Gentle Giant's Vintage 12" Star Wars Figures
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icruise
Super Freak
What would the purpose of making exact replicas be? It's not like the real thing is that hard to come by and it would piss off vintage collectors to have a bunch of copies floating around..
Prime Clone
Super Freak
Actually they'd be 18".
It'd be nice to have MIB replicas of the vintage line at an affordable price. The originals would hold their value, simply because they're originals.
icruise
Super Freak
I dunno. There are lots of threads about this kind of thing in the vintage forums at Rebelscum. A lot of people are very against any kind of replicas being made, for a variety of reasons. I think some of it is simply because they've invested so much time and money in collecting the originals, and want to keep it exclusive. But it's also true that releasing exact duplicates of something has a tendency to devalue the originals, at least to some degree. Many people who might have started collecting the vintage figures will end up just being satisfied with the replicas. And there are also some legitimate concerns about a sudden influx of figures and accessories making it difficult for people to tell what is real and what isn't. One solution might be to only make 12" figures of characters that were never originally made (which would potentially attract even vintage collectors). But of course they would end up being fairly similar to these jumbo figures -- just with cloth outfits.
I'm also doubtful that there's a big demand for replicas of the 12" figures, since they've never been that popular to begin with, compared to the smaller figures.
I'm also doubtful that there's a big demand for replicas of the 12" figures, since they've never been that popular to begin with, compared to the smaller figures.
Prime Clone
Super Freak
Actually that was part of my suggestion, to do the ones that reached the prototype stage but never made it into production. These have been well documented in photos (Bespin Luke & Leia, X-wing & Ceremonial Luke, Lando etc).
Diamond has done something similar with its Mego-style Star Trek figures. It started with the core TOS crew that had already been done, then moved into other aliens, TNG etc.
The interesting thing about the DST Trek figures is I don't think they devalued the market much. I don't think they did this intentionally, but you can pretty much tell just by looking at them what's a repro and what isn't. It's very obvious for the most part. The Klingon may be the only one that would need a second glance to be sure. If you go by that market, I think you would get a pretty good idea.
I would love to see reproductions of the vintage 12" figures!
I have three of the vintage ones from my childhood. Whenever I think about getting one or two more
I look at those e-bay prices and decide that I don't want to spend hundreds of dollars for them.
I don't think that repro figures hurt the prices of the vintage toys.
There already have been several repro lines, e.g.
Commemorative Masters of the Universe,
20th anniversary Tron,
40th anniversary GI Joe and Action Man,
DST Star Trek "Mego" figures
As far as I know these figures are all made from new molds and there a small differences
in comparison to the original figures and of course different copyright markings
so that you can tell which figure is original and which is not.
I haven't heard that prices have gone down on the original figures from those lines.
I have three of the vintage ones from my childhood. Whenever I think about getting one or two more
I look at those e-bay prices and decide that I don't want to spend hundreds of dollars for them.
I don't think that repro figures hurt the prices of the vintage toys.
There already have been several repro lines, e.g.
Commemorative Masters of the Universe,
20th anniversary Tron,
40th anniversary GI Joe and Action Man,
DST Star Trek "Mego" figures
As far as I know these figures are all made from new molds and there a small differences
in comparison to the original figures and of course different copyright markings
so that you can tell which figure is original and which is not.
I haven't heard that prices have gone down on the original figures from those lines.
Prime Clone
Super Freak
Another example of the repros "branching out" are the recent repros of the old 12" Mego KISS figures. The Figures Toy Company did those, and have since brought out more with different costumes from other albums.
kirklondon
Freaked Out
You can easily get most loose for what GG charges for their 12". Why do you need repros?
Invictus Sol
No Life in the Void
Even as a kid I wanted more detail and not less (remember being disappointed with 12" Luke Skywalker for that reason), so wanting to spend limited collecting dollars on poorly articulated, '70s style sculpts is difficult for me to comprehend.
steveo
Super Freak
I, too, wanted more articulation back in the day, but I was just happy to have anything Star Wars! The figures were AND still are cool, so I'm enjoying them immensely. The only one so far I won't be getting is Lando. Why it is not accurate to the original I'll never know. I hope they don't do that with any of the other figures, cause honestly, what's the point? It's not what we grew up and that's what they're trying to cash in on.
Invictus Sol
No Life in the Void
Sorry, steveo, should've been clearer. I was referring to the idea of 12" Hasbro 1:1 replicas of either the released line or stuff that only made it to prototype.
Totally agree with your point about the GG Lando release. I found that odd, too (and they did the same thing with one of the droids, too, in replacing the reflective mylar sticker with a flat grey one, I believe), since as you say there's no point if the reproduction isn't pretty much exact.
Totally agree with your point about the GG Lando release. I found that odd, too (and they did the same thing with one of the droids, too, in replacing the reflective mylar sticker with a flat grey one, I believe), since as you say there's no point if the reproduction isn't pretty much exact.
steveo
Super Freak
ah, ok. that does make a difference. I didn't know about the droid. I'll have to look into that. Was it R5 or the power droid?
Invictus Sol
No Life in the Void
You know, I thought it was R5, but just googled some images and GG's seems to match-up pretty nicely with the vintage. I remember a few people mentioning the inaccuracy on a certain droid, though... I'll take a quick look and see if I can track it down or if I've misremembered it.
Edit: OK, found the post I was thinking of but can't find a comparitive pic. Has to do with the Lando thing, too, so I'll re-post most of it.
Edit: OK, found the post I was thinking of but can't find a comparitive pic. Has to do with the Lando thing, too, so I'll re-post most of it.
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Shropt
Super Freak
R5-D4 is also missing the vac-metalized details. That change killed the line for me. 
I'm stopping with the original 21, so I'm good. Getting pretty close, too. 
I only wanted to get one as a special piece...IG-88...now I just have to wait until Nov...grrrrrr....I wonder which of the 3 versions of the figure they will produce?
steveo
Super Freak
R5-D4 is also missing the vac-metalized details. That change killed the line for me.
I also looked at the GG photos with the small figure in the shot and I can't see a difference. Did they change the actual production piece from the proto? Are there any photos showing this? I hope this isn't the case, cause what's the point of going for nostalgia, but making it different? Anyway, I hope they make all the original figures up through Jedi. I really want the Biker Scout and obviously Boushh. Looking forward to 2-1B as well. He was my favorite ESB figure.
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