The Rumor Buster

News Updates and Welcome to our new Rumour Busters

Just a quick welcome to our newest members of the Rumour Buster family Muddy Fox and Brutal88 and both of them have gotten right into the thick of it with Brutal88 pointing out a new line he found the other day DC Fisher Price Super Friends Little People you can read up Brutal’s post right here http://therumorbuster.com/board/index.php?topic=1493.msg20530#new

And Muddy Fox found this possible 3rd Variant for the Fantastic 4 box set http://therumorbuster.com/board/index.php?topic=1492.0 are you going to shell out for a 3rd box set ?

And also the all seeing all hearing all knowledgable Clevername here found this awesome little nugget of info the second of  Marvel Mega blocks figures are on the way check out the Mega Blocks thread to discuss these awesome little guys

And i can’t leave out Toxin who’s brought a whole host of new lines into the site , The likes of He-Man hot wheels and Pop figures all can be found here http://therumorbuster.com/board/index.php?board=27.0

Keep it up Rumour Busters !!!

May 2011 Hasbro Q&A – Super Hero Squad is retailer exclusive

Head on over to the Rumor Buster forum to discuss this most recent Q&A and all your other toy related topics.

1) What is the future of the Super Hero Squad action line now that all but one of the announced movie theme packs have been released, as have most of the announced 2-packs?

Super Hero Squad is becoming a retail exclusive program this Fall.

2) Several Iron Man 2 figures either never saw a release (specifically the unmasked Tony and Rhodey, movie Black Widow), or saw limited release (Ultimate Iron Man, Mandarin, Comic Whiplash, Comic Iron Monger), so are there any plans to incorporate these into either the Armored Avengers line
or Marvel Universe line?

No there are no plans.  Unfortunately, these items were dropped from the line.  We will work to include these characters in future lines where possible.

3) Although you only had limited time to prepare, will there be more X-Men First Class merchandise in addition to the two 3.75 inch figures?

That’s a possibility.  Keep your eyes peeled for more news to come.

Toy Talk Stampede 12/7/10

Imaginext fleshes out the Justice League with Hawkman and Flash action figures, while Killer Croc adds to Batman’s rogues, thanks to some digging by Toxin.  A little farther down that thread and ARBCOToys tells us about the Target Joker’s Fun House pack with bonus Two-Face, Joker and Riddler (with hat) figures.

We also discuss this week’s issue of Toy Fare magazine, which features a pretty spiffy version of the Destroyer armor on the cover.

Brian shows us the ninja prowess of Snake Eyes and Toxin and Jessevader team-up to tackle the mystery of the Toy Story buddies mystery figures from an SDCC poster.

Marvel Universe, Iron Man, Spider-Man and Super Hero Squad at NYCC 2010

Brianregan and a bunch of others kept up with all the NYCC news yesterday, and boy were there a lot! Marvelousnews has pictures (boy do they!)

Marvel Universe Apocalypse (here), Cable with Hope (here), the Sentinel (here), Archangel as Death and translucent vision (here), Bill Foster Goliath (here), Frost Giant without his helmet (here), Ultimate Alliance Galactus (here). There’s also the Giant Size X-Men box set (finally!)

More Marvel Universe news with Gladiator (here), the Jim Lee Cyclops (here)

There’s a classic Steve Rogers Captain America (not the Ultimate repaint!) with a dune buggy type vehicle (here), new Winter Soldier, WWII Captain America and the first demo of the new Captain America First Avenger line (here).

The Thor The Mighty Avenger line is also represented with Thor, Loki and Battle Hammer Thor (here), and an up-close of Odin (here).

Super Hero Squad gets a new subline as Iron Man 2 becomes Iron Man The Armored Avenger, and War Mechs is the first set to be shown featuring Iron Man, War Machine and Detroit Steel (here). Detroit Steel gets an upclose here. Thor The Mighty Avenger line brings us Odin, Hulk and Thor in Asgardian Smash (here), with an upclose of Odin and a new Thor in his modern armor here (here). Behind War Mechs, you get a glimpse at the Destroyer/Thor/Loki three pack Battle for Asgard’s Vault (here), with a gray/silver version of Destroyer here.

The mainline gets an X-Men Blackbird and a new Spider-Man vehicle (here), HERBIE, Tiger Shark, Red She-Hulk, repaints of motorcycle riding Wolverine and the Leader are amongst the figures here, the black Silver Surfer (here)

Iron Man’s 3.75 inch line gets a plethora of new armors of course (here)

Spider-Man’s 3.75 line shows us the newly articulated Venom (here)

In Handful of Heroes news… are those new colors shown here?

So now that you’ve done the link viewing, head over to the message board to discuss the Avengers Super Hero Squad figures, the Iron Man 3.75 line, and all those crazy Marvel Universe action figures.

Hasbro’s Latest Q&A – Super Hero Squad Repaints, International HTS

A new Hasbro Q&A for September (or August I suppose, since the questions are a bit backed up) answers some questions about the troubles and tribulations of international distribution, and what’s the deal with those upcoming repaint waves of Super Hero Squad

1) What steps have Hasbro taken to address the spotty distribution of Marvel Universe and other lines in the UK and Ireland? Obviously retailers like Tesco take some of the blame, but what about options such as Hasbrotoyshop shipping internationally?

1) Trust us when we say that we wish Marvel Universe was carried everywhere! We’re always trying to make as much product as possible available to consumers all over the globe. But ultimately, retailers choose which lines they carry and how much they stock based on the demand in their region. As for Hasbrotoyshop, we’re working on adding international markets, but e-commerce rules and regs vary dramatically from one country to another which has slowed these efforts.

2) At SDCC, two disappointing slides were shown that featured two waves worth of SHS repaints used to create new characters such as Red Hulk and Iron Patriot. Level with us, what was the thought process behind designing and developing these waves?

No real secret here. When it comes to Super Hero Squad figures, we’re well into the hundreds ! Tons of those have been completely original sculpts, and many have utilized existing tooling – there has to be a balance of both. The characters you mentioned were created from the existing library in order to balance out the many brand new sculpts that were created for other characters.

3) With Combat, Robot, and Adventure Heroes (the Indiana Jones line) all discontinued are there any plans to continue the “Heroes” style into any other properties or will Hasbro just be focusing on the Galactic and Super Hero Squad brands for the foreseeable future?

3) We can only comment on Marvel lines in these forums. With Super Hero Squad gearing up for season 2 on Cartoon Network, you can bet there’ll be plenty of new Squad stuff coming your way.

Hasbro’s Playtouch Coupons now live

Think posted on the board a report of how Hasbro’s Playtouch coupons are now live.  As he writes, it’s one coupon per transaction, 2 per customer, and they expire November 15, 2010 but in the meantime you can check out coupons giving you $1 various Hasbro offerings, including the Super Hero Squad, Marvel Uinverse, and the 3.75 inch Spider-Man line or Iron Man 2.  Even better, you can grab $5 off the Super Hero Squad Helicarrier!

SDCC Round-Up – Hasbro Edition

We’ve rounded up some Hasbro related pictures from SDCC 2010.  Early on, from Twitter, comes a picture of the Thor booth at Hasbro and a a picture of Captain America’s booth too.

Spider-Man 3.75 gets some new pictures too, including Ben Reilly (here), a new Venom (here).

Super Hero Squad gets some love too, including a new Collector’s Pack featuring Enchantress, Loki, Thor, Hulk, Iron Man and a giant Frost Giant (as seen here), a Super Hero Squad Hercules and a new Iron Man vehicle (here), and an Invisible Woman/Iron Man/HERBIE pack (here), Namor’s old foe Tiger Shark (here), and a new playset featuring Galactus (here), and Rescue and the other upcoming Iron Man 2 SHS figures (here)

Now, Iron Man 2 isn’t out on it’s own, there’s some coverage of the newest Hall of Armor armors (here), new armors (here), comic based classic Mandarin and Whiplash’s newest look from the Iron Man Whiplash mini-series (here).

Marvel Universe has had some love too, with lots of shots of previously released figures, and previously previewed figures, although it’s nice to see the new battle packs like Thor/Iron Man, Wolverine/Captain America (with his battle damaged shield), Daken and Venom as Dark Wolverine and the Sinister Spider-Man, Sentry and Spider-Man, and Cyclops and Dark Phoenix (here)