2008 NY Toy Fair Coverage - Indie
The news for smaller, independent toy lines was a mixed bag of great and not-so-great. The saddest news was the official cancellation of the Legendary Comic Book Heroes line by Marvel Toys. While losing LCBH was a pretty sad (albeit, expected) blow, there are still plenty of smaller collector-oriented companies ramping up their superarticulated offerings this year! Expand the post to find out all about it.
NECA - NECA is pumping a lot of great product this year. First and foremost is their excellent TMNT line. They had all four turtles on display, as well as their prototypes of April O’Neil (who looks fantastic!) and a robotic Mouser (also really cool!). See all those pics here. NECA is also doing some really nice Gears of War figures (images here) and some true superarticulated (think ToyBiz artic!) Shaw Brothers martial arts figures. Check those out here.
MEZCO - Mezco has the Hellboy license, and their figures from the upcoming Hellboy 2 movie are looking great. Some of them lack a few points of articulation that I’d like to see, but the sculpts and detail are exquisite. Pics here. Mezco is also doing Heroes figures and a bunch of other stuff that isn’t quite articulated enough to get featured on this site (heh). You can see all of Mezco’s Toy Fair pieces here.
SHOCKER TOYS - Shocker Toys had their Indie Spotlight figures on display. Some of them look pretty good - Scud and The Maxx in particular. Others need some work. I’m interested to see when and in what capacity these figs actually make it to retail. Check them out here.
Tags: 2008 ny toy fair, hellboy, tmnt
And if NECA releases a variant of that April figure clad in a yellow jumpsuit, I’m so game.
WHY??!! WHY OH WHY have they taken the best figures away from me superarticulated guy? I love the Legendary Heroes. I mean look at the PITT! look at him! Play with him!!!I am a big Hunter Rose fan–Grendel and long for a figure to play with and pose with my Batman etc. I understood that he and the Grendel Prime were going to get figures by Toy Bi..Marvel Toys. Now …NO. And we get no Frost Giant that would have been the coolest BAF since…well Monkey Man or Pitt or any of the others I guess. Man these companies are sad.
PLEASE anyone someone make an affordable Hunter Rose figure with at least 30 somthin’ points of articulation…please?
Anyway I haven’t seen the Shaw brothers but the Turtles look OK
I am unhappy with the Hellboy stuff. I miss the chest or waste and the bicep articulation that many had from the last film. That Wink would be great if he had more points.
Shocker Toys Please make me a Grendel. Help Me Shocker Kenobi, yer my only hope…sorry. The Shocker stuff looks good but a little interesting with the points of articulation…I will have to see but I will own a Maxx and probably all of at least one line cause I want a Tick BAF!
wes - yes, i too would love a yellow-clad April. And I’d also really like cartoon-color bandannas on the turtles.
andrew - i feel your pain. LCBH was my favorite of the current lines and I was really looking forward to the third series. But, it looks like Marvel has just opted to get rid of their toy manufacturing altogether. They sold the TNA license off and dropped their Curious George line. The official reasoning is that they want to free up the money they had tied in their toy division and use it in their film division. Oh well. But, maybe that means all those properties that MT had can drift over to Shocker Toys now. So, a superarticulated Grendel may still be within the realm of possiblity!
Do you mean that…LCBH is canceled forever?
Yep. sorry, alex. but marvel toys - the company that was toybiz - has been completely disbanded. so no more lcbh. ever. sigh…