The Energon Pub

While we want to give you as much info as possible, it is always important to note that, as we have seen with many toys now, anything can happen until Hasbro officially reveals an upcoming product. And that includes cancellation. We had previously published lists of upcoming toys based on listings provided by JTPrime17. This Seibertron member has access to case assortment solicitation from Hasbro to retailers which is how they let us know of new listings.
However, some listings are now no longer present on these solicitations from Hasbro. Those include SS Drift from TLK, SS Lifeline from the upcoming video game, Legacy core BW Dinobot and Legacy Sureshot.

Now these being removed from solicitations does not mean that are definitely cancelled (and it could also just be a mistake). As we saw with Buzzworthy Hound, while that release was cancelled, the toy will still be released in another way. However, there are previous listings that were no longer available and did not come out in their listed lines like T30 Brawn, T30 Sharkticon, Titan Master Optimus Prime, Titan Master Toraizer and SS Breakaway.

Here is the quote from JTPrime17:

Interesting note, updated case assortment Solicitations from hasbro to retailers have some changes. The changes actually remove some figures from the line up. Not sure if this is a mistake or if these figures were delayed or cancelled.

But these are the following figures that have seemingly disappeared.

F8762 Tra Gen studio series dlx TF5 Drift
F8761 Tra Gen Studio series dlx RISE Lifeline
F8519 Tra Gen Legacy UNI Core BW Dinobot
F8531 Tra Gen Legacy UNI Dlx G1 Sureshot

I say if Sureshot is canceled, we riot. They completed the Decepticon Targetmasters years ago, but it has been a slow, painfully drawn-out process to get the Autobot Targetmaster trio. Crosshairs in 2018. Pointblank in 2022. And now, maybe NO Sureshot??

Bounti76 wrote:I say if Sureshot is canceled, we riot. They completed the Decepticon Targetmasters years ago, but it has been a slow, painfully drawn-out process to get the Autobot Targetmaster trio. Crosshairs in 2018. Pointblank in 2022. And now, maybe NO Sureshot??

I always have my pitchfork ready!

chuckdawg1999 wrote:

Bounti76 wrote:I say if Sureshot is canceled, we riot. They completed the Decepticon Targetmasters years ago, but it has been a slow, painfully drawn-out process to get the Autobot Targetmaster trio. Crosshairs in 2018. Pointblank in 2022. And now, maybe NO Sureshot??

I always have my pitchfork ready!

I'll bring the torches!

It's not just these regular Autobot Targetmasters, the Double Targetmaster Autobots are getting screwed over, too. We got Scoop TEN years ago and they've never been revisited again. Meanwhile Spinister has had 3 or 4 figures in the last 12 years, Needlenose has had two in the last eight years and Quake had one in 2017, but should be getting a second figure this year.

Justice for Autobot Targetmasters!

Emerje

Of course the only other figure from the first 5 movies is missing. ugh.

Sharing my meme I made for this on TFW:


Hopefully it’s just something weird with the listing and Drift is still on his way this year, but what a bummer it would be if one of our only 2 Bay figures in SS this year was cancelled. We already lost the Buzzworthy leader reissue, come on!

EvasionModeBumblebee wrote:Sharing my meme I made for this on TFW:

IMG_0831.jpeg

Hopefully it’s just something weird with the listing and Drift is still on his way this year, but what a bummer it would be if one of our only 2 Bay figures in SS this year was cancelled. We already lost the Buzzworthy leader reissue, come on!

I feel this so hard. It just bothers me so much

EvasionModeBumblebee wrote:Sharing my meme I made for this on TFW:

IMG_0831.jpeg

Hopefully it’s just something weird with the listing and Drift is still on his way this year, but what a bummer it would be if one of our only 2 Bay figures in SS this year was cancelled. We already lost the Buzzworthy leader reissue, come on!

Nice.

This combined with them apparently cancelling Hatchet just makes me sad. Is it just G1 and videogame characters this year then? For freaking STUDIO SERIES?

Spider5800 wrote:

EvasionModeBumblebee wrote:Sharing my meme I made for this on TFW:

IMG_0831.jpeg

Hopefully it’s just something weird with the listing and Drift is still on his way this year, but what a bummer it would be if one of our only 2 Bay figures in SS this year was cancelled. We already lost the Buzzworthy leader reissue, come on!

Nice.

This combined with them apparently cancelling Hatchet just makes me sad. Is it just G1 and videogame characters this year then? For freaking STUDIO SERIES?

Plus a couple concepts figures for the Bee movie, AKA things that had some sort of design but never saw the light of day until now, as toys. In short: more G1.

D-Maximal_Primal wrote:Plus a couple concepts figures for the Bee movie, AKA things that had some sort of design but never saw the light of day until now, as toys. In short: more G1.

I looked it up just out of curiosity. There's core class Mohawk and BB Starscream, deluxe RotB Wheeljack and Scorponok, and voyager BB Shockwave and Skywarp (Pretty sure he was in the movie for a second, lol). Everything else is either video game related, G1, or as you said, G1 based concept designs for the movies.

That's a REALLY weak showing for the movie based line. I thought people were paranoid about the '86 subline just being an excuse to cram more G1 down everyone's throats, but this really kills my enthusiasm for the line.

What's going on at Hasbro? First there were the layoffs, now this

BATTLEMASTER IIC wrote:What's going on at Hasbro? First there were the layoffs, now this

From everything I've read, basically Chris Cocks happened. He's been pushing to more heavily monetize everything, resulting in a bunch of price increases and hairbrained schemes that have actually HURT sales and consumer confidence.

The idiotic stuff they pulled at WotC this past year with MTG and DnD were pretty disastrous for both brands, which were the biggest reasons for all the layoffs, but toy sales are down as well. Plus we have a natural dropoff from collector highs during the pandemic, which apparently they weren't expecting.

Edit: It's funny to me this site is actually censoring his name, lol. His name really is C*cks.

Spider5800 wrote:

BATTLEMASTER IIC wrote:What's going on at Hasbro? First there were the layoffs, now this

From everything I've read, basically Chris ***** happened. He's been pushing to more heavily monetize everything, resulting in a bunch of price increases and hairbrained schemes that have actually HURT sales and consumer confidence.

The idiotic stuff they pulled at WotC this past year with MTG and DnD were pretty disastrous for both brands, which were the biggest reasons for all the layoffs, but toy sales are down as well. Plus we have a natural dropoff from collector highs during the pandemic, which apparently they weren't expecting.

Edit: It's funny to me this site is actually censoring his name, lol. His name really is C*cks.

Thanks for the summary! I've only read about the layoffs and haven't been keeping track of their business in general.

That's an unfortunate name for the CEO - I had neighbors long ago named Kuntz - exactly how you'd pronounce the actual vulgarity They were horrible people too!

Is it right to compare CEO Chris to Farquaad when it comes to the compensation joke?

Quantum Surge wrote:Is it right to compare CEO Chris to Farquaad when it comes to the compensation joke?

Seems appropriate when he laid off a ton of people right before Christmas while still getting his absurd CEO bonus.

“Some of you may die but that’s a sacrifice I’m willing to make” - Lord Farquad Chris Cocks

So kind of weird, for the 4 figures mentioned, both studio series molds were from the same planned deluxe wave case for August-ish leaving just the WFC game decepticon infantry. For the 2 legacy figures they are also both the same wave, but different classes of course planned for April-ish.

I wonder if those are the next waves of each line that aren't too far into production to alter and if more changes may be coming to later waves.

Well they did lay off like half the company a few weeks ago. It may be harder to get product to the shelves.

Emerje wrote:

chuckdawg1999 wrote:

Bounti76 wrote:I say if Sureshot is canceled, we riot. They completed the Decepticon Targetmasters years ago, but it has been a slow, painfully drawn-out process to get the Autobot Targetmaster trio. Crosshairs in 2018. Pointblank in 2022. And now, maybe NO Sureshot??

I always have my pitchfork ready!

I'll bring the torches!

It's not just these regular Autobot Targetmasters, the Double Targetmaster Autobots are getting screwed over, too. We got Scoop TEN years ago and they've never been revisited again. Meanwhile Spinister has had 3 or 4 figures in the last 12 years, Needlenose has had two in the last eight years and Quake had one in 2017, but should be getting a second figure this year.

Justice for Autobot Targetmasters!

Emerje

Scoop and Quickmix could have even been part of a Titan class combiner. They've had unused pretooled heads that were made ten years ago!

Seriously? In-demand figures like Drift and Sureshot are potentially getting bumped or axed, but they're not bumping or axing the Springer that's almost certainly just "Clean SIEGE Springer with extra accessories" (granted, that would suck for the people really jonesing for him, but it would at least be a somewhat logical step based on Coronation Starscream shelfwarming)? Or cutting short Ugly Megatron's run?
Between this and Coronation Starscream getting a reissue that nobody asked for and that made
SS86 Sludge take a year after shipping to actually hit shelves in most stores... Somebody clearly has no idea what they're doing and is using completely broken demand metrics.

Sabrblade wrote:

Emerje wrote:

chuckdawg1999 wrote:

Bounti76 wrote:I say if Sureshot is canceled, we riot. They completed the Decepticon Targetmasters years ago, but it has been a slow, painfully drawn-out process to get the Autobot Targetmaster trio. Crosshairs in 2018. Pointblank in 2022. And now, maybe NO Sureshot??

I always have my pitchfork ready!

I'll bring the torches!

It's not just these regular Autobot Targetmasters, the Double Targetmaster Autobots are getting screwed over, too. We got Scoop TEN years ago and they've never been revisited again. Meanwhile Spinister has had 3 or 4 figures in the last 12 years, Needlenose has had two in the last eight years and Quake had one in 2017, but should be getting a second figure this year.

Justice for Autobot Targetmasters!

Emerje

Scoop and Quickmix could have even been part of a Titan class combiner. They've had unused pretooled heads that were made ten years ago!

Ah, but 1. Scoop's T30 toy was only a year old during Combiner Wars (and in fact, plenty were undoubtedly lingering considering I found one on the pegs at Target during Titans Return in 2017) and 2. Considering that combiner was going to be "Headswap redeco, but at the Titan price point"... it probably wasn't the greatest bet in the first place.

Emerje, in fairness TR Quake was a "Uh... Who from this era sorta works as a way to get more money from the Hardhead mold?" headswap redeco, and one of those Spinisters along the corresponding Needlenose were fanclub-exclusives (and also headswap redecoes) rather than regular releases.

But I definitely agree that the Autobot Targetmasters deserve better. Which is part of why I've had mixed feelings about random new designs like the Rock Monsters and the new Junkions.

The board needs to lock Chris C*cks out, and if possible fire him outright. He's a worthless stupid sack of trash who's price-gouging the brand to death. Any executive who can't grasp that "raise prices to make up for sales shortfalls" just causes increasingly more sales shortfalls (especially when grocery chains are also price-gouging), is a useless idiot who needs to be bricked up inside a closet where they can't actually affect anything. Or tossed out on their ear, but of course the *wonderful* phenomenon known as golden parachutes can be a problem there.

ZeldaTheSwordsman wrote:Emerje, in fairness TR Quake was a "Uh... Who from this era sorta works as a way to get more money from the Hardhead mold?" headswap redeco, and one of those Spinisters along the corresponding Needlenose were fanclub-exclusives (and also headswap redecoes) rather than regular releases.

Sure, but the point is they happened which is more than can be said for Quickmix, Landfill and Sureshot.

At least we got Artfire and Ricochet. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Emerje