Adam's Star Wars Newsletter #008 **************** CONTENTS I. Prologue II. The New Hasbro Reveals III. The New Hasbro Releases IV. New Stories V. Fin **************** I. Prologue It's a busy month! We're in the midst of the May 4/May 5 madness as I write this, with lots of pre-orders about to go live. We just got the trailer for the new Obi-Wan Kenobi series which looks decidedly non-cinematic so far, but it is a streaming show. We've got a big convention in about 3 weeks, and there's a lot of uncertainty as to when the rest of the new shows this year may come out. Thankfully, those two things will probably result in the answers we all still want. A lot of new stuff was revealed this week - and last month - so I compiled a list of the things I've seen on the reveal videos or pre-orders below. Fans will note there's not much from the original or prequel trilogies, but there's not nothing either. Figrin D'an is in two scales, and a companion 6-inch Nalan Cheel will be sold at Hasbro Pulse so you can "army build" the band with all the instruments. The Darth Vader helmet is back, but with more and arguably more correct paint on it. Princess Leia is back in the 6-inch line, now in her Endor Ewok Village dress. Fans of the games, comics, and streaming series have a lot to look forward to here, and presumably the Obi-Wan Kenobi stuff will start to be revealed shortly. If you're no longer a completist, the good news is there's still a lot to look forward to and you won't have to spend as much money to finish any specific collector focus. The bad news is scattershot figure selection means that it's going to be tough to encourage new people to come on board, mostly because it's rare that you'll see two or three figures that go together in a store at the same time. But if you only buy a handful of figures per year? It's still a good time to buy action figures. **************** II. The New Hasbro Reveals Exclusive items denoted below. Follow the following sponsored affiliate links to place pre-orders (we may get a cut of the sales on these affiliate links): Amazon New Star Wars Pre-Orders: https://amzn.to/3l37odz Entertainment Earth New Star Wars Pre-Orders: https://bit.ly/3E0SvBh The Black Series Figures __ Darth Vader (Redeemed/White, Shared Exclusive) __ Clone Trooper (187th Battalion) __ Figrin D'an __ Grogu __ HK-47 __ Luke Skywalker (The Mandalorian) __ Migs Mayfeld (S1) __ Nalan Cheel (Hasbro Pulse exclusive) __ New Republic Sentry Droid __ Obi-Wan Kenobi (streaming show, revealed on Jimmy Kimmel Live!) __ Princess Leia Organa (Ewok Village) __ Princess Leia Organa (Marvel Comics, Shared Exclusive) __ RC-1207 Sev (Gaming Greats, GameStop Exclusive) __ Saw Gerrera (Deluxe) __ Segeant Kreel (Marvel Comics, Shared Exclusive) The Black Series Special Items __ Darth Vader helmet (silver highlights) __ Obi-Wan Kenobi FX Lightsaber __ Trapper Wolf Helmet The Vintage Collection Figures __ Anakin Skywalker (Padawan) __ ARC Trooper Jesse __ Figrin D'an __ Heavy Assault Stormtrooper (Gaming Greats, Shared Exclusive) __ Lando Calrissian (Gaming Greats, Shared Exclusive) __ Shae Vizla (Gaming Greats, Shared Exclusive) __ Mandalorian Death Watch Airborne Trooper __ Mandalorian Super Commando __ Mandalorian Super Commando Captain __ Stormtrooper Commander (The Force Unleashed, Gaming Greats, Shared Exclusive) The Vintage Collection Gift Sets __ Clone Trooper Phase I 4-Pack (Hasbro Pulse exclusive) __ Imperial Death Trooper 4-Pack (Hasbro Pulse exclusive) The Retro Collection __ A New Hope 6-Pack (Han/Luke/Leia/Chewbacca/Vader/Stormtrooper, Shop Disney and Theme Park exclusive) __ Chewbacca (Prototype Edition, Target exclusive) **************** III. The New Hasbro Releases The Black Series __ Clone Trooper (212th Battalion - Walgreens Exclusive) The Vintage Collection __ Ahsoka (Season 3 Clone Wars) __ Ahsoka Tano (Corvus) __ Anakin Skywalker (Padawan/Phantom Menace) __ Clone Trooper (501st Legion) __ Death Watch Mandalorian __ Fennec Shand __ Mace Windu __ Obi-Wan Kenobi (AOTC) __ Yoda **************** IV. New Stories The Obi-Wan Kenobi series got delayed two days - and will feature a double-header on May 27, 2022. The Andor show is expected later this summer, but has no **************** V. Fin The 45th anniversary of Star Wars is upon us. A lot has changed since then! Heck, a lot has changed since I started writing about Star Wars on the internet in 1995. Back then we had comic books, novels, Bend-Em's trading cards, MicroMachines, and a new movie a few years out. (And some new figures.) Today, being a fan involves multiple scales of figures in a variety of price points, LEGO sets, large-scale props for $100-$300 (and higher), theme park lands with matching companion hotels, streaming series, conventions every couple of years, and of course comics, novels, and some other stuff. Trading cards have... mutated. A bit. Print-to-order? Not interested. But I digress. Back in the 1980s, "collect them all!" seemed like an unreachable goal. Kids didn't get big allowances, parents didn't want Imperial Shuttles in their homes, and heaven help you if you could even find just over 100 figures from across six different Kenner figure brands. (Plus packaging variants.) Today things are a lot more spread out, but instead of shelling out $100-$200 for an entire year's toy line, you can drop thousands on just Hasbro stuff - more if you participate in HasLab, or Disney's droids, plus the various experiences, variant covers, digital trading cards, and other stuff. It's kind of funny, because back in the 1990s it wasn't a huge challenge to be on the bleeding edge of this stuff. A few cereal boxes here, some Pepsi cans there, and Under-3 Yoda from Taco Bell or an Australia-only Pizza Hut figure set there... it was something you could follow. Today it looks like Topps is doing new lines of cards all the time, and I have absolutely no idea what it all is. Hopefully someone somewhere is archiving everything at Rancho Obi-Wan or Lucasfilm's own archives, because I can't imagine any collector having the long-term finances or energy just to track it all. Hasbro's line feels more expensive than ever, packed with reissues (many improved!) and some bizarre variants that are the kinds of thing we never really saw pre-Disney. But they're selling! And even though we're a lot of old guys looking at this, the fans are showing up to buy those weird metallic and holiday figures, Topps is selling out of a lot of its very expensive trading cards, and I'm still here decades later going "this is never going to end, is it?" But there's a bright side! Back in the 1990s, we got very little new Star Wars to watch. There were video games, a few minutes of new footage, and at the end of the decade, a prequel! That was a huge deal, so with a lack of new shows or movies we filled the gap with the Expanded Universe and a galaxy of toys. Today, this year alone, we've had one live-action show and we're expecting two more. Plus another season of animation, if not more. There's a whole list of movies that are in development hell and will never come out, but we don't even have to care. Back in 2013 it felt quasi-tragic that Star Wars Detours got kicked to the curb, but given the many hours of stuff on the horizon, one lost movie or TV show is not as big of a deal. There's a lot more coming. There are things coming you can skip and not miss, which seemed unthinkable 25 years ago, and you'll still have plenty of other things to watch if you're so inclined. Amazingly, there's still more coming up this month with Star Wars Celebration announcements, may they be fun, and supposedly we're going to get San Diego Comic-Con International announcements too. No rumblings on exclusives for either from Hasbro, though, most likely thanks to continued uncertainty about variants (variants were also problematic in the 1990s) and shipping from overseas. But maybe next year things will look a bit more normal. Is what I'm supposed to keep writing, I'm just keeping those expectations low here in the home office. --Adam ****************