The Vintage Collection Needs Publishing Figures Too And It Requires ZERO Tooling

Somewhat of a bombshell came out of the Victoria's Cantina SDCC '22 Q&A. Per Hasbro, they still have access to the Legacy Collection (2008-2009) tooling. Something fans know, but Hasbro doesn't seem to, is that the tooling from that era is every bit as good as the 2010 Vintage Collection tooling. While that means it's too dated for any main characters, it's perfectly passable for minor, secondary, tertiary, and obscure characters. With the exception of a few icons, such as Grand Admiral Thrawn, publishing characters almost always fall into one of more of those categories. This means that 2008-2009 Legacy Collection tooling for publishing characters could and should be reissued in The Vintage Collection as a publishing subset (i.e. not in main line).

Before we continue, please note, we are not saying that only publishing figures from the Legacy Collection should be reissued in TVC. That is merely the subject of this article. There are A LOT of non-main characters from TLC that need to be reissued, but that is a subject for next week. The purpose for today is to call for a Fan Channel exclusive publishing sub line for the Vintage Collection, similar to what the Black Series has, using existing Legacy Collection tooling. There are three figures in particular that would be ideal candidates: Exar Kun (2009 - Comic Pack #11), Ulic Qel-Droma (2009 - Comic Pack #11), and Darth Nihl (2010 - Comic Pack #16 - Entertainment Earth exclusive). Those three figures have the combination of passable enough articulation for the source combined with astronomical aftermarket value. Let's look at what the secondary market prices are for these figures loose:

• Exar Kun - $375
• Ulic Qel-Droma - $200
• Darth Nihl - $160

The price of Exar Kun is starting to approach vintage Yak Face ($550) territory. That is INSANE, especially when Hasbro supposedly still has the assets. Because of those sky high secondary market prices, some fans have been asking for these figures to be released in main line as smart pack refreshes. I have been against that. These sources are too obscure for the average fan, and if they ever made it into brick and mortar, I could see them being problematic sellers (not that it matters with the Lando situation right now). But a Fan Channel Publishing line would be perfect, and it would be a kindness to the fans who can't bring themselves to pay triple digits for loose figures.

We have only had one carded figure from publishing in TVC 2.0 and that's VC129 - Dr. Aphra from four years ago. There was only one in TVC 1.0 as well (VC59 - Nom Anor). A publishing subset would be a good way to grow TVC horizontally without requiring any costly new tooling.

---

comments powered by Disqus