Movie Toys Languishing?
 

Sad that the toy companies are likely to blame the fact that kids don't want yet another Captain America on the license and film tie-in concept, rather than the fact that every wave they release 3 variants of the hero and none of the figures people would actually want. The BAFs also don't appeal to kids, since parents are unlikely to buy an entire wave for their children, especially at $20 a figure.

BAFs are for collectors. Collectors don't want 3 versions of Steve Rogers. Kids don't want 3 versions of Steve Rogers.

Use a more diverse cast of characters, even if they only appeared for a minute in the film, or are just "inspired by the motion picture", it's a better way to get collectors in. Or, heaven forbid, use the characters from the comics, like the awesome ASM2 series, whose most wanted characters are, funnily enough, comic renditions.

I agree that certain superheroes are getting over-saturated, both in theaters and in the toy aisles. As I see it, the problem starts with Marvel Studios and their desire to do two Marvel films a year. Combine that with Fox and Sony doing movies to hold on to their licenses, and DC trying to get back in the mix. Then you bring in the retailers who demand movie tie-in products from the manufacturers and it's a perfect storm for the general public to get burned-out on superhero films and parents on buying their kids yet another Spider-Man, Iron Man or Cap toy.

But it's not like that's something new, either. It tends to happen with any big trend in pop culture, but it's especially true when it comes to movies.

By the way, I think it's BS that they lumped AOE into that shelfwarming group. I'm pretty sure they just wanted to name-check it since it's the most recent movie tie-in to hit retail.

Other than that most tenuous of threads, AOE has nothing in common with those other film series. It's not a superhero movie, it's not even in theaters yet, and the toy line just dropped a couple weeks ago. I wouldn't go digging the grave just yet, if I were them.

Every Kid Already Has Captain America and Spider-man....
So Give us Captain Marvel and Starbrand then!!

Have you seen the movie tie in toys? They are complete TRASH! especially the TF4 toys garbage...

With a couple of exceptions, this.

Well i she, the legends sell exceptionally, but captain America with support cannon is still on the shelf.

This article does not expand on the nonsense of the toy mallets releasing captain America with throwing action. Yet if toys are struggling, shouldn't price drop for legends?

I'm thinking the article writer means those kids line figures, those failing kids line may also explain Hasbro raising legends prices to pay for the failures of that captain America with laser gun action.

Well, speaking strictly about the UK movie toy releases; they don't actually hit until sometimes up to three or four months after the movie came out theatrically, and they're usually the toys that are targeted at younger children.

Collecting of course is different than a parent or relative buying for a child. We know the difference in costumes etc and may pick and choose which Cap's or Spidey's we buy from the different lines, but I'm not sure if this article is based more on speculation than anything else.

TF4 toys will sell once the movie gets some more steam as said above, once it hits theatres, and frankly it really doesn't matter if the quality of them meets that of the past lines. Kids are ferocious naggers when they want something, am I right dad's?

I prefer comic based toys, but movie based toys as said above also have a few gems. Up here it took 2 months before I noticed Electro warming amidst all the Spidey's, so maybe case packs are the problem? I don't have those facts on a spreadsheet so I can't say, but in any line movie or otherwise there will be more popular figures and less popular that sit on store shelves longer.

Isn't it fair to say that toys in general are a little less popular? I think last year for Xmas, my 7 year old niece and 5 year old nephew got iPods and some sort of game boy system. Yes, they have many toys, but some days it's all digital instead of physical toy imagination. I'm not knocking the age we live in, but at the same time my nephew doesn't have 2 Cap's etc, well not from me anyway. So, yes it's tricky for big toy companies to find the balance of how much to make of what figure or game and maybe that's the way it should be. Do we really want a single company to know exactly how much money is available per household and where the exact percentage of said dollars are going?

Any company won't stop trying to make more money, sometimes it takes longer to figure out the market. So, as a collector I think if figures ship in cases of 6 or 8 or whatever, make them all different, make them all sought after. Or in other words, don't make a warehouse full of figures that will never sell, when time after time we can see in a retail setting what isn't and hasn't been working. What a company saves in wasted plastic they could use the resources to make new and more sought after products.

This is just my temporary point of view until there are more facts for me to add up, but with all the free information out there nowadays, I wonder about the board meetings at big toy companies, like where are they getting the data for certain age groups? Because let's face it, advertising on Saturday mornings accounts for some of the desires of children, but other major media must have their hands in it too.

Right now I feel like we're being gauged on our spending amounts, not necessarily habits.

The only thing that is killing the AOE line and the rest of the super hero figures, is those stupid Titan figures. So much waste of plastic on those things and yet they keep making various ones...

David Vonner's podcast from last year addresses most of the issues around this argument, so I definitely recommend listening to it if you haven't yet:
Marvelicious Toys - The Marvel Universe Toy & Collectibles Podcast

It's such a good discussion that I have it saved on my phone and listen to it on long drives. lol

To me, it seems to just boil down to over saturation, lower quality, bad toy lineups, and parents willing to buy a mobile phone or tablet for their kids instead of an entire action figure line that you could probably get for the same price. At family parties, I notice what my nephews and nieces are playing with, and it always seems to be the latest craze as opposed to action figures: kendamas, those weird rubber band kits, junk like that. For Christmas, I actually got more toys than they did from our secret santa exchange! lol
Another thing I think doesn't get brought up often is that in this day and age, it just might be a shift of parents nowadays being scared to give their kids toys associated with on screen violence. A lot of them are probably afraid of raising the next active shooter, and so maybe they're just staying away from what they perceive influence that sort of thing (which is b.s., btw).

About time someone other than a collector said so! We could have told them that a long time ago! lol But, imo, it's only the toy company's fault. They drown the stores in the initial assortments. And they make too many different types of toys of the same character.

So now someone credible other than us (the adult collectors) are pointing this out, which btw we as a collectors community have been constantly bitching about this for years. They said our opinions didn't matter b/c we were just a small fraction of the customer base. The toy companies would fair better if they actually listened to us, people who are still children at heart. We still know what children want. They want the same kinds of quality and diversity we want, and that's especially true for those of us who grew up in the eighties and nineties and now have children of our own. I just think it's funny that this is finally getting pointed out like the toy companies had no clue at all it would happen.

I expect GOTG will shelf-warm too mostly. A lot of that has to do with the way the figures were designed.

The more they hinder articulation, especially now that's become expected from previous assortments, the less the newer will sell. Especially when it's part of the same cinematic world.

They need to find a balance. For Hasbro, that means consolidating down some of the marvel movie lines to allow for better distribution and mold re-use as well as covering characters that haven't been covered. For Mattel, that means the same.(which they've got a great start to that in their new multiverse line!)

For other properties it varies property to property. 100s of the same character though time after time after time is not the way. That only creates over-saturation where no one wants that character at all. They need to start including the full roster that's in movies, and retailers need to find a better balance than bulk ordering initial waves that cause the next waves to be forced from reaching shelves.

Ironman has had 3 films, and we've yet to really get a single carded tony stark figure, or Rhodes, or Pepper. Coulson was in the majority of the marvel features, and has no figure whatsoever. X-Men is still sitting on the back burner with no real representation as yet. There's so much untapped within the films the fact we haven't seen them on shelves is annoying. The same to Thor. He has a wide array of characters to his world, yet all we get repeatedly are Thor, Loki, and the one or two bad guys. Sif barely reached shelves, and they have yet to even do a warriors 3 box set. Both of those could do amazing. It's not like they don't have the molds either. They could have done two 3 packs for Thor and they would have sold well. Warriors 3, and then one with Heimdall, Odin, and Sif. They also had the perfect comic one with Valkyrie, Executioner, and thor. Though honestly I'd rather they swap Thor out for Enchantress.

The lack of sales is on both the retailers and the toy makers. They're strangling their own business models with a bottleneck and poor decisions.

They've got hot properties all around that kids and collectors alike want, it's just a matter of how they are approached that's causing the hindrances. Even GI Joe itself could sell truck loads if they approach it right.

Agree to disagree then. If you really think they're all trash, then you're sadly missing out on some great toys. I won't claim that every movie toy is a gem, but that doesn't mean they're all bad, either.

A lot of good stuff in your post, but this especially.

I'm not a fan of the Titan line of figures, either. But my point was AOE hasn't been out long enough to say it's shelfwarming like the ASM2 and TWS lines are right now.

Even saying that is bit misleading IMHO, since there are movie tie-in toys that appear to be doing pretty well at retail - at least in my area.

That's not the toy company's fault. Case ratios are, but the retailers decide how many cases to get for their initial orders. I suppose if toy makers would allow retailers to place orders by a specific wave or assortment number (and the retailers actually cared enough to make that distinction), then that part of the problem might be solved.

so.... movie lines not doing so well? maybe try SHIPPING SOME DAMN COMIC BAISED PRODUCT!!! MI is yet to hit in my area, but we have plenty of captain Mcfat-hips and 5POA happymeal toys! melt them down, use the plastic for something better, like plastic dog shat!

Indeed. After posting, I realized that I said it was the toy makers fault. I agree with one of the previous posts in that I place blame on both parties. But if I had to lean one way or the other, I'd say the retailers for ordering all that Wave 1/2 crap. I'd venture to say that retailers don't make the distinction...they just see movie toys. And think they're all the same....so they order crap tons of it.

Thank you for the link, I've listened to their podcast before, but I didn't know about this interview. It fills in a lot of gaps for me, and raises some questions the Vonner couldn't answer, but all in all very informative

I notice at TRU, Walmart, Target and other retailers that Marvel characters take up waaaaay too much shelve space for their lines. And it is mostly from the movies. I think Superhero fatigue is not going to affect just movie tickets but also other areas...it's becoming quantity not quality.

Reminds me what killed the 2000's Masters of The Universe figures.

Just like He-Man we see too much variations of Spidey, Cap, Batman, Superman and of course Iron Man.

Hasbro and other toy companies should consider supporting characters from the movies. Just one figure for the main hero is enough! We need more villains too!

I think the whole size reduce intented with the 4" figures is also part of this disaster.

Reducing production costs and targeting the younger audience was a good idea but final price differences for consumers are small and we got even more peg warming variations of each main hero.

For example, my kids and nephews have to play with 4" and 6" scale figures.
Too much characters did not get their 6" incarnation while 4" did.
That sucks and I can't stand it. Just my opinion.
They should focus on less different scale/size figures.

Returning 6" Marvel Legends are great and I hope they will keep on the series.

Here in france, we don't have the chance to see the same quantity of comic movie related toys. Why don't they expand their market overseas a bit more? We didn't have any Marvel Legends Inifinite Captain America : the winter Soldier!

Cap 2 made a great score but when I called my local Toys R us they had just roleplay gears and a few Cap figures! What the hell!?

Don't they check the world wide box office?
It shows how comic book movies are well received and people like that!

I know I'm just a fish in the sea but I had to say something.
I fully support comic and also movie related toys!

Now, where are the X-men days of Future past MOVIE toys? (except Minimates and Marvel Select)

Exactly ^ why not just make one GOOD main hero fig and maybeeee a variation instead of as Kylactus said making figures that look like they straight up came from a happy meal. *cough most marvel movie toys cough*

True, that's why films like Star Wars or GI Joe are so much better for the toy world - so many characters & if they have different outfits/figures, it makes sense in the story. But figures like Batman, etc., they basically have 1 outfit so how many versions can they make or do people want to buy?

Ironman I'd almost say is the exception to the rule. So long as each variation is something true to the movie or comic. Ironman has so many different appearances and armor variations that it can work.

Batman doesn't. Cap doesn't. Spider-man sorta does but they don't take advantage of it as well as they should.

For Ironman, we're still missing Heroes Reborn and 90s modular alongside his newest armors like the GOTG one and black & gold.
For spider-man there's Superior Spider-man(still no MU scale figure!), Ben Reilly Spider-man, Noir Spider-man(still no figure!), Manga Spider-man, Iron Spider-man, Big Time Spider-man(still no MU figure!), Spider-man 2099 etc. Then work within the confines of those for variations. Like translucent pieces for Spider-man 2099 and miles morales Ultimate Spider-man.

If they'd stick to the variations that have reasons instead of complete action feature randomness or what have yous, they could be doing fine. Though I will concede that Ironman Assemblers were a good idea in concept, but they needed to be able to have elbows and knees with those swappable too like the current mash-up figures. I'm also slightly miffed at the no pepper potts figure. Especially after the badass scene she got in IM3. That figure would have moved cases outright.

Why no widow in cap's line either? She had as much of a role as Winter Soldier and Falcon! No Sam Jackson fury figure either. The key players are the ones that are supposed to have figures!

Why no goblin in the ASM2 line as well?

So while I do blame the bottle neck on retailers, there are some really wtf choices going on at the toy maker level too.

Yes, because NOT putting out movie toys will help movie toys sell more. :rolleyes:

Hasbro is obviously shipping out MI because it's been showing up at retail in some areas. If I were you, I would look more towards your local retailers rather than Hasbro regarding the lack of MI in your area.

For example, I know the reason my local Target doesn't have any MI on the pegs is because they still have about 8-12 MU figures taking up that space. Until those are gone, Target won't put out any MI, even if there's a fresh case of them sitting in the back. It's just the way Target rolls.

I'm pretty positive most of them don't, since they tend to use one barcode per price point for any given toy line instead of separate ones for individual characters (or least wave numbers).

I beg to differ. They each have a few legitimate variations, even if you only stay within their respective "main" universes. But I certainly agree with your larger point that groundless, gimmick-inspired variants need to stop.

Scuba-gear Spider-Man, anyone?

If you mean the Harry Osborn version, I'm kind of glad they didn't make one. It's not like he was in the film that much anyway. Besides, they can save him for an ASM3/Sinister 6 release.

As much as i like movie costumes would be terrific if they started to make comic figures i.e 1st at the top of the image, people read comics more than they can watch a film in a sense until the next one comes out if they'd focus on making comic costumes rather than movie costumes besides aren't they based off comic costumes in the first place i.e the amzing spidey 2

basically use that huge archive of comic book characters at your disposal first by making rouge , moonstone , pile driver etc