Ask Matty Q&A for 8/31

Just in time for labor day weekend, here’s the Ask Matty Q&A for  8/31. Thanks to Toy Guru and team for answering our questions.

1) You’ve said that 2014 and 2015 would have characters that required more tooling, like Two Bad and Modulok. What does that mean for the number of subscribers needed to support the line? For example, do you need to increase the minimum subscribers needed to support more tooling?

Masters of the Universe Classics Two Bad Masters of the Universe Classics Modulok

No, the min number of sub holders has stayed the same year to year, we are just very strategic in banking a few fully tool’d figures with other partial tool figures so the year balances out.

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Soapbox Sunday: Sour Grapes – Club Infinite Earths Doomsday was too Big

Mattycollector Club Eternia Doomsday Comparison

The Club Infinite Earths subscription was declared officially dead last week. So what? – the club exclusive Doomsday, if he had gotten enough subscribers to get him made, was too damn big anyways.

For this edition of Soapbox Sunday, let’s take a look at how Doomsday was portrayed with Superman in the comics that led to their mutual destruction – spoiler! If you’re not convinced that the Doomsday(s) we were shown at San Diego Comic-Con (and subsequently did not support enough to save Club Infinite Earths and get him made) was way too big to be in scale with DC Universe Classics, then you’re probably one of the weak-willed individuals that signed up for Club Infinite Earths, and will never wield a Green Lantern power ring (just like weak-willed me).

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The Day that Club Infinite Earths Died

Death-of-Superman

DC fans put up the good fight, and in the end, Doomsday was dead – but so was Club Infinite Earths. With the announcement of refunds coming to subscribers for 2014 , it’s official – Club Infinite Earths is dead. But to carry on the Death of Superman analogy, who knows what will spring forth to fill the void? Hopefully it’s not four all-in subs! 😉

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Mattycollector Subscription Results: Masters are a Go, Future of DC is Uncertain, and Ghostbusters are Busted

Masters of the Universe Classics fans have pulled through again, jumping from 91% of the target threshold to a massive 115% in the final four hours of the pre-order window – so Club Eternia has got the green light for 2014. Sadly, Ghostbusters fans won’t be getting the Ecto-1, moving the meter just 1% to 38% in the final hours of the pre-sale.

In the same time period, DC Universe fans managed to jump 5 points from 58% to 63%, but Club Infinite Earths still could not muster enough subscribers to hit even the first tier of the exclusive Doomsday – though I suspect that the tiered system contributed a bit of the sluggishness in the pre-orders, since the first goal was a lackluster jail-suited Doomsday, when compared to the unleashed Doomsday of tier 2. While Club Infinite Earths won’t move forward with the plan partially revealed at San Diego Comic-Con, there is still a possibility of getting DC Universe Classics figures through Mattycollector in 2014 – Mattel just has to figure it out.

I’ve got to believe there’s enough fans to support a DC line – maybe this setback with the all-in approach will spur Mattel to rethink something that works better for the fans. We can hope, right?

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Just One More Reason to Hate Digital River

Club Infinite Earths order Matty Tracker 2014 - T-0-2

Update: Thanks to Kevin, who left a comment below, I checked my credit card activity and only have a pending charge for $38.15. So instead of having another reason to hate DR, I just dislike them a little more for being confusing. Please don’t let this discourage you from subbing to any of the Mattycollector subscriptions. Like I have suggested before – compare what figures you’re likely to get from the sub (pretty easy to do in case of Masters) against what you want from the line, and let that guide your decision-making. How you feel about Mattel, Toy Guru, or Digital River is just noise.

It’s more like seventy-five reasons – that’s what I was charged to pre-order the Club Infinite Earths subscription from Mattycollector. For two items that I will (potentially, if the sub actually goes through) get four and six months from now, I was charged the full price for the figures, the shipping, and tax. “Why are you surprised?” you may be asking – after all, I have subbed from the beginning. So I used the dreadful Customer Service link to find my previous orders to compare.

For reasons that are beyond my ability to fathom, the cost has gone up. Last year, for THREE subs, I was charged in the neighborhood of $150. Two years ago, for TWO subs, it was around $100. So, Digital River has found a way to increase what I’m charged four months in advance by 50% ($75 for one sub compared to $50).

But I suppose the more interesting thing here is that while this crappy practice of Digital River sitting on our money has been going on since the beginning, I didn’t even bat an eyelash before, even though the amounts were higher. I guess my dissatisfaction with Mattycollector and how Digital River handles the front end has been building up to the point where I don’t feeling good about buying from them. For someone who loves the toys, that’s saying a lot.

Anyways, time’s nearly up. What did you guys end up doing for the Mattycollector subs?

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