Top 5 Figures That I’m Confident Would Sell Well

Posted by Chris on 04/03/25 at 07:05 AM Category: Vintage Collection, Top 5

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One of my frequent replies when someone says Hasbro should make a given figure is:

Would you bet your job on it being a sales success?

The reason I say that is because that's exactly what were asking Hasbro employees to do whenever we urge them to make a figure. In the past, I think that corners of the community have "tricked" Hasbro into making figures that were retail duds to varying degrees. There are two in particular: Yarna D'al' Gargan and Wilrow Hood. Don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled those figures exist, but the force of their respective campaigns was not commensurate with their demand. Both figures peg warmed mightily. No one wins when the community convinces Hasbro to take a bath on a figure.

We absolutely, positively need secondary and tertiary characters in the line, but we need to be honest with their overall demand so Hasbro can manage them appropriately. It's easier to assume those risks if the line is healthy and has sales home runs like the recent Snowtrooper. With that in mind, here are five figures that I would stake my job on. Most should be 100% newly tooled figures. None of this repack and retool nonsense. In general, any core character shouldn't be touching tooling that predates 2022. One figure on my list might be able to leverage some existing tooling, but I'll leave that to the experts.

These aren't figures that necessarily appear on my personal Top 10 list (only one does). Most of these don't even place on fan polls, but that's sort of the concern I have regarding the highly engaged community. I think we pull Hasbro toward the narrow wants of the hardcore collectors, and away from figures that have more broad-based appeal. That's not meant to be a criticism. People should campaign for what they want, but we just need to know that if TVC becomes strictly the domain of the hardcore collector, it won't last long.

I'm going to go in descending order from five to one, but to be honest, I could throw five through three in a blender and come up with any order. They're really 3A, B and C.

5. Clone Commander Cody

We've gotten three Captain Rex releases in TVC 2.0, but what about the other preeminent Clone Commander? The last Commander Cody release was 15 years ago and utilized tooling that was sixteen years old. It's kind of crazy that Hasbro repacked all sorts of questionable figures in Fan Chanel waves during the first three years of TVC 2.0, but never tapped Cody. It's a figure that fetches decent coin on Ebay. Of course repacking the 2009 figure would never fly today. The community would riot. Cody needs the all new, or mostly new, treatment. I assume some tooling from the recent Clone buck could be utilized.

4. Luke Skywalker (Jedi Knight)

The fact that there has been a quantum leap in 3.75" Star Wars figure quality is a blessing and a curse for Hasbro. The curse is that it DRASTICALLY reduces which older figures are viable for repack. The blessing is that it gives pure market reasons to revisit the most evergreen, retail-gold versions of legendary characters with all new sculpts. Jedi Knight Luke is just that. It always sells (as do most black clad Lukes). I feel strongly that VC175 never met market demand during it's run. It's one of the few TVC 2.0 figures that consistently sells for more than the current MSRP on Ebay. A lot of vocal members in the community would scoff at another Jedi Luke, but it would sell like crazy. Some people scoffed at another Snowtrooper.

Alternatively, this could be Death Star II Luke, especially if it could be optionally be displayed with the shirt flap in both configurations. UPDATE: As McBeard pointed out in the comments, a definitive DSII Luke could be achieved by marrying a new upper and lower torso to the Jedi Academy Luke. This one DOES NOT need 100% new tooling.

3. Scout Trooper

This is that last true OT army builder left to be updated. The Stormtrooper and Snowtrooper seemingly lap all other figures in sales. It's time to finally give the Scout Trooper the 100% newly tooled treatment. It's obscene that such an iconic army builder hasn't been newly tooled since 2006. Even Greedo beat the Scout Trooper to "all new" status. The most recent Scout Trooper release was locked behind a vehicle. Hasbro needs to give new fans a chance to army build it, and a new sculpt would bring in all of us crusty oldtimers.

2. Jedi Temple Guard

This one has everything going for it. Unlike the previous 3 entries, the Jedi Temple Guard does place on fan polls annually. It came in 31st place in last year's Last Figure Standing, and was the 25th seed in this year's March Madness. It's a visually cool character with a double bladed lightsaber. The 5POA figure goes for a mother loving fortune on the secondary market, so it has collecting mystique. It's an army builder, and finally, it's never been done in the realistic line. I'm confident this is a figure fans would buy by the case. I know I would.

1. C-3PO

An all new C-3PO would sell on its own merit. If you have OT displays in your collection, chances are that you need several C-3PO figures. Tantive IV, Lars Homestead, Mos Eisley, Millennium Falcon, Cloud City, Jabba's Palace, Jabba's Sail Barge, and Endor all need 3PO figures. But even if an OT C-3PO wouldn't sell by the pallets on its own (it would), the fact that the tooling reuse is off the charts justifies its number one position on my list all by iteself. Heck, there are three justifiable repaints of C-3PO just by himself. Then you have any of the 99,000 other C3-series protocol droids that appear throughout the entire saga.

So those are the figures I have high confidence would sell well today. It was very hard leaving Episode III Obi-Wan Kenobi off the list, but I'm a little wary of the "Ahsoka affect". Ahsoka was once retail gold, but Hasbro went to the well too frequently in a short period of time. We're getting two Obi-Wan's this year, and we got two a couple of years ago. Only Luke and Vader can pull off that sort of omnipresence in the line. I also very much wanted to put the Stranger on the list, but I'm worried the community will have moved on by the time Hasbro gets around to it.