Ask Matty Q&A for 8/15 (a Few Days Early!)

Mattel DC and Batman Unlimited (1 of 4)

It’s been a long time since our last Q&A with Matty, but we’ve decided to get back into it. Toy Guru provided some answers early, because he’s either going to be driving for every last subscription to Club Eternia and Club Infinite Earths, or he may just be out of the office for a few days.

1) A lot of people thought that the DC Unlimited and Batman Unlimited lines were doing well at retail. What were the reasons for canceling those lines?

We are always working with retailers to find the best way to bring DC figures to mass collectors and moms and kids. Right now the 6″ line will continue on Matty pending we get the min number of sub holders.

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Toy Guru Sets the Record Straight about Mattycollector Subscription Targets (Again)

MOTUMeter_600x600_v7 DCUMeter_600x600_v7 Ecto1_600x600_v7

Matty Tracker 2014 - T-11Toy Guru returns to YouTube to continue the push to hit the targets for Club Eternia, Club Infinite Earths, and Ecto-1 pre-orders. He also tries once more to squash the conspiracy theories about the meters. Repeat after Toy Guru: they are real – they are not a marketing ploy! Hey – repetition is a proven way to get a message across.

One of the more interesting remarks he makes is regarding the Club Eternia sign-up last year – he tells us that there was no meter on Club Eternia, because they thought they didn’t need one. I guess their surprise at the implied drop-off (I have no idea what the subscription numbers are) is why we have a He-Man shaped silhouette on the Club Eternia sign-up pages for 2014.

I’m still collecting both Masters of the Universe Classics and DC Universe Classics – Ghostbusters died for me when I couldn’t bring myself to buy that Dana Barrett. But I particularly feel for those of you just collecting DC. Maybe it’s just leftover from last year, when the MOTUC bias was much worse, but it still feels to me like DC is the red-headed stepchild – this video is shot in front of current and vintage Masters figures. On the DC front, only Doomsday is name-checked. I know Toy Guru is a big DC fan, but with his favored JLU line completed, there doesn’t seem to be any cohesive vision for what Club Infinite Earths should be – maybe that’s why it’s been hard to articulate why we should be buying the DC subscription.

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If Toy Guru Can’t Convince You Mattycollector is in Trouble, Maybe the Four Horsemen Can

DC Universe vs the Masters of the Universe 1

It’s not without a little irony that as Mattel gets a huge push this month for its two flagship collector brands with the DC Universe vs the Masters of the Universe comic book hitting shelves, Mattycollector is finding its subscription pre-orders for the DC Universe Club Infinite Earths and the Masters of the Universe Classics Club Eternia both in jeopardy. Deja vous? Last year we were in a similar spot. During the Matty sub period, we had the MOTU limited series comic book hitting shelves, and collectors were still reeling from DC Universe Classics going on hiatus at big box retail. But somehow, it seems more dire this time around.

And yet, we’re seeing the Crisis on Multiple Earths / Eternias (see what I did there?) being handled using almost the same exact playbook as last year. To start, when the subs are announced, we get promised improvements from Digital River. Last year: manage your subscriptions online. This year: a new quarterly shipping option. Are these changes from Digital River helping?

When it’s clear that the subs are not gaining traction, the next step is for Toy Guru to sound the alarm – if the subs don’t hit minimums, they’re gone! And now we’re at the next point, where the Four Horsemen tell us that hey, this is for real.

Guys, it’s not that we don’t believe you. I just think it’s silly to keep running the same game plan, when it should be painfully obvious that it’s not working like it used to. If the subs don’t succeed in KILLING THE LIEN this year, make sure they don’t do it next year – try something new.

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Border Patrol: Marvel Legends Mutants – Rogue, Cyclops, and Juggernaut

Marvel Legends Rogue 1 Marvel Legends Rogue 2

Marvel Legends Jim Lee Rogue by Draubner – I don’t remember when it was in the comics that Rogue turned into another hot X-Female – when she first showed up as an X-Men baddie, she was short-haired and homely – I don’t think it was Jim Lee’s doing, but he certainly designed one of Rogue’s most popular looks, and this custom captures it with an envy-worthy smooth paint job – ends soon at Aug 06, 2013 11:32:42 PDT

In AFP’s Border Patrol, we scour active eBay auctions for customized action figures that you won’t want to let slip by!

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Watch Mattycollector’s Ghostbusters Ecto-1 Mockup and Comparison Video

Ghostbusters Ecto-1 Mockup Compared with Batmobile Ecto_600x600726

I may need to be covered in mood slime and blasted with some Ray Parker, Jr. – because I don’t think things are looking too good for the Ghostbusters Epic Creations Ecto-1. When I checked yesterday, the subscription tracking silhouette (typing that in made me miss the thermometer) hadn’t moved for over a week, if the 726 on the photo means July 26.

Toy Guru is bringing the marketing effort to YouTube, where he stacks up the foam model against the short-lived Mattel Ghostbusters figures and some earlier Mattel Ghostbuster vehicle efforts that somehow didn’t need pre-orders for Mattel to make them. To be fair, the earlier toys are smaller and didn’t have lights and sounds. In Ghostbusters, Ray Stantz was able to pick up the Ecto-1 for $4,800 – Mattel only has to sell 22 and a third of their 1/12 scale Ecto-1s to recoup the cost of the original.

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