Asmus Toys : Frodo Baggins and Samwise Gamgee

[Wor-Gar]

Are the old Frodos around still for a decent price? I thought most had risen to $160 and climbing?

For that price I'd just as soon paint it myself.

 

[Entropy]

I got one of the last the dealer had, $135 shipped, sold out now I’m afraid. Not ideal but if I’m going to duplicate a figure might as well be Frodo.

 

[Wor-Gar]

I'm so sorry I spent $113 for this new slim Frodo. Had I known, I would have bough the old Frodo long ago off ebay.

I guess that's why Asmus never mentioned the changes on their new batch of Frodos. No one would have bought them from Asmus.

 

[Wor-Gar]

After their initial response, I actually asked Asmus if I could just purchase the Slim v1 sculpt with the extra paint app. I figured I may as well give that a try rather than trying to soure it online. This was their response:

"We made the changes because we thought that would make the headsculpt better not because we were trying to cut costs or did not care about our long term customers. We are sorry to hear it's received so badly... we will take this to improve our future services and production. And all the old ones are sold out so we can't offer those even if we want to."

If they truly made the change with the thinking that it was a better choice, I'm really surprised they didnt announce it on their Facebook page, or in here. They have done a great job in bringing collectors along for the journey with Gimli with lots of behind-the-scenes pics and details. That's what makes me think if this change to the Frodo sculpt was truly intentional in them thinking it was an improvement, they would've posted about it on Facebook and here. But I guess it is what it is now, with not much that can be done.

Asmus should have at least admitted their bad decision by allowing returns at their cost -- since the product IS NOT AS ADVERTISED.

 

[Entropy]

Yeah, it’s a drag. I remember when Frodo suddenly disappeared from the Asmus site only to come back a day or so later. That must have been when v1 supplies had been exhausted, sold off to customers and retailers.

 

[CanadianBrandon]

Bull crap that they thought it was an improvement. That make no sense. How is giving him the wrong colour eyes an improvement in any way shape or form? I don’t believe that for a second. At least admit your mistake. This is not the head sculpt I paid for and from their response it sounds like I won’t ever get what I paid for.

 

[Wor-Gar]

It's clearly not for "improvement". It was a business decision.

I don't think anyone complained about the old Frodo look. No reason to change it -- except if they had to change factories OR if they wanted to cut costs a bit (no face paint, less paint on hair, cheaper eyes).

I've been a big supporter of Asmus for many years as most of you know and as anyone from Asmus reading this knows. But I do feel cheated here, with no option other than spending half Frodo's price to ship him back to Asmus at my cost for a refund. I don't think that is an acceptable response for something that was switched mid-production.

I will not be preordering anything from them in the future. If it turns out good, I will buy it thru a retailer.

 

[Entropy]

I can’t imagine they saw the results of the v1 slim head paint and said “this needs to be changed”, so it seems more like a factory goof up than a conscious choice and if it was an error you can’t admit to an error without inviting return and replacement requests for the admitted mistake. That would be too costly so better to stick with the “deliberate improvement” story and move on to the next project, which is disappointing for us the customers but understandable. Shame it happened to the main character of the franchise though.

 

[CanadianBrandon]

It's clearly not for "improvement". It was a business decision.

I don't think anyone complained about the old Frodo look. No reason to change it -- except if they had to change factories OR if they wanted to cut costs a bit (no face paint, less paint on hair, cheaper eyes).

I've been a big supporter of Asmus for many years as most of you know and as anyone from Asmus reading this knows. But I do feel cheated here, with no option other than spending half Frodo's price to ship him back to Asmus at my cost for a refund. I don't think that is an acceptable response for something that was switched mid-production.

I will not be preordering anything from them in the future. If it turns out good, I will buy it thru a retailer.

Yep I am the same.

 

[Rdeezy]

If anyone isn't happy with their slim Fodo PM me as I'm looking to purchase one of the full boxed slim figure sets.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk

 

[Asmus]

Ok,

I am very sorry that people didn't like what we did, but please let me explain...

1. Skin Tone: The original Frodo was too dark. Elijah Wood was very very pale in the Rings, so we changed the skin color to our Dante color. There are 7 steps solely on the skin tones, no short cut, all the applications are there.

We want Frodo to be very clean, very pretty. So at the sculpting stage, his facial texture was originally made very shallow to begin with, all the paint applications were made very subtle, because we want to keep him as pale as possible. Therefore eventhough the paint application is the same, but Frodo's skin texture is not as obvious as Dante.

 

[Wor-Gar]

So what happened with the eyes...? You couldn't have thought they were too blue.

 

[Asmus]

2. The Pupil :

The whole world knows Frodo has the pair of biggest and bluest eyes, and we tried that, and we didn't like it. We felt it was hollow, it was fake, and there was no depth on the figure in the hand.

We did many research, in research, we mean " What would the great Hot Toys do with blue eyes?"

We found it was a touch of green and darken the pupil. The green naturalize the blue, make the eyes look more real, they became not as shinny, and it also helps the eyes blend in the face instead of jumping out of it.

Please check out Thor, Dr. Strange or Luke Skywalker, they are all great examples.

I know this may take away the authenticity of the character, and we struggle to decide it too, but at the end of the day, we still want to make a good looking toy, instead of blinding going to look exactly like how it should be.

Once again, I apologize on behalf of the team, for anyone who go against it. It was never easy to make a tough choice, but next time we will be more careful on the timing when taking them

 

[Wor-Gar]

Really appreciate you coming here to explain the process and the mindset of Asmus. You didn't have to -- so the fact that you did means a lot. Personally I have had only good experiences with Asmus as you know. I've been a big supporter since the beginning. This is the first time I have felt let down. And it's not just the eyes, but also the hair is painted so thinly on mine that there are areas that are barely covered -- you can see the flesh-colored plastic.

I think my biggest problem was that I personally had no warning about the switch on paintwork. There were no new pictures or updated information regarding the new paint. So I ordered a Slim Frodo based on the original pictures I had seen... but the figure I received (and I believe I was the first) was the new updated head -- which was not what I was purchasing. I asked about an exchange for the old head but was told Asmus is only offering this new head; I was told I could return it if I was not satisfied but I would have to pay return shipping. And shipping back to you is not cheap.

I think if you change your paint scheme again on something, definitely show people what they are getting before you take and fulfill orders.

 

[Asmus]

Really appreciate you coming here to explain the process and the mindset of Asmus. You didn't have to -- so the fact that you did means a lot. Personally I have had only good experiences with Asmus as you know. I've been a big supporter since the beginning. This is the first time I have felt let down. And it's not just the eyes, but also the hair is painted so thinly on mine that there are areas that are barely covered -- you can see the flesh-colored plastic.

I think my biggest problem was that I personally had no warning about the switch on paintwork. There were no new pictures or updated information regarding the new paint. So I ordered a Slim Frodo based on the original pictures I had seen... but the figure I received (and I believe I was the first) was the new updated head -- which was not what I was purchasing. I asked about an exchange for the old head but was told Asmus is only offering this new head; I was told I could return it if I was not satisfied but I would have to pay return shipping. And shipping back to you is not cheap.

I think if you change your paint scheme again on something, definitely show people what they are getting before you take and fulfill orders.

You upset is totally understandable,
buyers pay for the returning shipping is the official way of online business today, it does protect the seller if I might say, but please understand the hastle if we don't do it.

However, may be if you can send just the head back, it would cut your shipping cost down to just 2~3 USD, and we exchange back to you with no charge (no returning shipping either)

 

[Wor-Gar]

However, may be if you can send just the head back, it would cut your shipping cost down to just 2~3 USD, and we exchange back to you with no charge (no returning shipping either)

That was the first thing I asked when I contacted Asmus... but was told there were none of the older heads anymore (the ones with the big blue eyes). So exchanging the head for the same does me no good, and a headless Frodo does me no good.

But I do of course understand about the shipping.

 

[Ringwinner]

Hello, all! I've been a lurker for a time, here, having received a murky-eyed Frodo shortly after Wor-Gar, before I knew there'd been a switch at all. Finally saying something as I feel I now have something to say.

instead of blinding going to look exactly like how it should be.

I understand very well you, and Asmus as a whole are simply trying to do your jobs. I am very grateful you've come forward to say something, and explain the reason for the change, but this bit of your explanation particularly, doesn't sit with me very well.
That seems contradictory: you don't want to go in, making it look exactly how it should be...? Shouldn't making it look like what it should be, be the goal? From the perspective of a manufacturer of high-quality figures, of course you want the figure itself to look good in-hand. But, your Frodo is advertised, verbatim on your site: "An authentic likeness of Frodo from the film."
As you said, Frodo has the biggest and bluest eyes of them all. Giving his figure murky eyes is not an authentic likeness. Again, I understand about your feelings as figure-makers, wanting the figure to stand well in its own right, but... You claim it's offering an authentic likeness, and it's not.
And saying that Frodo's eyes looked fake for how blue they were is a lot to digest, when Sam's eyes are still a very vibrant blue, and it's a general consensus that in the films, his eyes were somewhere in the hazel spectrum.
This isn't meant to single you [the person writing for Asmus] out in any way, I'm just centralizing a few things I feel strongly about: that from the get-go, not wanting to make something look as it should, seems a little backwards to me; and that making Frodo's eyes darker was one of the least-authentic choices that could be made on a figure of him.

I know I - an avid fan of The Lord of the Rings, and Frodo particularly - was very disappointed to find my Frodo's eyes were not accurate, when before, everyone else's Frodos had bright and beautiful eyes. I agree with Wor-Gar that moving forward, the next time a change like this is made, it needs to be properly announced, so people know clearly what they're buying. In fact, I think Frodo's page on your site still needs to be updated, so any future buyers will know they're getting one with darker eyes.
Otherwise, you're going to see more of the same disappointment already seen in this thread.

I don't agree with the decision to change Frodo's eyes mid-production, and not announce it anywhere, but what happened, happened, and I suppose there's not much to be done for it, now.

All the same, thank you for taking time to read everyone's opinions, and to give us answers to our questions that you weren't required to. It was really nice of you to give us an insight into your production process, and why you did what you did.

Edit: And as a final note, as I do think it’s a question that deserves an answer: if Frodo’s eyes were so blue, you felt they looked fake, why are Sam’s eyes still so bright? So bright and blue, they’re either almost, or exactly the same as Frodo’s eyes used to be. Why haven’t Sam’s changed?
If either of them needed their eye colors darkened, I would think Sam needed it more. Frodo’s eyes are supposed to stand out; they’re the most striking feature of his face.

 

[superdoug]

Ok,

I am very sorry that people didn't like what we did, but please let me explain...

1. Skin Tone: The original Frodo was too dark. Elijah Wood was very very pale in the Rings, so we changed the skin color to our Dante color. There are 7 steps solely on the skin tones, no short cut, all the applications are there.

We want Frodo to be very clean, very pretty. So at the sculpting stage, his facial texture was originally made very shallow to begin with, all the paint applications were made very subtle, because we want to keep him as pale as possible. Therefore eventhough the paint application is the same, but Frodo's skin texture is not as obvious as Dante.

I almost chimed in on this before since I have both the slim and the expansion. The skin tone of the expansion definitely was closer to Frodo’s look in the movie. I was not expecting it to be different than the slim until I held them side by side to compare the eyes and that’s when I noticed the skin tone difference. That was an upgrade from the slim but yeah those eyes. I thought the slim’s weren’t blue enough so you can guess what I thought about the expansion ones. I love that Asmus is constantly trying to improve and that they are communicating but it is frustrating when figures are being changed mid run. If the eyes had been great everyone that bought the slim would be complaining that it was not right for the expansion pack buyers to have better heads than theirs.

 

[Entropy]

I glad Asmus posted an explanation. Thanks for that. I also agree a notice of a change would have been nice but it’s done now and I’m looking forward to Gimli. Hopefully there won’t be any surprises and Gimli will come out looking as good as the prototype.

 

[Lee in MI]

Any side by side pics?

I’m going to have all my Hobbits repainted...sadly.

Thanks Asmus for engaging the fans. It’s understandable. Tough choices. In the end, you can’t satisfy us all.