The articulation on the Mezco figures are only for slightly altering the pose they are in. They can not be picked up, played with and posed like an action figure hence my ‘‘glorified statue’’ remark.
NECA figure were all basically like this a few years back and look at how they are packing the articulation in now. They are even re-doing some of those older figures.
I love Thundercats as much as anyone but financially I am not going to buy statues and other products that do not interest me in hopes that they make a product like action figures that do interest me.
Look at Transformers, TMNT, MOTU and multiple other brands. They are selling well because they are making products the vast majority of fans want and can afford.
How the success (or lack of success) of over priced statues bares any relation to how successful an actual toy line would sell is beyond me.
I agree with you! I want action figures too because they don’t take up a lot of space like the larger figures but as the guy who works for Mezco mentions it’s all about how the brand does in retail, if that was not the case they would be more products in stores.
A lot of retailers just don’t trust this brand as much because of the recent failure of the 2011 line, thus the lack of products right now. I’m confident things will pick up though…
I suggest someone explain to the guy at Mezco what ‘niche marketing’ is.
:duh:
Fans wanting Thundercats figures is a small fan base when compared to other well known brands of the 80’s. The fans wanting large and expensive statues of Thundercats is substantially smaller.
Mezco cannot gauge how well a Classics line would do based of the sales of their large mega scale figures.
Thundercats will never have a lot of products at retail unless some company takes a risk and actually makes good quality products that the vast majority actually want.
It’s the core adult characters. And they are not statues.
The statues that were made weren’t overpriced, and nor are the mega scale figures. That you don’t want to buy them yourself doesn’t make them overpriced or push them into a category that they simply don’t fit.
We have a chance to get a 6 inch deluxe line here, even if you don’t intend to buy Tygra yourself, if you really want to see action figures made, it’s probably more productive to support those who like the mega scale figures, rather than criticize the line.
I agree! We need as many supporters as possible…but based on the Mezco interview they will probably switch to smaller scale since so many figures are far apart when releasing the larger scale figures.
I think this is why majority of the retail loss interest in the line due to the huge release gap.
They are statues, statues being glorified as action figures, but basically statues. Granted they have some minimal articulation but they only look good posed in the one position rendering the articulation they have some what pointless.
To be fair maybe saying the statues were overpriced was a bit harsh as I don’t really know the standard cost for statues as I do not buy statues.
I am not criticizing the line or those that support it, in fact I bought Lion-O and Mumm-Ra when they first came out! I am criticizing the way WB etc have handled the Thundercats brand and that it would be nice to have something the general collecting market would be interested in buying.
I hope the Tygra figures looks good and sells well and lot of people that really want him get him. But my point is still the same. They cannot gauge how successful a 6" Classic figure/line would be based on the sales of a large Tygra statue/figure.
Maybe between now and SDCC Mezco should get a 6" figure ready to sell/show and use the interest in it as a basis on whether they should do a 6" line.
Saw the pixel dan interview…as optimistic as i want to be…didnt seem like they had any real plans to release more thundercats…if they do, i got the impression that its gonna take years to move the line…sort of like the tygra, which took soooo long to get out…
It’s more than just statues vs figures. Thundercats as a brand is not in demand, and hasn’t been for a long time. The show didn’t last long on Toonami, DVD sales were mediocre, comics didn’t go anywhere, movie was cancelled, reboot show failed… You say things would be different if it was figures, but that’s not much of an argument. You can’t compare Thundercats to other 80’s brands because it’s not on the same level. Ninja Turtles, Transformers, GI Joe, and even Masters of the Universe are far bigger and better known brands. And not because Thundercats didn’t try, there have been many attempts over the years. Fact is, the demand for the Thundercats is relatively small. A handful of diehard fans wanting figures means nothing when the entire brand is dead in the water.
You know if I had to choose one piece of merch, that would be the last Thundercats release ever. I would trade in all of the possible action figures and plush dolls for a complete soundtrack to the original series.
Thundercats was huge in the UK in the 80’s-early 90’s and is still one of the most remembered TV shows and toylines here.
WB messed Thundercats up, wrong people working on the comic, the movie and the 2011 TV series and toyline.
Ninja Turtles, MOTU, Transformers and G.I. Joe have also had unsuccessful stages but they didn’t let their setbacks stop them. They always came back with something else fresh to try and keep the brand going.
You guys don’t seem to grasp that all I am saying is the market wanting statues and large figures like Mezco are making is significantly smaller to those who would be interested in buying 6" scale figures that would display well with other 6" scale 80’s classic inspired figures.
Who? Where? If there is such huge demand for these figures then why isn’t there a petition? Why are we not seeing the Mezco Facebook page flooded with requests? If people want things then they need to do more than just post on a fan forum.
In regards to other franchises having unsuccessful stages, that’s true. But, at their peak they were bigger than Thundercats and had other good runs. Thundercats mattered once, only once. And that was 30 years ago. Everything but the original run in the 80’s has been a flop. Wrong people this and bad luck that, but at the end of the day Thundercats has not delivered since the 80’s. If you are a company executive what evidence do you have to go by? Where is the evidence that there is a demand for this product?
The biggest problem I see with Thundercats is that while people know about it and like it to some degree, the number of people who can actually say that Thundercats is their favorite show/franchise ever is actually very small. I’m a fan, but it probably doesn’t even make it into my top 10 favorites list. That could be the main reason why there is so little visible demand for this product. Hell, your Thundercat forum icon is a Ninja Turtle.
If people want something, they need to speak up. Myself and a few others spent 2014 posting on the Mezco Facebook and sending messages through their site to create Tygra. Not a huge crowd but it got the job done. If all the masses that supposedly want 6" toys made an effort to be heard then I’m sure the company would recognize that.
All the more reason that WB should be putting out a product that has more cross brand appeal for collectors. Not everyone buys figures based just on their favourite show but dabble with other lines.
The majority of people that want 6" Thundercats all seem to want Mattel to make them to include them with their MOTU Classics figures. I am not a big fan of Mattel’s recent work so I would be more than happy for most any other company to make them but I wouldn’t refuse Mattel figures if they were made.
Also I am using the Turtle picture I painted as my profile picture as I thought it would be better using a picture I created myself instead of just a pic of my favourite Thundercat. I am not even a very big fan of the Ninja Turtles…the original cartoon wouldn’t probably be in my top ten favourite cartoons or toylines.
If I get time to work on a Thundercats painting though I will probably start using that as my profile pic.
Didn’t like Silverhawks. The G.I. Joes were fun. I was never to bothered about lots of articulation just as long as they were fun to lay with. I loved my old Thundercats, He-Man and Bravestarr figures. I liked G.I. Joe and Transformers but not as much. Oddly enough though I was always annoyed with the real lack of articulation on the old Transformers.
As far as fighting game action figures go SOTA really set the bar high with their Street Fighter line.
I was interested in the Mezco line in the beginning but I lost a lot of interest when I found out they had no leg articulation. I owned Lion-O and Mumm-Ra when they came out but with the sporadic releases and no guarantee of various characters I just lost all interest in them.
I liked the size of the Bravestarr figures but they probably would have been better an inch or two shorter. They had a great buck. I wish Mattel had used it for the New Adventures of He-man line, then those figures would have been a lot better.
But that’s 3 years ago. Since then we got Panthro, Cheetrara, Snarf, a second version of Mumm-Ra, and now Tygra. If Tygra sells well enough Jaga and the Kittens (in some form) are likely releases for next year. They even mentioned interest in Grune. Sure, we won’t get minor characters and even Mutants may not get a release, but even without that you would be looking at a 10-figure set.