Some stuff popping in at Disney Stores...

[Drtooth]

... Baby steps... Baby steps, sir.

It really isn't all that epic or amazing, but I've seen some of their earlier made specifically for the Disney Store merchandise, unless you count the run of UK Kermit Environmentalist stuff. NO TOYS...

So far, All I saw was kid's T-shirts, a beach towel, one of those metallic water bottles, a tote bag, and a kid's school set (Note pad, pencils, eraser).

But... here's the encouraging news... the print on all of them features the heads of various Muppets.... included are Beaker, Statler and Waldorf, The Swedish Chef, AND Pepe. So if there's any future 3-D or figural merchandise, this shows that you can expect to see them.

 

[ohtherain]

YES! I have been waiting for this for years, even before I was a fan of the Muppets. I can't wait until they make a PVC set from them!

 

[Gelfling Girl]

Cool! When we were in New Orleans a month or two ago, there was some Muppet stuff at the Disney Store, but pretty much just some of that "Easy Being Green" environmental stuff you mentioned.

 

[Drtooth]

Well, that's exactly it. You were there a month or 2 ago. These JUST came out. I haven't even seen them (maybe a couple shirts) in any of the other Disney stores I went to this month... so either they're brand new, or they haven't hit all the stores just yet.

I'm really hoping this cheaper, silk screen stuff leads to stuff that has to be sculpted or patterned or prototyped in any way.

 

[beaker]

Not sure I dig the style of Kermit stuff they have, but yeah it's a start. And having all the main and side Muppets on the water bottle is good. I cant wait for the *real* Muppet merchandise to come around though.

And sadly, Disney refuses to ship out more than one Up pvc set to a few select stores, most of which end up on ebay in auctions going towards $60-$70.

Disney's lack of merchandise for Up I find an utter travesty, but Tron 2/huge Muppet focus/return to 2d makes up for it.

 

[Drtooth]

Not sure I dig the style of Kermit stuff they have, but yeah it's a start. And having all the main and side Muppets on the water bottle is good. I cant wait for the *real* Muppet merchandise to come around though.

Personally, I wouldn't bother getting excited... but they have Pepe. That's huge. Why, other than the Palisades figures, the Fun4All push puppet, the Jack in the Box premium and the unwinnable carny Nanco plush, there really wasn't anything with him on it. I don't count his appearances in comic books as "merchandise." Too bad the only t-shirt they have with that design on it is for little girls. I REALLY want a T-Shirt with Pepe on it. I mean, how many Animal shirts can someone bother getting?

And sadly, Disney refuses to ship out more than one Up pvc set to a few select stores, most of which end up on ebay in auctions going towards $60-$70.

I still believe they're test marketing... but a fat lot of good that's gonna do, since I can easily see greedy employees buying them up and scalping them on e-bay. Again, I think they were burnt with the Ratatouille merchandise.

Then again, I see so much Terminator Salvation garbage STILL sitting on shelves at deep clearance that NO ONE IN THE WORLD WILL EVER BUY EVER! You could take half the unsold merchandise, melt it down and build a rocket to send the other half of it into the sun. Because that's the only way to get rid of it. So really... when it comes to movie merchandise, some people make the WRONG predictions on what kids would buy. At the very least they FINALLY have bean Bag plush sized Dugs. That was the least I was expecting.

But rest assure, Muppets lend themselves to merchandise a LOT better, and it's been proven time and again. I REALLY want to see small, bean bag size plush at one point. And I DEFINATELY want to see Pepe.

 

[beaker]

Personally, I wouldn't bother getting excited... but they have Pepe. That's huge. Why, other than the Palisades figures, the Fun4All push puppet, the Jack in the Box premium and the unwinnable carny Nanco plush, there really wasn't anything with him on it. I don't count his appearances in comic books as "merchandise." Too bad the only t-shirt they have with that design on it is for little girls. I REALLY want a T-Shirt with Pepe on it. I mean, how many Animal shirts can someone bother getting?

Oh ye have little faith. As you mentioned, it was only a few years ago we saw a ton of great Muppet merchandise all over the place. From the Starbucks mini Muppet plushes to all the Palisades stuff, to even the Fraggle Rock stuff...all amazing.
So I wouldnt be surprised if there's some seriously cool stuff in the works from Disney. And yeah, sadly there hasn't been *too* much Pepe. The Nanco plush is impossible to get, even back then I remember never being able to get it online.

I still believe they're test marketing... but a fat lot of good that's gonna do, since I can easily see greedy employees buying them up and scalping them on e-bay. Again, I think they were burnt with the Ratatouille merchandise.

I cant believe you actually saw the Up figures Thats why I now have an emergency credit card, so I never again have to miss out on something rare that I come across. Personally I think
it's just Disney being jerkwads and trying to do some artificial scarcity. Either that or the whole thing is a hoax, and it's in actuality just prototype figures were seeing on ebay. Up to me beats the pants off of a lot of Pixar films I hate to say.

Then again, I see so much Terminator Salvation garbage STILL sitting on shelves at deep clearance that NO ONE IN THE WORLD WILL EVER BUY EVER! You could take half the unsold merchandise, melt it down and build a rocket to send the other half of it into the sun. Because that's the only way to get rid of it. So really... when it comes to movie merchandise, some people make the WRONG predictions on what kids would buy. At the very least they FINALLY have bean Bag plush sized Dugs. That was the least I was expecting.

Haha, I saw an article or two mentioning how Terminator Salvation toys were the LEAST bought movie tie in toys in many many years. Whats odd is that Playmates flooded every single toy store and non toystore alike with these ugly as sin garbage...and noone bought it. Seriously, I've seen no indication anyone but a few ebay scalpers bought this stuff. I can't see any kid saying "oh wow, I want an ugly decomposed robot flesh guy for $12!" The movie stunk, as did Wolverine. Now granted,
I cant believe kids are dumb enough to want to buy that Bakugun garbage or WWE figures, but Terminator Salvation takes the cake.

And yeah, I saw the small Dug sized plush. I got the small 5" Kevin plush.

But rest assure, Muppets lend themselves to merchandise a LOT better, and it's been proven time and again. I REALLY want to see small, bean bag size plush at one point. And I DEFINATELY want to see Pepe.

One can only hope! I want to see Palisades mini/Fisher Price 1978/Jack in the Box 2003 scaled articulated Muppet figures, darnit!

 

[Drtooth]

Haha, I saw an article or two mentioning how Terminator Salvation toys were the LEAST bought movie tie in toys in many many years. Whats odd is that Playmates flooded every single toy store and non toystore alike with these ugly as sin garbage...and noone bought it. Seriously, I've seen no indication anyone but a few ebay scalpers bought this stuff. I can't see any kid saying "oh wow, I want an ugly decomposed robot flesh guy for $12!" The movie stunk, as did Wolverine. Now granted,
I cant believe kids are dumb enough to want to buy that Bakugun garbage or WWE figures, but Terminator Salvation takes the cake.

Yeah, but kids weren't dumb enough to buy Terminator Salvation stuff, even Marshall's and it's ghetto cousin A.J. Wright have trouble getting rid of them... even on deep discounts of 1 or 2 bucks a figure. The fact they dropped all 25th anniversary TMNT figure plans to chase the worst movie of the year only enhances the fact that whoever runs that place now should be fired.

 

[beaker]

Yeah, but kids weren't dumb enough to buy Terminator Salvation stuff, even Marshall's and it's ghetto cousin A.J. Wright have trouble getting rid of them... even on deep discounts of 1 or 2 bucks a figure. The fact they dropped all 25th anniversary TMNT figure plans to chase the worst movie of the year only enhances the fact that whoever runs that place now should be fired.

While FYE, Marshalls, Kohls, Big Lots and Ross are all selling Terminator Salvation figures for literally a couple bucks; Toys R Us still has at all their stores a huge aisle selling them at full price. ($10-$14) NEVER in the decades of collecting figures have I ever seen a toy series get such a wide release yet have absolutely noone interested. What was Playmates thinking? Noone will buy them for even a dollar. I bet even the Dollar/98 cent stores who normally sell dangerously toxic cheap bootleg toys wont be able to sell them.

Also, what the heck was up with charging $10 for the 80's TMNT figure reissues? Go to ANY retro toy shop, flea market, ebay etc and you can find good condition figures of ANY of the original series for pennies.

What I loved was the 2003 TMNT and Fast Forward figure line,
Im sad that had to go bye bye.

I just find it funny that when theres a film I really like, like Monsters Vs Aliens or Up; the toys for such seem pretty scarce.
Whereas when its dookie I dont like at all like Shrek, Cars, Terminator Salvation, Wolverine Xmen Origins, etc the products are everywhere.

 

[Drtooth]

It all has to do with Movie Buzz. personally, I'm not surprised that we didn't get a massive line of Up merchandise in stores, but Monsters VS Aliens? I really hate how TRU claimed dibs on the line, creating artificial scarcity. And yet, TRU has all this Planet 51 stuff they'll never sell, and it's exclusive to them. Oh well, at least I managed to get 2 of the McDonald's figures. The thing that bugs me is that the only toy lines that are on store shelves are movies and movies based off of toylines and comics. The occasional cartoon based off of comics too... but never an original cartoon series.

But back to the main topic... I wanna see a lot more Pepe on T-shirts and a LOT less Animal. Unless he's with someone.