Action Figure Woes: The Nostalgia Trap

Looks like it's THAT time again... A Mattel rant... Well more of a MOTUC rant, cause Hurricane Hordak, Battleground Evil Lyn are coming... and cause of some figures that have come before them like Clawful, Grizzlor, Buzz-Off, or Whiplash... Before anyone thinks that this is a Pro Anime Hyperdetail argument; please stop... It is not...
Yes, MOTUC's goal is to join ALL the lines within a Vintage inspired look. Hence the whole Classicizer Machine and all that crap... I understand that, but it seems that Mattel/The 4 Horsemen have painted themselves into a corner by Adhering to Much to the unwritten rule that states: "If it was made that way in the 80s it shall be made that way in MOTUC".

Look at Buzz-Off... Do you see something wrong with his head? His antennae... They are slicked back... This was made this way in the 80s due to sculpting/mold limitations, yet in 2010 Buzz-Off was still sporting that awful 80s limitation... The 4 Horsemen HAVE made a Buzz-Of with Antennae standing tall and proud WITH his Helmet being usable... Why is Buzz-Off with slicked back antennae? The Nostalgia trap...

What is The Nostalgia trap? It's when they try to be SO FAITHFUL to the Original designs that they KEEP the flaws and 80s limitations even when they can go beyond the 80s toy...
Like King Hssss not getting the larger snakes. Sculpting USELESS dials on figures, Buzz-Off's slicked back antennae, etc.
Throwing NODS to the original figures is fine and dandy, but going out of the way to recreate stuff that is UNNEEDED (and in some cases doing it inaccurately) well, that sucks big time...

The approach to the dials should've been the same approach used for Leech's mouth... His face STILL looks vintage, but he does NOT have the Vintage Suction cup... that sucks... (pun not intended)

If the Hordak dial had been turned into a spine of spikes that vaguely resembled a dial, then this part of the rant wouldn't be here... Cause Hordak would have a nod to his vintage figure that does NOT ruin the sculpt... I'm worried about Tunglashor, Terror Claws Skeletor or Marlena...

Now the next part of this rant: BAttleGround Evil Lyn... or BAGEL for short...

He-Fans and She-Ravers,

Ever since we announced the new version of Evil Lyn coming out this fall, their has been a lot of questions over her design and look. To understand this better we went straight to the mouth – the Four Horsemen’s mouth that is. We talked with them and Terry Higuchi from Mattel design to understand the inspiration for this new version of Evil Lyn.

TERRY: Part of the feel and look of the vintage MOTU line has always been the strategic use of shared parts (Stinkor and Mer-Man anyone?). To help capture that feel in MOTUC, we very deliberately use shared parts in MOTUC even when sometimes a new part could be called for. Bow and Optikk are both great example of this. It is part of the look and feel of the brand.

FOUR HORSEMEN: When designing Battleground Evil Lyn, we used a combination of new parts (new head, cape) along with thought-out reuse parts (tunic, Catra hand) to capture the charm and nostalgia that reuse parts evoke uniquely with MOTU. While we are always trying to go the extra mile for fans, sometimes our efforts do not jive with what the fan base is looking for (She-Ra 1.0's mask attachment, Space Explorer Marlena in Green are good examples).

Fans have also asked why the new 2.0 female buck was not used for Evil Lyn. At the time this figure was being sculpted the 2.0 body was not developed yet. We knew that it was coming, but it didn't exist for us to work off of. With this in mind we felt that it would be better to go with this simpler version rather than sink a lot of tooling into a version that didn't have waist articulation, better hip function, etc. If we used up the tooling now, it may have killed the chance to do a version that 100% satisfies all of the fan requests. Now that the 2.0 body has been created and worked into the line, the door is open to do this version in the future.



TERRY: Clearly fans are looking for more new parts on a grey skinned Evil Lyn. We will certainly take this into account when looking at future variants of the evil warrior goddess. There are lots of ways we can update her down the road and just as we did a She-Ra 2.0 and multiple versions of He-Man, Evil Lyn is clearly a popular enough character to warrant multiple versions.While we do not have another version of Evil Lyn on the books anytime in the immediate future, don't count her down for the count. She could very well be back when you least expect it!



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Hope that cleared up some design choices and we can't wait to see what the Horsemen are working on next!

See you all at Power Con on Sept 24th and 25th!

Matty

Alright, that's Mattel's long winded explanation trying to justify BAGEL... (Which happened after the pro-200X fans/customers complained...

Especially after Scott Toyguru Neitlich promised that a 200X Evil Lyn "would be much more then a repaint"...
Yes, the THEN instead of THAN is intentional... (to capture the TG speak as accurate as possible)
So, what is MUCH MORE THAN A REPAINT?

-But Toyguru said that this is NOT 200X Evil Lyn!

Look at the signs, she WAS MEANT TO BE 200X Evil Lyn, until the fans/customers complained...
*Her Skin Color is reminiscent of the 200X version.
*No Screech.
*Her clothes are in a 200X-ish palette.
*Her Extra head is 200X inspired.
The only thing missing is her 200X dress

TERRY: Part of the feel and look of the vintage MOTU line has always been the strategic use of shared parts (Stinkor and Mer-Man anyone?). To help capture that feel in MOTUC, we very deliberately use shared parts in MOTUC even when sometimes a new part could be called for. Bow and Optikk are both great example of this. It is part of the look and feel of the brand.

Wait, what!? This almost sounds like another instance of the NOSTALGIA TRAP!! Going for the Evil Lyn= Teela repaint vintage angle... TG can't come and use the Classicizer Machine here cause look at the Faceless One... He IS wearing Evil Lyn's 200X dress... and it didn't become Teela's dress... Which is the MAIN Reason why people wanted a 200X Evil Lyn in the first place!! Evil Lyn wearing a different dress than Teela... That's what the fans wanted in a 200X Evil Lyn...

TERRY: Clearly fans are looking for more new parts on a grey skinned Evil Lyn. We will certainly take this into account when looking at future variants of the evil warrior goddess. There are lots of ways we can update her down the road and just as we did a She-Ra 2.0 and multiple versions of He-Man, Evil Lyn is clearly a popular enough character to warrant multiple versions.While we do not have another version of Evil Lyn on the books anytime in the immediate future, don't count her down for the count. She could very well be back when you least expect it!

So, let me get this straight... People asking for a 200X Evil Lyn have been saying the same thing ever since the Original EL came out on 2010, yet Mattel never got the memo? But that's OK since they can do MORE Evil Lyn variants in the Future... (and Making BAGEL a pointless variant... I mean Repaint with 2 new pieces...) If they got things right on the first time, there would be no need for further revisits to the character...

I wouldn't be surprised If Mantenna is made as a two legged character because of the Nostalgia Trap...