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Desperate Times, Despicable Measures

Posted by Paul | October 11, 2011 at 07:25 PM ET

Yeah, it’s another rant and I won't apologize for it. Click through if you dare.....

Pictures follow after the rant, be sure not to miss them!

Quickly reenergized and hopeful to find more figures I started visiting more Kmart stores on my toys runs after work. (I will probably need the same amount of Ponda Babas as I do Gamorrean Guards. Those of you who read my works know what this means.) I saw the Proto Fett mail-away sticker a mile away hanging from the pegs like I had eagle eyes and almost did a cartwheel in the aisle. But to my dismay I found vandalized figures instead. Some loser/DB/jerk/[insert your own expletive here as I don't curse] ripped off the UPCs and stole the mail-away certificates from two figures: a Logray (Ewok Medicine Man) and a Luke Skywalker (Endor Capture) in a Revenge Of The Jedi package. Yes, it’s theft and that is just morally reprehensible, but it perhaps feels worse than ever because the figures are so impossible to find at retail. It’s sort of like the Great Depression right now of Star Wars figures. Just because we’re in desperate times, it doesn’t give you license to act like a criminal.

With my last rant, many of you shared your feelings with me. Some of you echoed my exact sentiments, some of you called me a crybaby and others just asked when the new figures would be added to our Research Droids Reviews. (They’re all there now FYI.) But it’s not about whining and complaining until we get our way. No, it's so much more than that. We are trying to make the point that the lack of product is sucking our joy of collecting dry. It's exhausting and used to be one of the fun highlights of our lives. And if you cannot see that, then maybe you aren’t fully invested in collecting like the rest of us who feel so patiently about it. I am a one of everything collector and it’s maddening to not just browse the aisles and decide whether or not I want my 27th Gamorrean Guard or not. That should be my prerogative. I shouldn't wish that I will see my 27th Gamorrean Guard on the pegs! Sheesh! (I don't have 26 Gamorrean Guards by the way.... I think.)

I do see signs of positive change happening. Not one TARGET in my area has one Cloud Car Pilot, Dengar, Sandtrooper or 4-LOM left. If this can trigger new cases of The Vintage Collection to speed to retail then it’s more than fine with me. But why have these figures sat on the shelves for a year and a half before Hasbro did anything? We’ve been complaining since wave 2 that next to nothing had hit most retail location. Very few TARGETs and Walmarts actually got a decent supply of wave 3. It never even hit Toys R Us and to be honest, I am NOW just seeing waves 5, 6 and 7 come in heavier numbers. And yes, late is always better than never, but I believe we’ve been beaten and battered by no rewards of good store finds that we’ve become quite jaded. I am hopeful things will start to look up for collectors. But what is really going on any more? Is it possible that Hasbro is not producing figures anywhere near the demand? I don’t believe there are figure rotting in a warehouse. Are the excuses to bide time so they can make more?

Hasbro needs to be more active at the retail level. it’s easy for them to just blare out that The Clone Wars and Saga Legends are kids’ lines and TVC is for the collector base (I love how we’re always the “others” – we’re solely responsible for the line lasting this long fore heaven’s sake.) But I was in TARGET recently and there was a father probably a decade older than me with his son and they were apparently looking for Darth Vader from The Vintage Collection for a very long time. (Big surprise.) As I offered to help point them to the Saga Legends Darth Vader(s) clogging the shelves, he politely told me that he was looking for the one in the packaging that he grew up with to introduce his son to the figures that were part of his childhood. The Vintage Collection isn’t just for collectors. It's a way a father in my age range can share his childhood and bond with his child. And this is coming from someone who has no offspring whatsoever. I have seen probably just as many kids reach for TVC and I have for TCW.

So you’re probably like: Paul, shut the heck up – you just found wave 9. Stop your belly-aching. Perhaps you’re right about that and your point is valid. But I am empathetic to your frustration out in cyberspace. I still get emails people asking me all the time when will they see the new waves of figures. Our foreign readers even have it worse than American readers. It’s a whole hot mess. It just isn’t fair to “collectordom” that the Star Wars line is the best it’s ever been yet out of reach for most collectors. We will be attending NYCC and you can bet we’re going to try to pull answers out of Hasbro. Here we are in the middle of October again and while there are some exciting sporadic store finds, it isn’t representative of what most of us are finding out there. And back to this theft. If you’re the thief who stole the insides of these figures and you’re reading, I spoke to the security and store manager about this. They both appeared appalled to me. Try it again and see what happens. And if we ever happen to be in the same aisle while your doing that, one of us will be in the hospital while the other is being fingerprinted in jail.

The new The B-52s live CD With The Wild Crowd (Live in Athens, GA) came out today. I highly suggest you pick it up because it rocks and it's the only thing that's been able to make me smile today. But The World's Greatest Party Band kind of has that affect on you.

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