of Japan, etc.

funkyryno

I vaguely remember that I always wanted to buy some He-Man figures as a kid, but when I went to the store I could never find Skeletor, He-Man or Man-At-Arms. I also remember there were a lot of those bumble bee guys.

In the end, G.I. Joe got my allowance money.

Red Hood

This tidbit actually bugged me about the Star Wars episode because it was completely incorrect. The way it was worded and presented in the documentary made it seem that Hasbro didn't make any Star Wars toys until the first prequel came out and that after the figures didn't sell as they expected, then they came with other Star Wars line of figures like Power of the Force. What really happened was that Hasbro re-negotiated the deal with Lucas in 1994 and then in 1995 the Star Wars Power of the Force figures were released. The first set of figures had weird, buffed sculptures, so the main characters were re-released again with their bodies more to the likeness of the actual characters. Also, Hasbro started to release, on purpose, variants of the figures, including Boba Fett among others to take advantage of the hot toy collector market that was driving sales at toy stores. All of this was mostly to revive the franchise name in the toy section after Dark Horse had revived the Star Wars name with their Dark Empire series and Disney/MGM done the same with the Star Tours ride. Hasbro continued the toy production for the next several years before the prequel in 1999 with the Shadow of the Empire toy line and new releases on the Power of the Force line.

Also, the documentary skipped over the Droids toys released in 1985 that tied in with the cartoon series



All of these is pretty basic stuff in the Star Wars toy history and really wonder how they screwed up the timeline in the documentary

Michael Corvin

Yeah, that kinda bugged me too. They made it seem like it went from ROTJ in 1983 to the Phantom Menace in 1999. The 1994 Power of the Force line rejuevenated the dead franchise. There were some other toys (Micro Machines, BendUms, the 12" "Suncoast" figures, the 12" dolls, etc) that kept SW fans going during the dead years. They really could have touched on that quite a bit more.

To be honest, Star Wars toys/merch could generate a full length documentary and not just a :45 minute tv episode.

Red Hood

And honestly, this flub made me question the accuracy of the other 3 episodes. I understand that they are trying to dumb down collector's information for the general public but there is no reason why they should be inaccurate in what they present.

Abob Teff

How the hell did I miss this? Oh well, I needed a reason to watch these again.

There is: Plastic Galaxy.

Could they have skipped that since that was Hasbro, not Kenner proper? I know they touch on the Hasbro buyout, but that could have been used to illustrate another mis-step.

fujishig

Weird because the 200x He-man line kind of died because there was nothing but He man on the shelves. And then the online only toy revival a few years ago made some of the main characters like Teela almost impossible to get. Does the documentary go into that, the collectors line that you had to subscribe to, getting dozens of unwanted figures to complete the collection?

Quatermass

Watch the Barbie episode. It's more about the business than the doll itself. It was funny too.

PhantomStranger

Skeletor always seemed hard to find back in the day.

cultshock

How in hell indeed? It was very distracting!


I was popping in to mention the same thing, that's a very good Star Wars toy doc.

DthRdrX

Droids was covered but deleted from the episode. Some of the footage of the rare Vlix figure is on the Facebook page. It seemed as if they wanted to focus on the early 80s and not the mid 90s revival.

Red Hood

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Jason

Maybe I was just having a bad day when I watched it, but I found Plastic Galaxy to be tedious and amateurish. I'll have to try it again.

As for the Droids figures (and series), some things are best left forgotten.

Ringmaster

I loved all 4 episodes. The only thing I wished the GI-Joe episode should of covered too was Sgt Slaughter. I remember it being a big deal that a famous Pro Wrestler was added to the Joe cannon. An interview with Slaughter now would of been cool too.

robin2099

Not really. The main reason as to why Kenner/Hasbro(who had already bought Kenner) renegotiated the rights was because Lucas said that he was getting ready to do the prequels. The Power of the Force came out because they wanted to get product out while waiting(same with releasing toys for Shadows of the Empire) and Lucas kept releasing Star Wars related stuff to keep building the interest up until Episode 1 was done(Empire, the Special Editions) so it wasn't inaccurate as it was portrayed.

funkyryno

I don't remember the documentary mentioning the collectors line. Basically the huge drop in He-Man sales was blamed on flooding stores with weird characters no kids wanted, while neglecting the popular characters. I suspect there might be other reasons for the decline that weren't mentioned, though.

PhantomStranger

I think the whole Sgt. Slaughter involvement may have been the peak of the G.I. Joe cartoon and toy line. It was all over television.

stingermck

The He-Man ep did mention the current toys. Said they found their niche selling to older collectors. Even showed the new $300 castle greyskull.

Trevor

Haven’t watched this yet, but today I stumbled upon a show called something like Mark Hamill’s Pop Culture Collector. Only half watched the first 6 or so episodes but it seemed decent.

PhantomStranger

I think it's something he put together for YouTube.

Rob V

I came back to this thread to post this... WTF was that?? How did it make it thru post-edit and also, WTF??? I've never been more creeped out watching something; especially with my 9 year old there with me.

fujishig

Argh I still need to find time to watch this show.

I have that new greyskull, still boxed, not because I want it mint but because I have no place to put it and I'm hopeful there will be some kind of revival that can get my son into it. The original greyskull was one of my favorite toys as a kid, down to the combined swords making the key to it.

The collectors line definitely went after the old collectors, as you can see with the earlier post about the convention exclusive that was basically prototypes. They learned early on that in order not to have the normal problem with pegwarmers, and to save money, they had to keep inventory super tight, and then the only way you could guarantee you'd get the main figures was to subscribe to a year long sub where you literally had no idea what you were going to get. It was expensive too, and shipping was horrendous. They started putting a ton of secondary characters and she-ra characters in, and I finally had enough. Because I started late, I never got teela, and I have no idea how they didn't go back and reprint such an important character in the line.

Rob V

I never got into He-Man... but this episode was great because the guys they interviewed were brutally honest, funny and reminded me of how my dad would have behaved / spoken back in the day. Really insightful.

spainlinx0

Yeah, that was super bizarre.

funkyryno

Haha. I had to pause the show on one of those scenes so I could show my wife the chair. I imagine that woman paid big money for that thing (I assume it's some kind of sculpture).