fenrir72 wrote:It may just be your "opinion" about recognizing Jazz and Mirage without those alcohol and tobacco endorsements from the original inspiration vehicles that Diaclone/Transformers used. On my side, I feel Jazz might escape the "Martini" logo but he is very iconic with the royal blue, red stripe and dark blue back ground paterns of Martini. See how his binaltech release looked like an anemic and generic bot?
Gitanes' gypsie girl logo plus the F1 Elf makes Mirage Mirage. As for the former not having a strong presence in the USA, never underestimate an "ambulance chaser" chance to raise some issue to earn a fast buck.
Obviously then, since this toy has no Martini markings:
And this toy has no Citanes markings:
...then you have absolutely
no idea who these two characters are then, right? They are absolutely unidentifiable as Jazz or Mirage, and are thus the worst toys ever! Pardon me, I must throw mine out immediately.
(Well, maybe not my Jazz...)
(Thanks, Reprolabels!)
If Takara makes these characters, I am sure they will have all of the appropriate markings. And at the very least, Jazz should have no problems with importers, since
the laws in question here apply to tobacco, not alcohol. So I don't know why we are even discussing Jazz.
If Takara makes a Mirage, I suppose it is hypothetically possible this problem might rear its head again. I doubt it, as I still think Gitanes, as a company without a US presence (that I know of) would have no reason to object to their sale. (Thus, who exactly would your hypothetical ambulance chaser be going after? There'd be no one for him to sue in a US court of law.) But a hypothetical Hasbro release might still be possible, because I think most people (obviously with you as an exception) will still recognize him as Mirage without the Citanes marking.
Exhaust, on the other hand, needs the distinctive red patch to look like Exhaust. So he has problems that Mirage and Jazz wouldn't.
Anyway, isn't this all rather academic at best? Until such time as Takara actually produces either character in the Masterpiece line,
if they even ever do so, and then once we can see what details are included on their decos, is there even a point in arguing any of this?