[Snowflakian]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Grippen

I said this before in other forum (GI Joe related). The 4'' scale unfortunately is not very profitable. They are skipping it as much as they can or reducing articulation. This is why GI Joe line is mostly dead right now. If they reduce articulation collectors won't buy it because that is mostly what made GI Joe different from all others their articulation.

For MU still with the articulation reduction they can still sell it as we've seen, fans in the MU are not so demanding articulation wise. The new paradigm is 6'' and 2.5'', 4'' scale tends to have less and less focus.

Well, part of that for GI Joe though is also how much they've already covered over the years. How many variations of the same character will a consumer purchase before they say they have enough? How many can be sold when half the market is already "full" on that character?

Marvel Cinematic lines having a pause for so long means they don't quite have that same issue of re-selling the same characters over and over again. So I'd expect Spider-man is one of those that may get a figure still when his film gets nearer. They've already said they are planning him to have his own 4'' comic line, so a 4'' movie line support of some kind doesn't seem that far-fetched either.

Part of the problem is character over-saturation. How many times will a parent or collector re-buy certain characters for their kids before they'll say "don't you already have that one?" Or collectors skip it because it's the same figure repackaged with no emphasis for the purchase.

So skipping some mainstays for now that do have solo films coming up and can carry their own line even without a film, yeah it's to be expected they may come later. Whereas others that are a singular tool with likely no retool potential behind them to offset costs, may wait for a big push year. Black Panther for example can get repackaged. Agent 13 herself is mostly part swapped made to reduce costs. Vision would require a complete new tooling with potentially no re-use except for figures of himself later. Wanda is much similar.

So skipping Spider-man for now in favor of waiting for his film makes sense. Making black Panther for now makes sense since he could get reused for the Legends 4'' or even slightly retooled again for a later release in Infinity War or his own movie. Him having a solo product line as an unproven movie is highly unlikely, though they could do a minimalist one like Thor: The Dark World had gotten. Really depends on who is in his movie that would warrant molds besides himself.

Vision would have made sense, because with the distance between Civil War and Infinity war, re-releasing his figure could have saved costs. Wanda though is a mystery. Not sure if they could have recouped costs on her by a re-release if she gets a new costume later, and her mold has no direct animation support either unlike Vision coming up, nor comic support, and it'd need a heavy retool but it probably still would have been prudent to do her and Vision as an exclusive two pack release minimum. Really depends. I'd expect Infinity war may have more 4'' support due to the induced drought. And we also still don't know Thor's movie scale for Thor: Ragnarok. So we very well could see a Banner figure there.

The 4'' scale is also the only scale that did get an Edward Norton Banner though. Blonsky too. So we have gotten material in the past other scales haven't. So now it's their turn while we wait. No big deal. Market trends fluctuate, it happens.