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The Beasts Are Rising: Talking Transformers with Hasbro's Ben "BMac" MacCrae
780 Plays3 years ago
This week's episode is more than meets the eye as we dive into the latest news and insights from Transformers with Hasbro's Ben "BMac" MacCrae! From the Rise of the Beasts film to new high-end collectible bots from Robosen, store exclusives, and more, find out how BMac wound up at Hasbro, his long history with toys, and more in this jam-packed episode!
Follow BMac and Hasbro on Instagram @bmacatron84 and @hasbropulse and visit hasbropulse.com for the latest news across the brand!
Follow the rest of the Transformers crew on Instagram @naveskoorb, @marclonus, and @king_samlock
Save 12% at BlendJet - use our special link and the discount will be applied at checkout! zen.ai/aicpod12
Follow us @aic_podcast on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube
Intro and other voices by Joe Azzari
https://www.instagram.com/voicesbyjoe/
Theme Music is "Game Boy Horror" by the Zombie Dandies
Proudly part of the Non-Productive Network
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Transcript
Introduction to Adventures in Collecting
00:00:02
Speaker
Are you ready, kids? Get your parents' permission, check your mailbox, and grab your shopping cart. It's time for the Adventures in Collecting podcast. I'm Eric. And I'm Dave. Welcome to Adventures in Collecting, where we talk toy news, culture, and halls, along with our journeys as collectors. Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Adventures in Collecting.
00:00:32
Speaker
Hi. Dave.
Special Guests and Transformers Teaser
00:00:35
Speaker
Eric. This episode is, uh, is more than meets the eye. You could say that. And the lead is currently not going to be in disguise. No, that's not cause I'm not going to bury you. Disguise a lead. I don't know. I know you could bury one, but we should, we should really do not do that. No, no, no, no. But we should really roll out.
00:01:01
Speaker
and just announce today's guests.
Ben B Mac McRae's Journey with Hasbro
00:01:03
Speaker
Um, I just have one question for you, Dave. Do you have the touch? Um, I've got the power. Perfect. Perfect. Nailed it. Now I was hoping, I was hoping we were going to get like a Mark Wahlberg, Dirk Digler sort of impersonation, but it's kind of late. That's a lot on the, that's a lot on the pipes, you know, allergy season. It would have been perfect though. You would have nailed it. Well, if, if you haven't picked up on it already,
00:01:31
Speaker
Um, and you didn't read the title of the episode and you didn't look at the tile art and you're just coming in completely in the dark. We didn't see Instagram. None of that. None of that. This is your brand. First of all, if you're brand new here, hi, welcome. Um,
00:01:45
Speaker
But, uh, yes, today we are joined by a, uh, a new guest on the pod. We have had other members of this absolutely talented, awesome team, uh, on the show before, but we are finally adding, uh, adding today's guests to the list. Uh, we would w we are welcoming Ben B Mac McRae marketing on the, uh, the Hasbro transformers team, Ben B Mac. Welcome to the show, man.
00:02:10
Speaker
Thanks for having me. This is going to be a lot of fun. Uh, very excited to join the prestigious world of what my other teammates have already had the chance to do. Yeah. I mean, we're just like, we're just collecting Hasbro folks. Eventually, eventually we're going to get you all. We're like Pokemon now. You got to collect us all. See if he can evolve us up pretty much. Uh, so before we kind of dive into your history with toys and, you know, and, and kind of how you wound up at Hasbro and everything,
00:02:40
Speaker
as this is a show about collecting the first thing we ask all of our guests.
Ben's Personal Collection and Toy Testing
00:02:45
Speaker
What are you currently collecting and what are some of your recent pickups?
00:02:48
Speaker
Yeah, for me, I'm sure this isn't going to be a shock for anybody that's paid attention to our streams or seen me crash a G.I. Joe fan stream here or there. G.I. Joe is my ultimate true love. No disrespect to Transformers by any means, but I was actually a toy tester for G.I. Joe at Hasbro as a kid. So I've just kind of always been in love. It was something that my dad passed on to me. He was watching G.I. Joe and buying the comics before I was even born. So by the time I could pick up a comic like I had the first
00:03:17
Speaker
four and a half years worth of GI Joe books or Marvel to read. And that show was just on every afternoon. So classified definitely have at least one but more likely three of every character that's come out since that line launched.
00:03:30
Speaker
So, yeah, that's my current go-to. I also collect some of the X-Men stuff. I was a huge Age of Apocalypse kid, loved Joe Madarea, and that whole arc of comics just hit perfectly in that era of my life. So as soon as that first wave came out, which I think actually launched before I was at Hasbro, I ordered that whole wave, and then the second wave came, and then it still didn't include Mr. Sinister, so I got to go after Dan and Ryan and be like, I know there's another wave, why would you do that to me?
00:03:58
Speaker
Um, so I've been really digging a lot of the classic expense stuff that's been coming out as of late as well. So there's a lot to unpack here. Um, before we get into the, uh, you know what, let's just go right into the toy tester thing.
00:04:12
Speaker
So please tell us more about that. Yeah, so we had a family friend who worked in the factory when the offices that we're in now were actually still one of the factories and they never had any kids. So he was able to adopt me per se as his toy tester family member and he just was able to get me on GI Joe. So I have some stuff in my basement like
00:04:36
Speaker
wrong color prototypes, stuff that never actually ended up coming out. Just a lot of late 80s, early 90s stuff. I think it's the Battle America tank is what it's called. It's like the one that looks like a tank, but flips down and is the brick walls that they can all stand on, which makes no sense for a vehicle, but it was so 90s that it hurt.
00:04:56
Speaker
I think I tested like 100 different rubber bands to try to make that center platform work and like I never got a working one but they did finally get one when the toy came out so like mine doesn't actually stay down anymore. I tested the new HQ that came out at that point.
00:05:12
Speaker
Yeah, it was just a lot of fun. I just got lucky in that I got to do that. I did test some nerf sport things and a couple other things along the way, but 98% of everything I got to play with was Joe. Because the internet and cell phones and stuff didn't exist back then, you actually got to keep the toys when you tested them. I actually still have them now. I'm like, now where we come in, it's IP secure and all that.
00:05:33
Speaker
It was really cool and I never understood all my dad hated it because he also had to fill out like this survey like how was it to build how we're putting on the decals and I was just I get to play with cool toys. This is great for me. So it was kind of one of those funny processes that I never you know had to really play with like he had to do the hard work and I got to have the fun. So that's amazing. Do you remember like, you know, having friends over anything to play with them to where they were like, Whoa, this is the best.
00:06:00
Speaker
Yeah, some of it, mainly family that were like trying to like, oh, I'm going to borrow this. And I'm like, no, you're going to put that back like right now. It's fine. You're not taking it out of here. To this day, the sad, like I got to test that HQ and one of my cousins actually broke off one of the gun turrets and like the molded plastic for the bottom of the turret is different on the full line production run. So like it's complete but incomplete because that one piece is broken and it like kills me to this day. It's awesome to have, but at the same time, I'm just like, man, it's not 100% complete. So.
00:06:30
Speaker
Man, that's awesome. That is really, really cool. Yeah, that's so cool. And then the other thing you mentioned, you know, that obviously, you know, the G.I. Joe is your love and everything. Must have been pretty cool to be part of the crossover stuff then, getting to bring Transformers into the G.I. Joe world.
Career and Role with Transformers Team
00:06:47
Speaker
Yeah, it was awesome when I joined the product team, which I'm sure we'll get into like my whole journey. That was one of the projects that just like all of a sudden I see and I'm like, okay, I'm going to manage this like this. I'm taking this project. It's mine. Like I have it. Don't worry about it. It'll be cool. And I was like, yep, Megatron has tank. This makes total sense.
00:07:04
Speaker
Um, saw that we were doing all striker bumblebee that was coming a little later. I'm like, that's really cool. I'm like, okay, so for next year, here's what we have to do. And I was just like super stoked. Like this is what it's going to be. So like, I haven't been shy about the fact that there will be more of these crossovers. So one is coming. You might be able to guess like when it might get announced, um, cause we kind of have a cadence now, um, for it. So it's this year's is going to be really awesome. Um, I'm super stoked. Um,
00:07:32
Speaker
When I decided to pursue it marks like I have a whole deck on that I thought about that like three years ago. Here's what it should look like. And it was just instantly came together. So it was fun. Yeah, I can't imagine the conversation between you Mark and Lenny as you're trying to like, yeah, you know, combine the it's just, yeah, awesome. Yeah, we nerd out a lot. So so how did you find your way to Hasbro and the Transformers team?
00:07:59
Speaker
Yeah, my story is kind of interesting in that regard in that I, let me give you a little backstory. So I used to help run Magic the Gathering events all over the world for a contractor. We got that contract officially at the end of 2017. I worked for them full time through 2018 and then they did some restructuring and I was kind of one of the only East Coast people and it just made more sense for them to keep their West Coast team. So I got laid off.
00:08:24
Speaker
and then i was kind of having issues finding work so i decided it was time to go back to school and pursue my bachelor's cuz i had my associates since like two thousand four getting out of high school and going right to college so i went back to school and in the process of pursuing that an internship on the franchise side of the transformers team got posted i was like i'm in school so i just have to be an active student let's apply to this so i did
00:08:48
Speaker
got interviewed it was very like just you know fortunate and that they were looking for somebody that wasn't very green they needed somebody that could come in and like hit the ground running so I had a lot of experience from owning my previous merch companies and doing that event stuff and just like being working with franchises so that was my start. Got in as an intern in the fall of 2020 yeah
00:09:13
Speaker
and worked on the franchise team and then got extended for a second internship right around Christmas time. And then about March of 2021, Rachel, for those of you who remember her from some of our fan streams and PulseCon, she was having her first kid. And so she was going out for maternity leave and basically the product team stole me from the franchise team and put me in charge of product of which I had never worked on before. And that was two and a half years ago now. So like, I've been here ever since.
00:09:41
Speaker
Clearly moved around and start to work on a lot of different things so that's my that's my journey of how i got in and where i'm at now. That's awesome and i mean you kind of alluded to the fact that you know you. Have were very ingrained in like the hasbro fandom when you were a kid but that that was on the gio and you know what were you big into transformers when you were a kid too or did kind of the role suck you into the fandom.
00:10:06
Speaker
I was a Transformers kid, not anywhere near what I was for G.I. Joe, by any means. I had watched G1, the first DVD I ever bought. I actually tried to go buy the G.I. Joe movie and it was sold out, so I bought Transformers, the movie. I did get my G.I. Joe DVD like a couple weeks later, but that intro, how can you not like the intro to the G.I. Joe movie, right? So I just took this past summer, I took I took
00:10:31
Speaker
My seven-year-old to go see it when they showed it in theaters. It was hilarious. The whole Joe team, a bunch of us in the Transformer team, we all got to go to. It's funny to watch that now in theaters with everybody because you never got to. So Transformers, I was into it.
00:10:48
Speaker
When beast wars came out it actually kinda hit perfectly it was on every morning on my local tv channel while i'd eat breakfast before school so i watched a lot of that show so it was kinda interesting in that i joined the transformer team in the 25th anniversary of beast wars and kingdom was coming so it was just kinda like oh yeah i really know this show so it worked out well
00:11:09
Speaker
I kind of dropped off a little like when I got to college and really watched like Armada or Energon or Cybertron or any of that. And then Prime came out when the hub network and they were also relaunching Joe. So like I had got clued into the hub network. Loved Prime, was absolutely in love with that show. Watched all of the Prime Wars trilogy and then clearly was, you know, into the war for Cybertron stuff and had been watching it before I applied and then, you know, got to see Earthrise and Kingdom come out while I was there.
00:11:37
Speaker
Yeah, Prime is still like those designs are so sharp. They're almost they're almost like take a take a page out of a Evangelion, like the like kind of like stretched, like warped. Everybody's tall and angular. And yeah, the show was so unique. It was well like ahead of its time. And as I've been here, learned that it was expensive to animate as you would expect. So.
00:12:00
Speaker
makes sense. Yeah, was also like into comics a lot. My dad was a huge comic collector. So when devils do, it was a dreamwave one of the two whenever they got the Transformers license after Marvel, and Pat Lee was doing the artwork, I was just like, happened to be in a comic shop. And I'm like, this covers awesome. I need this. And so like, I have the Decepticon and the Autobot number ones and
00:12:22
Speaker
So I've always just kind of been like in and out of the fandom for Transformers. You know, not I, I have no Evan or Mark by any means those guys pull stuff out of everywhere. And I'm just like, how do you know this? Um, so yeah, having, having Mark, Mark being our first, uh, Oh, I guess Lenny was technically on before Mark, but he was already transitioning from Transformers to GI Joe. Like we knew that that was happening, but when we had Mark on, it was.
00:12:49
Speaker
It was such
Engaging Fans and Franchise Strategy
00:12:50
Speaker
a fun interview, but it was also a challenge for us. Full disclosure, we are green when it comes to Transformers. Our knowledge doesn't go very, very deep. So when we had him on, it was almost like we were sitting there like, mm-hmm. Yeah.
00:13:09
Speaker
He pulls out stuff all the time. He's like, we should do this character. I've been dying to get this out. And I'm like, who are you talking about? If it wasn't for TF Wiki, man, there's times where I would just be completely lost. I go there at least 10 times a day when we start brainstorming for the next year. We're working on an exclusive capsule. And I'm just like, who's this? What did you pull out? Oh, OK. Yeah, that makes sense. Let's do that. Oh, what's this character? Oh, OK. Yep. That's cool. Those colors work. Let's look at that.
00:13:35
Speaker
It's they're, they're absolutely talented, incredible. Um, and this brand is can give all of its success on fan products like generations for studio series. And that, uh, so those two and Sam Smith, who was on our team for a while, um, and Lenny too, like clearly Lenny had a lot to do with transformers before moving to GI Joe. So you went speaking of Evan, um, you and Evan just wrapped up on the latest Hasbro pulse fan stream where a new Robocen
00:14:03
Speaker
Optimus Prime was introduced. Tell us about this elite Optimus Prime. Yeah, it's pretty awesome. It's very close to the flagship that came out. But now that the flagship is out of stock and
00:14:17
Speaker
unattainable. Robeson and Pulse wanted to get back together and bring out another item because there was more demand from people that wanted their song auto-converting Optimus Prime, which is an awesome thing to play with. So the Elite's a little smaller, but it still has a lot of the same motor. I think it has the same number of motors, the same number of servos, all of that stuff. So it's just a little more compact. The big thing that I got from this and from talking with 6.0 prior to the fan stream and just getting a little bit of background on it from Robeson is that
00:14:47
Speaker
This one's a little more interactive with the app than the flagship was like there's some challenges and you unlock extra moves and you can also do your own like building stuff with this and like terms of making some new robotics abilities with him so it's a little more interactive and playful than the flagship.
00:15:03
Speaker
Was initially like their stuff now that people have figured out how to do with the flagship but again like if you feel like you missed out and you don't want to spend that much money trying to find one you don't have a chance to go preorder that elite you're gonna get it it's awesome it's a very cool toy robison is really cool i like everything they do i spent forty hours listening to peter colin lines when i was on the franchise side of the business
00:15:27
Speaker
cataloging them because they had been recorded but nobody had ever transcribed them. He wished me very many happy birthdays and very different inflections because part of those audio files were also when we had reading cards for Optimus Prime. So yeah, so I put a lot of love like a whole legit whole week. All I did like ignored emails, ignored meetings was listen to 40 hours of Peter Cullen lines.
00:15:51
Speaker
It's like that, uh, when, when you, you guys partnered, uh, with calm, I think the app was the, you know, Colin, you know, tells you a bedtime story that legit was I, yeah.
00:16:03
Speaker
It hit his voice, just those, those. He's super and he's super nice person too. Um, and if you ever have the chance to talk to Frank Welker, very mind-blowing. And the fact that his natural voice sounds like Fred from Scooby-Doo of who he is the voice of, and it just like, it's very like weird to like.
00:16:22
Speaker
You're like, oh, I'm having a conversation, but I really feel like you need a white shirt and an ascot right now so we can talk properly. Um, but he's one of the, again, one of the nicest people in the industry. Like we super lucked out in who we, we've had make our show historic throughout the 40 years of the brand, you know? Yeah. And, and, you know, just getting back to the, the, the Robeson, uh, you know, Optimus, it's just one of those things where like,
00:16:48
Speaker
I can't believe how far toys have come. I'm sitting here with an Optimus Prime from just a few years ago and the idea that there's one that's just a few inches taller than this and you can talk to it and he does push-ups and plays air guitar and drums and it's just like, I can't believe we've gotten here. It's unbelievable.
00:17:07
Speaker
It's kind of what you hoped they would do when you were when you were younger now kind of evolved to know this is what they do. And like he breathes like him just sitting there like gentle like you could see his chest moving. It's so Yeah, it's so well done. Robeson's been a great partner. Excited for everything that they've done. Looking forward to you know, what else is potentially possible as time continues. Yep. Yeah, speaking of Frank Welker, hopefully, uh,
00:17:36
Speaker
Hopefully you have 40 plus hours of Frank Welker interested future Sadly, I don't think it's gonna turn into the Walter PPK, you know, that's just gonna not probably work out for anyone. So yeah No, but I think everyone's used to just a tank with a really big, you know a really big old fusion cannon. Yeah exactly
00:18:02
Speaker
So Transformers Rise of the Beasts is edging closer to that June 9th release date.
Transformers Rise of the Beasts and Toy Production
00:18:09
Speaker
And it's finally going to see the Maximals and Predacons enter the film universe. Has it been exciting for you to have the opportunity to support the release of this new film?
00:18:21
Speaker
Yeah, it's been a lot of fun. I'm glad I can finally talk about Unicron. I've known about that being in the movie for three years now, and I'm just like, oh my gosh. And it was one of those things that we weren't sure they were actually going to show in a trailer prior to the movie. So it was the biggest kept secret in the industry about the film. So that's really awesome. I'm glad to see everybody's excitement for that.
00:18:45
Speaker
I can't wait to see it. I actually haven't seen much outside of like a couple things basically outside the trailer. There are people within the company that have seen it. They saw a rough cut last summer before animation was done and they've seen a few different cuts since then as they're like working the last little bits of tweaks as movies tend to do, you know, up to release time that last two weeks prior. They're still making some final tweaks and animation fixes.
00:19:09
Speaker
From the product side, it's been interesting in that we actually have movie product in studio series in the movie year. That had a lot to do with the movie shifting out a year.
00:19:19
Speaker
When we made our plan is that we were supposed to be following it because we'd really try to go for that screen accuracy final CAD from the film make the toy. So we tried our best. I'm sure there are a couple people who once they see the movie like, well, that's not 100% accurate. That's what studio series is supposed to be about. Well, we tried our best. We updated the toys up until the absolute last minute that we could for production.
00:19:43
Speaker
But it's been nice to have stuff. I really think that they're also going to take off like once everybody gets a chance to go see the movie and connect with characters once they see the film and be like, Oh, yeah, Rhinox is totally my dude. Or Oh, primal just absolutely slay this movie. I need an optimist primal. Where's my optimist primal or I'm in love with RC now because she's just funny and like Eliza Koshy is great actress and I actually have to go get that core class Ducati because it's just awesome. So
00:20:10
Speaker
Yeah. It's been a lot of fun to create that stuff. Our kid team actually got to create a lot of really awesome product for the film too. So, um, more to come from studio series. I won't be shy about it. We have some more to reveal this year and even some other characters into 2024, just how things worked out. So don't feel like we're going to stop supporting this movie by any means. As soon as it hits theaters, we still have more for everybody this year. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah. I mean, that's one of those things that, that always comes up to right where it's like,
00:20:38
Speaker
You know, especially with Hasbro and the relationship, you know, Hasbro has with Disney and the, you know, and, and, you know, kind of these film verse things is there's always like that certain amount of stuff that you can put out before the film or like while the film's out. And then there's always, you know, the big reveal, the twist, the things that happen. Oh, I hope this comes. Yeah. Yup. Yup. So definitely excited to, uh,
00:21:00
Speaker
to see where you guys go with that. Because we're seeing all the stuff start to hit shelves, and the pairings of the characters. It's like, oh, how do these interact in the movie? Yeah. So what's been different for you between production of the movie-based bots and then the evolution line?
00:21:19
Speaker
Yeah, like I was saying, studio series, we try to be as screen accurate as we can. So when it's licensed, like, I'm trying to think here what was licensed for this film, per se. So clearly, like Bumblebee is licensed with GM. Other characters in the film that are licensed would be like a Nightbird is the Nissan.
00:21:43
Speaker
The battle trap is a licensed GM tow truck, so we have a lot of licenser beholding to make sure the characters and the vehicles look really accurate to their vehicle form, too. Sam absolutely crushes that. He is very much a car guy, and without him, sometimes he just has this attention to detail that even Takara, when given CAD from the company, will be like, hey, we're just going to cut this corner. He's like, no,
00:22:07
Speaker
No, no, no. This line needs to be here because of X, Y, and Z. It's been on the car since 1993. You're just like, I don't know how you know this. So there's a little more constriction per se for live action stuff on Studio Series. We have a little more freedom in terms of what we're doing with our 86 line and then now expanding into war for Cybertron. Again, trying to be as 100% screen accurate as we can be.
00:22:29
Speaker
Evan spends a lot of time watching the eighty six movie with his pantone book and making sure he's mailing the colors since it's been color corrected so those toys really come out as close as you can.
00:22:39
Speaker
And then for the war for Cybertron stuff, we actually got like the original CAD files for the characters from our digital games team from the disks back in the day. And they tried to make those like as accurate as they could clearly transformation engineering a little different from what it was able to do in a video game, but really just a lot of fun there. In terms of evolution, we have a lot of freedom. It's a lot of fun. And we get to just kind of do what we're trying to do. It started out like I know in year one of legacy, like there was a lot of
00:23:09
Speaker
interesting comments we'll say about bulkhead or RC coming from Prime Universe but then being G1-ified and maybe it took it quite a little too far and I think we've kind of like found that good medium line where we're making a cohesive look and scale of how everybody looks in Transformers Legacy over the years.
00:23:30
Speaker
and found that good blend of paying homage to the universe they come from, but bringing them into this one cohesive generations line. So we get a lot of freedom and that's where Mark and Evan get to shine. Tarn this year, absolutely incredible. People have been asking for, I don't know, five, six years, when are we getting an official Transformers Generations Tarn figure? And we're like, okay, let's do it. This is the line to do it in, so let's just get it done.
00:23:55
Speaker
Yeah, and clearly marks had the freedom to come up with like legitimate new characters with like those those junkyons That have been coming out and you know, there's another one trash master trash master. Yeah, that'll get revealed soon Yeah, we've kind of had this custom build system in generations for a little while now It started with the weaponizers and war for Cybertron and then they did the fossilizers in Kingdom And then we got to have you know the junkyons this year which is a ton of fun and
00:24:26
Speaker
Yeah, so tons of crazy creations. I've seen people make like somebody was able to make a predator out of the weaponizers and the fossilizers. So I can't wait to see what they're able to do by adding these junkie on pieces. But one of the biggest pieces of feedback we get is like creating new characters because it's been so long that like everybody knows the history and like they love their Optimus and their bumblebee, but they definitely want
00:24:47
Speaker
something new so being able to give them new characters from an existing faction that they know or maybe creating a new faction like we did with the fossilizers who just made sense like fossil play is huge.
Impact of Michael Bay Films and Studio Series
00:24:59
Speaker
So yeah, it's been a lot of fun to just kind of have that that freedom with legacy and then now with evolution and it's just a lot of fun to just make stuff that people were like, I'm never going to get this toy recreated and then all of a sudden we're like, hey, we're recreating this toy and they lose their mind and it sells out in the first 20 minutes when it hits pulse, you know, it's great.
00:25:18
Speaker
And kind of going back to the studio series for a second, you know, I'm not shy about saying the fact that the Michael Bay franchise is what got me into Transformers and I'm by no means like a car expert, but I do. I think one of the things that was so attractive about that movie to me was seeing like, Oh, like look at in, in kind of like in real life, like look at where the windshield goes and like see, like looking at like the transformation process and then
00:25:46
Speaker
For me, the icing on the cake was we went to Universal Studios and went on the attraction and seeing Optimus, you know, transform, you know, feet away from you, you know, in the ride in 3D was just like completely blew my mind. And I mean, that's what sucked me in. And like the attention to detail on the studio series line, I mean, like it, it matters. Like it does little tiny things. Yeah. And it's, it was different too from like,
00:26:15
Speaker
You know, the cartoon, you hear the noise and they transform and you know, it happens, but it's to see it like kind of quickly flow into movements in the movies was just kind of the, the mind blowing kind of jaw dropping part of it. And that's, that's what I always enjoyed most about those movies is the, just seeing the transformer, seeing the, um, the, the bots do what they do.
00:26:38
Speaker
Yeah, there's no denying that like in 2007 that movie just hit well, right? Like it rejuvenated the franchise. It brought people back to Transformers that maybe had walked away from their childhood. It created a new generation of kids who had never heard or seen a Transformer. Then all of a sudden they see this commercial and they're like, dad, I want to go to the theater and see the truck do the thing. You know, so it was like, we owe a lot to those films in terms of like our longevity of our brand and it always being on for the last 40 years.
00:27:08
Speaker
It is like studio series is all about that detail. And our team absolutely nails it every chance they get to car does their best to try to make those transformations look as close to screen as they can, like clearly, you can do a lot more CGI than we can do with physical plastic in your hand, but
00:27:26
Speaker
Yeah, Studio Series definitely is a different beast. And it's actually like a great introduction for a lot of people. So you're not the only one. We do see a lot of people join the Transformers toy collecting world through Studio Series because they saw X movie and they're like, Oh, this is that character. So like, you know, the fallen just came out last year. And people are like, I've been waiting for the fallen, you know, since 2009. Where's my fallen?
00:27:48
Speaker
And now they're just like back in again. They're like, Oh, this just came back out. I love this villain. And they're like, Oh, wait, there's 100 more of these things. Oh, gotta go buy more. So yeah, studio series and just the films in general have been great for the brand.
00:28:02
Speaker
Well, I mean, I can tell you that every time we see a yellow and black Camaro anywhere, like my, my daughter is like, Oh, it's bumblebee. Very good. And sometimes it's not a Camaro. It's like a Corvette or something, or, you know, some other kind of, you know, low flat sports car, but it's that same color scheme. She's like, is that bumblebee? I'm like, that's not a Camaro, but like,
00:28:25
Speaker
You're still adorable. Is it still a Chevy? Maybe he decided to change today. You never know. Yeah, he scanned it in the car. It's fine. It's fine. Yeah, but it's just, it is awesome to see the studio series characters come off the screen and into the line.
00:28:45
Speaker
Something else that was revealed during your most recent live stream were two very interesting Amazon exclusive sets that include some pretty deep cuts, including characters like Data Clerk Orion Pax and Senator Ratbat.
Exclusive Sets and Character Selection
00:29:03
Speaker
So how do characters like that that are such deep cuts, how do they find their way into the line?
00:29:11
Speaker
Yeah, that one is actually all Evan. He had this whole plan that he presented when we were trying to figure out our 2023 line. And he was like, Hey, Amazon gives us what we call it's called a plus content. So Amazon with their their product pages, they have a lot of extra space so that we can provide extra ecom copy and tell a little bit of a story. So using the story that existed loosely through all the different iterations of the pre work comics,
00:29:37
Speaker
and putting these characters together we were like okay we can tell a story of this pre-war senate versus the centicon era before the autobots and decepticons were a thing everybody knows optimus as optimus prime but there was a time where he basically was just like a
00:29:54
Speaker
He was a better credit he was working in the library in icon city and he was beholden to the senate and he would use him to do different things. It was fun to talk about rat bat not being a tiny cassette that lives in sound waves chest because you're like okay so he's this big giant senator but then he just decides to later in life transcan into a cassette and live in somebody else's chest like kind of funny.
00:30:17
Speaker
And then like Senator Shockwave also being like, wait, Shockwave wasn't always purple, wasn't always a cyclops and wasn't always just like completely insane and just wanted to kill everything and everyone? Huh, okay, yeah, let's talk about that. And then we've always wanted to make a minor Megatron for a while. You know, clearly an important part of his history, especially if you've read that, that miniseries that came out about Megatron.
00:30:43
Speaker
So these packs were great and then clearly we weren't shy about it on the fan stream that there's more coming to this story capsule so that you'll be able to build out a little more and maybe even some more deep cuts that I don't think people are expecting but really unique characters that we wanted to again use that storytelling platform of Amazon to really drive home kind of like we did with the Wreckers last year where you actually got that story that built on itself.
00:31:08
Speaker
each day when it came out. So you knew what we were doing or two years ago with the Golden Disc when you were like, wait, we're doing time travel about this disc all of a sudden in the same capsule where we're already doing time travel and the main line was going on here. So really awesome ability and great partnership with Amazon to be able to bring fans something they never thought they'd be able to get in a very easy to get exclusive process. Thanks to Amazon. And now a word from our sponsors.
00:31:41
Speaker
This segment is brought to you by our friends at Chubsy Wubsy Toys. A traditional mom and pop toy store in Little Falls, New Jersey, Chubsy Wubsy Toys brings you the best new toys from the brands you love without the hassle of pounding the pavement searching for them at larger retail stores.
00:31:57
Speaker
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00:32:27
Speaker
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Ad Segment for BlendJet 2
00:32:57
Speaker
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Speaker
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Speaker
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00:34:32
Speaker
and use the code AICPOD12 to get 12% off your order and free two-day shipping. Shop today to get the best deal ever. And now back to the show. So with stuff like this and these deeper cut characters and obviously the way that the two-pack system works, it's like clearly there's like a hero character and then like a secondary character in the pack.
00:35:02
Speaker
But like with this process and you know the selection process does a lot of it go into like here the available tools that we have and you know what can we reuse and you know kind of an economic view of how do we bring these characters to life and you know.
00:35:20
Speaker
How does that work? That definitely is a big part of how exclusives work. We have a full tooling budget for the entire year for the brand. Clearly, we need to make newness all year, and that's what you really see across mainline in Studio Series and Legacy. And then we try to look at where we can partial, where we
00:35:41
Speaker
Mark and Evan are great at this. They actually build like alt heads into a lot of the molds when they make the character the first time, knowing they're going to make X exclusive down the road. They're like, Hey, I already seated for this, or they'll actually even put the extra pieces that it's not actually a partial. It's just actually a straight up redeco. We just turn off another part of the tool where we have scraps that we just get rid of. They're really good about it. It actually like, that's how galaxy shuttle came to be. We were looking for an exclusive and Mark was looking through old tools and found that John Warden had hit the galaxy shuttle head.
00:36:11
Speaker
in the astrotrain mold back in siege days and he's like we can make astrotr- we can make galaxy shuttle which was perfect considering like we had just done victory saber and we knew that death source was coming even though the fans didn't we're like yeah we should make galaxy shuttle this is perfect it's another you know
00:36:28
Speaker
about universe characters. So yeah, we do plan for that. But yeah, clearly tooling and finances do play a part in what we are able to do.
Retail Exclusives and Product Planning
00:36:39
Speaker
It's not unlimited money, sadly. I would love to make everything as new as possible, or everything be a partial, but clearly there are stuff where like, I mean, it's how the line was built though, right? Characters were literally built on just straight up redeckling other versions of those characters. So that's clearly where it comes from. Yeah.
00:36:59
Speaker
Yeah, and, you know, it's yeah, I was going to say, I feel like like reuse is the nature and it's just kind of one of those things you almost have to think about in a way.
00:37:09
Speaker
Yeah, the team's really good at that. They get it. Being toy collectors, they love their six versions of the same character in different decos. So they're like, if I make this and I can make these three different heads, this is what you get. It's really awesome. And they're really good at it. And then they just present it to me and I go, yep, that makes sense. Cool. Way to be economical. Make it. So it's great.
00:37:33
Speaker
Now, we saw from another exclusive from Target, there was a shock drop for the buzzworthy bumblebee capsule. And that really kept the collector community on their toes. Is that a strategy that's going to continue into the foreseeable future?
00:37:50
Speaker
Yeah, we are very strategic, I guess you would say, in terms of our exclusives. Part of the truth is, is that the way the line planned out with the movie shift, there wasn't a space for Optimus to exist within studio series.
00:38:06
Speaker
As we allocate tooling and things here, we were actually able to just like we've seen good success with some studio series stuff at Target. So we knew we wanted to try something else out with that and we were able to get optimists and we're like, yeah, we clearly need to have optimists from Rise of the Beast somewhere. I know fans at certain points were just like, why would you make him an exclusive? It was just literally because of the movie shift and it was just the way it worked. So
00:38:31
Speaker
I think it's fun. I think people are going to go. It's great that people will have a chance to, you know, they'll go to the store and they'll hunt, which I think is something that's kind of lost a little bit now. Everybody's so used to their pre-order phase, but I think it'll be fun for them to go and try to find these optimists character and see like what else is on the shelf for Rise of the Beast and the movie after having seen it.
00:38:52
Speaker
And again, I know Evan kind of shared it on the stream, but like he started out as what was supposed to be a partial, but by the end, Takara Wizards work their magic as they tend to do. And pretty much almost all of that figure is brand new compared to the Bumblebee optimist that it started with. So we got there. It's crazy. It's super fun. But yeah, it's gonna, it'll be a fun one to go hunt the summer when it drops.
00:39:15
Speaker
Yeah, all of the vehicle modes and for the Rise of the Beast figures so far, like the Mad Maxification of them, it's a cool...
00:39:26
Speaker
It's a cool concept. I can't wait to see it play out the movie. I totally want I want us to buy one of the optimists from the movie and just like park it at the office. I think it'd be super fun. I actually joke and say I want scourge and then I want to take it home because then I could get to the office real quick the next morning because everybody would just get the hell out of driving that down the interstate like, Oh, no, move, move things gonna hit me. Yeah, you're right. I'm gonna run you over because it's not gonna hurt me. So
00:39:51
Speaker
Well, listen, if you get one, if the zombie apocalypse ever happens, we know where we're coming because of that. Skirgil. Skirgil, get through anything. Get through anything. Yeah, but to your point, it's been kind of cool going into Target and seeing unannounced stuff, because we grew up in that generation. Back when everything was unannounced. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not going to say that I don't love
00:40:20
Speaker
my pre-orders because I love being able to just kind of sit at home hit a button and just sit back and wait like it's nice it is nice but at the same time you know I'm going to Target for other reasons you know like it's not I'm not just always going for toys you know from from one father to another you know those
00:40:40
Speaker
Oh crap, we're out of Desitin or, you know, uh, those, those little runs. Um, and I'm always checking out the toy aisle. So it's always fun to see, you know, the, in the Transformers out of stuff that like has not been shown on a stream and doesn't show up in Hasbro on, on the Instagram feed. And it's like, Oh, you know, that the buzzworthy, uh, Bumblebee capsule is still paying off, you know, just like random new stuff showing up. So.
00:41:03
Speaker
Yeah, it was super fun. I was actually on vacation over the weekend out in Santa Rosa, California, and had a target run to go get a couple things. And I'm like, hey, guys, while we're here, I got to go head up the toy aisle, take some pictures, just to compare it back to home. And it was actually interesting to see, again, ran into some of the kid movie line Buzzworthy Bumblebee exclusives on the shelf. And I was like, that's cool. I haven't seen them yet. This is great. And I got to take a picture.
00:41:26
Speaker
send it back to the team and like, hey, I'm on vacation, but here's some pictures of the store target in Santa Rosa and like, look, they have exclusives on the shelf. They're working. It was a, it was nice to see. So yeah, it's a, it's a good program. Um, I like what retailer exclusives do in terms of like driving people to the store to do what they're supposed to do. Right. Like what toys are us exclusives always did back in the day. Um, same kind of concept, just like helping our partners who help us continue to make this line successful.
00:41:56
Speaker
Giving them things that drive consumers into their stores and incidental purchases on other things why they're already there because The toy sections buried so you have to walk by a lot of things and you're like, oh, yeah, I need that Oh, yep, I forgot I needed that and then all of a sudden They're getting another hundred dollars and purchases and it works out for them and works out for us. Yep. Yep. It's strategic They don't know where they know why they put the toy out where they put it Yeah, it makes sense
00:42:21
Speaker
All right, so our next section here is our Q&A so As we always do when we have a guest on we'll post on our Instagram so Dave So make sure to smash that subscribe button and hit those likes and what about the follow button those hit the follow button and
00:42:46
Speaker
answer that question for when we say do you have a question? Yes. That's the only way you'll be able to participate in the Q&A and ask a question. You get better at this. Checking those stories. You get better at doing this the way that you do this every episode and I just
00:43:27
Speaker
So, uh, you know, as, as Dave was saying, you know, we, if you're following us on Instagram at AIC underscore podcast, uh, anytime we have a guest, we will post and collect, uh, some questions to ask our guests. We know it is a, uh, you know, we, we, we take it very seriously that that it's.
00:43:29
Speaker
I'm very proud of you. I love it.
00:43:45
Speaker
take it very seriously. We understand that not everybody has access to the people that we have on the show, and we understand that privilege. So we want to make sure that we give you guys the opportunity to submit some questions as well. So all of that being said, Dave, would you like to handle our first question? Yes. At Cooby Maximus? I think that's right. Hope I got that right.
00:44:12
Speaker
Um, when can we go at Cooby Maximus asks, when can we get an update on the has lab deathosaurus?
00:44:20
Speaker
There should be an update going out soon. I'm just waiting for the team to get it formatted and send it out. Evan recorded another video for anybody who backed Victory Saver and saw the EP1 video review. Evan has done the same thing for Death Source for all of you wonderful backers, where he goes into all of little details, shows even some of the things that were messed up on the EP1, things that we're correcting as we work through that process. So that video should be going out
00:44:49
Speaker
Pretty soon he does do some comparison with victory saber in it I believe I've been so super busy that I actually haven't had a chance to watch it myself yet so
00:44:59
Speaker
Another semi-lengthy video, but Evan is really good at getting midi and gritty and detailed with everybody there. And hopefully some more updates, a little more consistently as we finished out the production cycle. The EP2 actually showed up at the office today. I decided to work from home because of my trip and I was being considerate to my team. Didn't want to potentially maybe get anybody sick, not that I feel bad, but I was just like, let's just be safe with your two international airports, we'll be good.
00:45:27
Speaker
So I'm looking forward to seeing what changes and improvements they made over the first version that Evan reviewed. And then we will have some pictures of it. We will be taking it to Comic-Con with us and potentially, hopefully, maybe we'll be ready to do an unboxing at Comic-Con like we did last year with Victory Saver. Awesome. All right.
Fan Influence on Transformers Projects
00:45:48
Speaker
So the next question comes from at the nemesis rises asks, how influential is the fandom to project design?
00:45:57
Speaker
Has there ever been a post comment or trend that has directly impacted a product decision? Directly, I'm not sure. In terms of comments and what people are asking for, clearly, Tarn, definitely one of those people, characters that people had been asking for. And we're like, yep, yep, we hear you. We hear you. We're going to make it. Some fan vote stuff has happened, like Windblade was fan created. She finally got made.
00:46:27
Speaker
I know Lenny worked on that and had a lot of fun when that all went down. Who's going to be the next prime was a vote and they worked through all of that before I was on the team. So we do try and we fail at it sometimes and we're going to try to be better at it of engaging with the community and seeing what people really are asking for and wanting.
00:46:47
Speaker
I spend a lot of time probably too much time on forums and comment reading to see what people are saying about stuff when it comes out. I go back through and read the comments after the fan streams and see like what else everybody's kind of mining for we do take that all into consideration as we continue to develop the lines in the future.
00:47:05
Speaker
So directly impact, I don't know, maybe there's design stuff that happens. Sometimes we see people kit bash characters that come out right when it comes out and they're like, oh, this redeco is coming. And we're like, oh, we didn't think of it that way. Maybe it'll work.
00:47:21
Speaker
Yeah, influential. Yeah, the fans are definitely influencing where we're going and what we're doing. But clearly, you know, we have to make our optimus and our bumblebee every year. But we do, we are expanding and making these fun characters. And it's because the fans have been asking for them repeatedly. And we're like, here, I have like 600 posts that say make Tarn. So we go and make that character. Nice. So
00:47:43
Speaker
You know, we always get those like, when is this coming? Amalgamation and thank you for everyone that asks like when something's coming. What's the best way for the community, for the Transformers fans to make their requests to the team heard?
00:48:00
Speaker
Honestly, just keep commenting where you are. You can comment to Mark, Evan, or myself on our posts when we post on Instagram. Post in the chat for the fan stream. Post on the forums you're posting on. We're reading there. We are trying to, as a company overall, try to figure out how to engage with fans better.
00:48:18
Speaker
It's something we're working on with Pulse. And now that we have that platform to be like, hey, we should be talking back in the community, kind of like other big corporations do, you know, like Wendy's, for instance, one of my favorite Twitter accounts that they actually just get back at people. Clearly, we're not going to be that kind of vulgar and mean to people, but engaging with people in that way. So there's definitely just, you know, where you're posting now, do that, but definitely hit us up on Instagram if you want to. Dave, you want to do the next one?
00:48:48
Speaker
Yeah, sure. atjaden1047 asks, what was the first transformer you ever worked on? Oh, that's a good question. So I inherited the first year of legacy when I joined the product team, but the year was pretty much baked. So were all of the exclusives. I was kind of just managing it.
00:49:10
Speaker
So evolution overall is kind of like my first foray into products I worked on. Did the brainstorms work with the design team, figure out where we were going. Again, studio series for the most part was baked because it just shifted a year because of the movie. So War for Cybertron, video game characters were something new that we decided to work on an added 23. But I'm trying to think of like the first actual character
00:49:37
Speaker
that I took on and managed. It was actually probably those collabs. They had the GI Joe crossover ones. They had kind of started, but they weren't completely
Ben's Projects and Favorite Collectibles
00:49:46
Speaker
done yet. So those were the ones that I really owned from the get-go. And then the biggest marketing things I had to take on were our Jurassic collab.
00:49:56
Speaker
and had to do all of the marketing for that. Like that project got dumped in my lap and they're like, we need a marketing plan and how are we going to launch this? So we're going to do this and we need to do that. I was like, okay, sure. Let's figure this out. So we were able to use an animator that we knew.
00:50:10
Speaker
to make that teaser animation that we had go out the weekend before we launched it. So that was a lot of fun to work with them on that. And then I worked with one of our photographers in house to do the photo shoot where we recreated the T-Rex breaking out of its pen in the night. I got to stand there and hold the fog can and splash water on the things while we were taking the shots to make it look like it was raining and wet. It was a lot of fun.
00:50:33
Speaker
So that was kind of one of my big first projects that I did entirely. And then also, Victory Saver kind of got dropped into my lap. And I didn't know much about the Victory Universe before coming back to the brand. So I did a lot of brushing up and watching a lot of subtitled episodes and trying to figure out how we were going to make that. So getting that launch video put together from the renders.
00:50:55
Speaker
trying to make sure it was really going to hit with the fans. And then clearly we went and had the audio rerecorded so that people were like, oh, this is legit. This is great. So those are probably the first two major projects that I worked on that anybody saw an impact of what I did from the marketing side of things. Awesome. All right, so our last question for the Q&A here comes from some guy. Definitely not anyone important or that anyone knows in the Transformers world
00:51:24
Speaker
Definitely not a former guest on the show. Um, at Mark Clonus asks, do you think sea spray will ever be made?
00:51:34
Speaker
Yeah, he's definitely like one of the not important people in our community by any means. So yeah, I don't know. Always asking him when things will get made. Clearly, I am not shy about sea spray. This dude has been in the line plan. Every time we make a line plan, we look at exclusive programs. I try to figure out where to fit sea spray into the line wherever I can.
00:51:56
Speaker
full transparency we're talking about 2025 now we're doing our planning and he's in the wave one trying to figure out how to keep him i guarantee just because it's my luck he'll probably not make the cut so don't keep your hopes up if you're a giant sea spray fan i'll fight for him till the death but it's just one of those characters that like he's very unique and hard to partial or reuse efficiently like we talked about earlier um
00:52:20
Speaker
I'm a Decepticon forever. Always will be. Soundwave, absolutely love him. I think he's actually like the secret best leader of the Decepticons and eventually at some point in time he's going to win out and he'll just take out Shockwave and Megatron and Starscrape and just be like, yeah, I got you all. You had no idea I was coming. But Seaspray was my first minibot as a kid, so that's where my love for him comes. He still sits in my office up on my desk and looks over me all the time while I'm working.
00:52:45
Speaker
It's just fun. One of those characters that gets an occasional remake here and there, like he got a Power of the Primes in that trilogy somewhere, Redo, and that was awesome. And then Marcelo recently was showing some artwork he had done for that packaging, and I was like, I need more sea spray in my life, and now I think he's bringing me those original drawings to Comic-Con for me to get off him so I can frame him and put in my office.
00:53:09
Speaker
He's just one of those characters that I love as much as I, you know, love the rest of my Decepticons because peace through tyranny, clearly. Listen, all you got to do is get them to show up in one of the movies. And then... Yeah, that's true. Yeah. It's funny, you know, everybody's always like, more boats. And I'm like, they're called Autobots. Like, just saying. Yeah, no, but, uh, you know, of course that question comes from, uh, from Transformers designer, Mark Maha. Mark.
00:53:38
Speaker
Welcome back on the show at any time, buddy. Thanks. Thanks. Thanks. Thanks for busting chops. Mark's great. We, uh, we have a team design chat, um, and we just talk all day, every day about stuff like, Hey, will this work? Or like today Mark was trying to figure out a redeco and partial thing that's happening for an exclusive next year. And he just kept dropping pictures and he's like, ignore, ignore this. I'm just need a picture. I need to reference it on teams. When I get home, ignore. And like, I just have like.
00:54:05
Speaker
40 pictures from him today in the office like trying to figure out stuff to compile back to send it to car and be like, look, this is how this will work. I took pictures and like puts it together. So yeah, it's it's great to work with both of them. And then our team at Takara, they again, we say Wizards all the time, and we mean it like they are absolute legend designers, and it's great to be partnered with them.
00:54:28
Speaker
And we couldn't do it without that partnership by any means like me they really are a big part of what we do which is why we try. To be conscious of like giving them credit when we reveal the toys and do the post online to be like yeah you know we work on this with the sui sauna we work with the suyuki sauna just making sure that they get as much credit as we do like where the face but they they do as much work as we do.
00:54:49
Speaker
It was great to see Hisui-san on, not this last live stream, but the one before that. Seeing him actually there with the model, I thought that was a really nice touch, by the way. Shouts to the Takara team.
00:55:02
Speaker
Yeah, it's always fun to get them involved as best as we can. You know, there's clearly a language barrier, but their team is great about it and they are very willing to do those videos and then send us a nice translation document and we're able to put it together and hopefully it comes out in the way that it should make sense. I'm sure we miss.
00:55:19
Speaker
like a line here or there somewhere along the way, but our fans on this side aren't fluent in Japanese, or at least most of them aren't. So we definitely are trying to make sure that they get the credit they deserve to. But yeah, Hisui had worked on that previous model of the Armada Optimist that got out there a few years ago. So we were like, yeah, we need to make sure like you get to talk about this and then talk about how it plays in scale with the Armada Megatron that's coming with it and just like, you know, so.
00:55:49
Speaker
It's, uh, it's a lot of fun to use them where we can. Very, very cool. Well, with that, that takes us out of our Q and a section B Mac. We did it. You survived a fan Q and a, I did it. Um, and then, uh, before we let you go though, we do have a final question that we ask all of our guests, uh, Dave, would you like to fulfill your role as this podcasts, James Lipton and ask our final question. Why? Yes, I would.
00:56:18
Speaker
BMac, the final question that we ask all of our guests, what is your favorite and or strangest piece in your collection? It can be one of each, or it can be both. Interesting. That's a good question. Probably my funniest, I don't know if it's strangest, but funniest is I have a Conan the Barbarian toy from the old cartoon.
00:56:43
Speaker
that was like this battle axe chopping motion Conan toy that has a string and you pull in his back. The battle axe is long gone and being a guy and being stupid, you can turn his hand in a very inappropriate way now and pull the string and make him do funny things. That toy is always a talking piece when people see it. My brother-in-law happened to be over and was helping out. He's in my basement.
00:57:09
Speaker
he saw the thing and he just picks it up and pulls the string and he's just like oh oh okay what's going on and my wife just like i'm sorry my husband's you know ridiculous and this is his toy and this is what happened so um i don't know it's strangest but again funniest or unique just old toy to have um yeah i don't know if anything like super unique per se i'm trying to think there's so much stuff now that i just like
00:57:34
Speaker
Well, I mean, you dropped a couple of gems in the beginning. Those prototype things are awesome. Someday I plan to get them all out and display them in my office. You know, maybe until we have another kid and then I have to pack up and get out of my office and go sit in some corner of the house. But yeah, I don't know. That one's my fun, interesting, good talking piece that people don't expect to happen.
00:58:02
Speaker
In terms of those old Joes, probably just getting to test the X-19 jet before it ever came out, that was just really cool. You're just like, this giant jet. We lived in the glory age of toys and playsets and stuff.
00:58:18
Speaker
That one's probably fun. I know people really, it's like a grail for some people that they missed along the way. So I really like having that. I have an old Batman, the animated series, Batmobile still from the original run of that show. That's a lot of fun. I really enjoy that. It has the like the hubcaps pull out so they can like grind on the other vehicles. That's a good fun one to have in the old collection too. And then I have a lot of the old toy biz, Marvel stuff. Professor X, the Wolverine with the claws, you push the button, they spring load, pop out some cable.
00:58:49
Speaker
gambit with his bad PVC coat that just looked awful, but you're like, I have a gambit figure. I don't care how bad this looks. So, um, yeah.
00:58:57
Speaker
A lot of fun old stuff. The plastic decisions of the early 90s. Yeah. But the artwork on the cards was on point, right? Yeah. The X-Men trading cards, I know Ryan's a huge fan of that, but being able to have Jim Lee art on a trading card just doesn't seem like it's something that you should have been able to ever buy because he's such an amazing and wonderful artist.
00:59:20
Speaker
actually found out that he did two covers for the Transformer Marvel books throughout the time when he was at Marvel. So that was interesting to read. I'm like, that means we should get Jim Lee to do something with us somewhere along the way for the 40th anniversary. Like let's get Jim on something. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So is Jim in budget? Yeah. Well, Jim, didn't he just get promoted to like, yeah, he's like, he's like head in charge. Yeah. Yeah. They gave him the big promotion. Um, a big one.
00:59:50
Speaker
Well, BMac, thank you so much for taking the time to be on the show. This was awesome. Before we say good evening, remind our listeners, where can they find you on Instagram?
Social Media and Transformers Updates
01:00:04
Speaker
Where can they find out the latest about Transformers? Drop all the ads and the mentions and everything. Where can they find all the good stuff?
01:00:14
Speaker
At Transformers, our official handle on Instagram, that's where all you'll see the pre-order posts go up, anything about the movie that we're resharing with Paramount. You'll find it there. At Hasbro Pulse, also another good one to follow as we work hand in hand with Pulse, they're kind of like the marketing extension of Hasbro and action brands in general. You can find me on Instagram at bmacatron84, because sadly bmacatron is taken.
01:00:40
Speaker
Um, so, you know, I throw that 84 and there's a year I was born year. The brand started. So it works. Um, as we alluded to, you can find Mark at Mark Clonus. Um, and then I'm always going to butcher Evans, um, username. It's, it's his name backwards. So it's like Evans. So it's nave.
01:00:59
Speaker
It's like Nave Skorb. Skorb because his last name is Brooks. So like his name just backwards is his username. Um, and then Sam is at King Samlock. So, um, who crushes all the rest of us and how he does his Instagram posts. And you're just like, Oh, it's so beautiful and perfect. And he goes into key shot and he just makes these perfect 360 turns and CAD half videos. And you're like, uh-huh. I'm like, here's the graphic from Hasbro pulse that says I'm going to do a fan stream next week. Like,
01:01:25
Speaker
I have the least creative because I can only talk about things after they're public. The other guys actually get to do some behind-the-scenes stuff. Yeah, that's where you can find us. If you want to follow Lenny, atweatherdominator is his GI Joe handle because clearly the weather dominating machine was an awesome part of a real American hero. I like that he started to commit
01:01:49
Speaker
to his Instagram account being like in the voice of Cobra Commander and has just turned back into just being Lenny. Perfect. All right. Well, BMac, thank you. We'll make sure we'll put all those links, uh, you know, in the, in the show notes that way people can go and click and follow and, and leave the comments for all of the, uh, the, the, you know, headmasters and all of the, the random bots that they want. Um, and they can, they can pepper you with those requests.
01:02:19
Speaker
I expect my inbox to blow up of like, why haven't you made this character since 1988 wave to it hit shells on March and I want a new one. I'm ready for it. Send it. Send it full send. Uh, yeah. So, uh, Dave, why don't, uh, why don't you send us home? Go see rise of the beasts on June 9th and check out all the new toys till all are one.
01:02:45
Speaker
Thank you, dear listener, for hanging out with us today. Subscribe, rate, and review us wherever you listen, and then tell your friends to do it. Thanks also to Joe Azari, the golden voice behind our intro. Our music is Game Boy Horror by the Zombie Dandies. Find more about them both on our show notes.
01:03:01
Speaker
Follow us on social media at AIC underscore podcast on Instagram and Twitter. Stop by and say hi. Show us your toy hauls and share your toy stories. Maybe we'll talk about it in a future episode.
01:03:25
Speaker
This has been a non-productive media presentation. Executive producer Frank Kablaui. This program and many others like it on the non-productive network is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial No Derivatives license. Please share it, but ask before trying to change it or sell it. For more information, visit non-productive.com.