After the coverage we offered yesterday of the investor meeting from Hasbro, including the various slides made available during the call itself, in two of our stories - respectively, the
future of the live-action Paramount movies and the
general Transformers brand from a company perspective - we return today to New York City, to cover the Hasbro Entertainment Brand Preview!
Ranging across their several franchises, the event covers the likes of My Little Pony, Star Wars, and more, including of course our favourite transforming robots. Check out below as we update the story as the event takes place, featuring figures from multiple Transformers lines like
Power of the Primes,
Studio Series,
Masterpiece (now that Takara Tomy and Hasbro have unified their brand efforts), and more!
!!MAKE SURE TO REFRESH THIS STORY FOR LIVE UPDATES!!
Derryl DePriest (main GI Joe brand manager) is MCing the event, and various housekeeping announcements are taking place, including the HasbroPulse app. You can check out Hasbro Pulse
here. The app will be free, and will allow you to create wishlists among other features.
Brief introduction to Stretch Armstrong relaunch.
First brand up is Mighty Muggs, as we have covered in our preview story
here, featuring Marvel and Star Wars, plus My Little Pony and Transformers, featuring Bumblebee, Starscream, Optimus Prime, and Megatron.
Followed quickly by
Marvel.
Infinity War toys to come up soon, as Black Panther currently taking the spotlight. Superhero Adventures for the younger fans. Marvel Legends talk about various waves from Spider-Man BAF Lizard onwards, plus Ultimate Rider Wolverine with motorcycle. Next are Doc Ock, Cloak and Dagger, Bullseye with new BAF SP//dr. Avengers line will include Antman and Wasp from movie-verse, using photoreal technology to capture likeness of actors. X-Men wave including Wolverine and Sabertooth. Venom wave with Eddie Brock, Scream, Spider-Ham to coincide with Sony movie. More reveals later in the year. More Deadpool offerings too, to coincide with Deadpool 2 movie, including NERF blasters. Bishop, Lady Deadpool, Deadpool in boxers - BAF is Sauron (pterodactyl X-Men villain).
More Black Panther figures being announced, including Walmart exclusives, and wearable Infinity Gauntlet. Plenty of Fantastic Four figures appearing at Walgreens, including Silver Surfer.
10 products for each of the 10 years of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, from Iron Man (2008) to Infinity War (2018): Walmart Iron Man two-pack with new head; Iron Man 3 Pepper Potts and Mandarin; Target two-pack for Age of Ultron Hulk vs Hulkbuster; Crossbones vs Captain America with new Chris Evans.
Moving to
My Little Pony.
In a first time of showing actual products during the presentation, we have new products of characters Trixie, Lulamoon and Starlight Glimmer from fan series. New Tempest Shadow from My Little Pony movie, with lightning glow. New animation accurate of Mane 6, and Cutie Mark Crew, a new line of cutesy collectibles.
Season 8 of the Friendship is Magic animated series will introduce Sea Ponies, premieres on March 24th.
Introducing new characters: Yona Yak, Smolder (dragon), Cozy Glow (new pony).
Next is
Power Rangers, as pre-announced during yesterday's news cycle.
Introduced by Brian Casentini, executive producer of the series, partnered with Nickelodeon through 2021. 26th season launches in early 2019: Power Rangers Beast Morphers, as the new direction takes hold. No products shown yet, as launch is still far away.
Next brand, finally, is
TRANSFORMERS.
Ben Montano and the brand team presenting, wearing I LOVE 84 t-shirts, with Takara team also present, thanking the fan community for their support, several rounds of applause.
Sean Carmine Infantino presents the
Transformers: Cyberverse animated series with some test animation, to illustrate how the series will eventually look, showing the lore, backstory, history and characters - effectively the story of Autobots and Decepticons, their origins, teammates thrugh the perspective of Bumblebee. Animation style looks to be a mix between Rescue Bots and Robots in Disguise.
For the toyline: On the Decepticon side Megatron, Starscream, Shockwave on the Autobot side Optimus, Windblade, Bumblebee, Grimlock. Shadow Striker - new Decepticon female character - will arrive later.
Brought a fresh take to G1 designs for the toys, with Cybertronian influence, to new Scout, Warrior, Ultra, Ultimate classes of figures. Infusing new play pattern: "action attack" uses conversions to power a "signature move" which is accurate to the show.
John Warden introduces the Generations line, which as of March 9th will include ALL of the music for Transformers to be available on colored Vinyl. Lead into
Machinima's Power of the Primes animated series, with poster featuring Optimus Primal.
Prime Master Quintus Prime with Bludgeon Decoy Suit
Megatronus with Bomb Burst Decoy Suit
Solus Prime with Octopunch Decoy Suit
Wave 2
Legends: Tailgate, Battletrap
Deluxe Terrorcons forming Abominus, revealed in a black box, with G1 accurate paint and deco, and new tooling.
Voyager Elita-1, with combined form called Elita Infin1te. The 1 is intentional.
New product: Nova Star, looks to be a Moonracer retool to join the Elita-1 team.
Leader Optimal Optimus, as seen
previously.
Predaking shown on stage. One of most popular combiners, comes with Matrix of Leadership that houses only Onyx Prime Prime Master of entire toyline. Divides into five voyager Predacons, Cybertronian animals - Tantrum is renamed Torox.
Next direction for the line is War for Cybertron Trilogy, different from the old videogames (but same name, totally not confusing), going to correspond to 35th anniversary of G1, starting in 2019. Sounds like this is Cybertronian war pre-Earth, Tetra Jets will likely be there.
Fan vote poll for a deluxe class:
#Needlenose vs Tracks (brother vs brother),
#Spinister vs Wheeljack (Saboteur vs Scientist),
#Impactor vs Mirage (Greater Good vs Greater $$$)
Vote by hashtag Tuesday 2/20 - Friday 2/23 on Facebook and Instagram (hashtags above). Winners will be sold separately, but share story.
Studio Series:
Deluxe / Voyager / Leader classes
Most accurate newly rolled figures fans have experienced, licensed vehicle modes, in scale with each other, numbered packaging.
New Deluxe Jazz and Lockdown
Also shown are Ratchet Crowbar Stinger and Bumblee, as covered
here.
Voyager Starscream
Voyager Optimus and Megatron from ROTF
Voyager Brawl
Thundercracker from Nitro Zeus
Leader Grimlock
Leader Blackout, with licensed helicopter.
Release due for April 2018.
Full brand team, from Hasbro and Takara TomyNext brand is
Star Wars.
They're really excited about Porgs
Presenters dressed as Han Solo and Chewbacca pajama jumpsuit.
Plenty of villains to appear in Solo spin-off movie, NERF blasters, tiny little Black Series Porgs, Amazon exclusive R2-X2 astromechs, most figures feature photoreal technology, Kessel run Millennium Falcon, new Stormtroopers, new force link 2.0 figures (Han, Qi'Ra, Chewie), NERF glowstrike, and ultimate co-pilot Chewie.
Showing Tobias Beckett, Walmart exclusive Mimban Stormtrooper with weathering, Range Trooper. Kylo Ren from Jakku. The Vintage Collection featuring Death Trooper, Assault Tank Driver, Han Solo, Dr. Aphra, Cassian, Luke from TFA, Range Trooper and more from Solo movie, all series will be numbered. Imperial Assault Tank with molded coffee cup on the dash. Coming in 2019 is Saelt-Marae (Yak Face). Introducing #TheVinmtageConversation to discuss toylines with fans and get feedback.
Final reveal is the Hasbro Crowdfunding platform, HasLab, launching with Star Wars (but hoping to expand to other brands): funding for the largest Star Wars vehicle... Black Series Return of the Jedi Sand Barge. Big enough to fit a Jaba The Hutt inside of the barge, has pilot seat, prison cell, galley/kitchen, smuggler's compartment, Jabba will be included (with photoreal technology), all sorts of cool stuff. Over 2.5 sq ft of display area.
The new site is live now:
https://www.hasbrolab.com/Everyone moving to showroom for images, stay tuned!
)
), Cybertronian alt modes aren't really my thing, so I doubt I'll get much from it unless they eventually do bring in some Earth alt modes later in the "trilogy", which the description suggests they won't.
