Report From Hasbro’s Pre NYCC Kickoff Party

Once again, Hasbro threw a pre-party the night before New York Comic Con begins, to show off some of their coolest new toys being released over the next six months.  This year’s showing had something for everyone, with spotlights on the eagerly anticipated Captain America and Spider-Man Legends, Transformers 4 and lots more.

Captain America Legends had two awesome new figures to show off– a new Hydra Solder and the series Build A Figure, Mandroid.  The Hydra trooper was displayed loose and in box… much like the Star Wars Black Series, next year’s Cap Legends will replace the blister card packaging for a collector-friendly box.

Recent solicits have shown Cap Legends to be only six figures, but Hasbro has shown more than that between San Diego Comic Con and NYCC, and the first look at the packaging seems solves this mystery.  It appears the Hydra Soldier and Red Skull will be variants called “Agents of Hydra” while Baron Zemo and the AIM Soldier will both be released under the name “Agents of AIM.”  This brings what looks to be the final wave breakout for Cap Legends to be:

Wave 1

• Marvel Now Cap
• Agents of Hydra (Red Skull / Hydra Soldier)
• Agents of AIM (Baron Zemo / AIM Soldier)

Wave 2, coming Fall 2014, will likely be the previously revealed movie style Cap, Winter Soldier and Black Widow.  The Build a Figure Mandroid will be assembled by collecting all six figures from both waves. Captain America The Winter Soldier will also get a 3.75″ line, which will be fully articulated like Thor Dark World.  Winter Soldier was on display as well as a carded sample showing off the packaging design.

It was announced in San Diego that Hasbro’s 2014 Marvel Legends would be anchored by the various movies of the year, which was a controversial move, but ultimately I think the right one.  Like we saw with the Iron-Man Legends, a smaller number of figures and a unique SKU for each line will prevent a huge backlog of launch wave figures blocking the release of a follow up wave, and tying the lines into movies should motivate idiot retail buyers to throw their support behind the lines.  It’s a win-win situation, and has me very hopeful that the distribution issues that have plagued many of Hasbro’s best toy lines may become a thing of the past.