NYCC Announcements

I started this on April 20th, guess I better get around to publishing it, eh?

New York Comic Con took place last weekend (Apr 18-21-ish), and among the many activities and panels taking place, toy companies like to announce upcoming product and show them off to potential consumers. Geeks like me that can't attend spend hours in front of their computers (like we usually do) refreshing the main page of sites like Action Figure Hub, Toy News International, Action Figure Insider and others wanting to see pictures of the new product as soon as it's uploaded.

The two lines I'm focusing on collecting this year are McFarlane Toys' Halo 3 and Mattel's DC Universe Classics (DCUC) so those were the lines I was hoping to hear about.

McFarlane posted pictures and info about wave 3 of Halo 3 on their site a week previous to NYCC, so I was really only watching for Mattel's announcements. Of course, McF had to go and surprise me with the announcement of their SDCC Exclusive HellSpartan and Active Camo CQB Spartan (my thoughts on that), so that was fun and unexpected.

Mattel gave us some great news regarding the distribution of the DCUC line: beginning with wave 3 (June-ish) Walmart will carry the line. That's quite exciting, as I have 3 Walmarts near me before I get to a Target or ToysRUs, so I hope to find these figures near me, instead of driving for 30 miles or ordering them online. Mattel also previewed the figures for waves 4 and 5 (which will be exclusively available at Walmart), the SDCC Exclusive figure, some two packs exclusive to TRU and named half the line up of wave 6.

TRU 2 Packs

Mattel announced that they will re-release some hard to find figures from last year's DCSH line, first up will be Batgirl (Barbra Gordon) and Azreal, in the first TRU 2 pack. The second announced pack contains a new version of Orion (from DCUC wave 1) with a removable helmet and a new figure Lightray. I believe Mattel said four 2 packs would be released in 2008, but only 2 have been announced so far. I'll get the Lightray/Orion pack, but I've already got Azreal, and I'm not a big fan of the blue/gray Batgirl. If they did a black/blue version of Babs Batgirl (like DC Direct is later this year) I'd consider getting it.

Wave 4

Wave 4 will contain several cool figures: Wonder Woman, a variant of Artemis as WW, Captain Atom and a Kingdom Come version of him, one of WW's main enemies Ares the god of war (he's a really cool looking knight) and Cyborg from the Teen Titans. The Build-A-Figure, sorry, Mattel's calling it a Collect and Connect, is a scary, three-eyed alient that's tried to destroy everyone on earth (Superman/Batman vol 5: Enemies Among Us) and conquer the universe (Justice League Animated Series, Hearts and Minds). I like this version of him, quite a bit, he comes with a bandolier or two, and some guns, and basically has a bunch of accessories, which is pretty cool. I plan to get all the figures in this wave, regulars and variants, and maybe try to build two Despero's.