Hasbro's Star Wars brand team agreed to answer three questions from Jedi Insider fans on a regular basis. Here are this week's questions and answers. We should get another round of answers back on or around December 18th which will be the final round for 2009.
JI: Dear Hasbro, the very ends of the Y-wing exhausts have a pattern which provides a pretty clear orientation - there is one fin that sticks out further than those around it giving either the appearance of a horizontal or vertical orientation. The vintage Y-wing, which had to be assembled, allowed one to orient those last exhaust pieces whichever way one might choose. Pictures of the original movie models seem to indicate they should be oriented in a "vertical" position. I've noticed however that the new Clone Wars Y-wing has one vertical and one horizontal. Was this an accident or on purpose, and will it be fixed for subsequent re-issues? It seems like a small thing but once you notice it, you can't un-see it and it looks a little odd. On a similar topic, how much of a chance is there we might see those end exhausts re-done so one could see down into the nacelle, in other words, make them look like the vintage Y-wing's exhausts?
Hasbro: The different orientation seems to have been a vendor mistake partway during the run that was not corrected, since our initial samples were correct. At this point, we cannot correct since the production is completed. It will have to be something we correct if we should ever release the Y-Wing again in the future. The inside of the tubes are pretty boring, so to open them up would not provide much detail unless the entire tube section were retooled, and honestly we're not sure whether it would be worth it to redo it. That's a big chunk of expensive steel and we'd rather look at something new and different for the investment.
JI: A minutia question: the Essential Guide to Vehicles, both the earlier edition in '96 and the updated edition in '03, refer to the Turbo Tank as the "Juggernaut". Was that name not carried forward into the toy version becaue of trade-mark issues with Marvel - either the company or the toy line - or for another reason?
Hasbro: We actually chose to call it the Turbo Tank over the Juggernaut, sinceTurbo Tank conveys a more descriptive image which we felt was essential for our kid communication including the TV Commercial.
JI: The question of playsets/large vehicles comes up quite regularly in these Q & As and the answer tends to be the same. With the exception of the Falcon which will always be an iconic vessel, other big items need a) media support and b) to be multi-faceted i.e, vehicle AND playset such as the new Falcon, AT-TE and Juggernaught (Turbo Tank). Multiple requests for Anakin's Twilight from the Clone Wars have met with the dreaded "not exciting enough" response time and again, yet the Falcon in and of itself, is not very dynamic (I believe the famous quote was, "What a hunk of junk!"). It's only through seeing it in action (aka "media support") that it became the ship we all love. With this in mind, Anakin and Ahsoka spend a high percentage of their time on board the Twilight. It's saved their hides more than once. It bears all the basic hallmarks required to become a new classic - "ugly" by conventional standards but souped up with much more under the proverbial hood than one might think thanks to Anakin's tinkering and tough as nails. Couple this with the thought that it also seems to be a great shape to offer some playset playability. A toy Twilight, with the length of the B-wing (or only slightly longer) and the volume of the original Vintage Falcon toy (but in a more convenient boxy shape) would be a good compromise between size and playability and could fold out or open in such a way as to have a usable interior. With some solid designs, I could easily see a Twilight fit in to the new 75 dollar price-point, and maybe the hundred if you guys really went all out.
All this is to say, you'd be hard-pressed to find a vehicle that is not a starfighter of some sort with MORE media support than the Twilight right now, and I'm curious how it could still be considered such a dog for forecast sales - can you please give it another look?
Hasbro: We have actually done a lot of work on what size and price the Twilight would be if we did one, but have always come back to the same place: it simply does not have the gravitas in the show that a big vehicle would need to have in order to succeed. It has not shown itself to be as truly heroic and universally memorable like the Millenium Falcon. Unless the Twlight gets a lot more attention and becomes something that really gets kids excited, we won't be adding it to the 3-3/4" line.
If you would like to ask Hasbro a question to possibly be used in a future round in 2010,
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