Has Star Wars collecting "jumped the shark"?

[metaphorge]

Star Wars collecting jumped the shark in 1999 with The Phantom Menace. I think now is the best possible time to be a Star Wars collector, and I'm buying more of Hasbro's basic figures than I have since the line began. Many of the figures (clone and stormtroopers) are now articulated enough that, if not definitive, the figures are close enough to definitive that I'll never need to replace them with "better" versions.

There's a simple solution to the "problem" of repacks and repaints: if you've already got it and don't want to buy it again, just don't buy it.

If anything, "collectibles" in general have jumped the shark. Not every vaguely science fiction or fantasy film needs a full range of multi-hundred dollar maquettes and statues to gather dust on retailers' shelves.

Also, a collection is "worth" how much enjoyment it brings you, not how much it can be sold for.

 

[OSCORP]

Decent post.

I just gotta say wait till the new shows hit,especially the live action show.(it's all gonna come back ten fold on us!)

Something tells me were all gonna enjoy collecting SW into the next decade.(i hope certain company's step up and deliver great product in the years to come)

 

[barryo]

i dont know if i would say "jumped the shark" because i really think this license will sell products for years to come. and sw items come & go and a few years ago everyone wanted a piece of it and slapped a label or sw picture on it and someone eventually bought it. but the oversaturation is not where it was and i think the the companies that have the license found the niche they fit into to make money. saying this i do know i have cut back on what i buy mainly because of repaints, repacks, and same figure different card. (yes i collect some hasbro too.........but only if it strikes me as really cool ..as in the McQ figs). brilliant move by hasbro standards. but i think change is good in any business when they start to flounder & let another company take a shot at a certain target market. i've always thought mcfarlane could do a bang up job with the sw license but seeing how ssc has the 12" & not likely hasbro is gonna give up the 3 3/4" any time soon i doubt that would ever take place. i would really love to see a company such as hottoys get a 1/6th specialty line for small vehicles such as a landspeeder, speederbike, etc.....a creature line: rancor, bantha (oh we need a tusken raider for that...ssc?). im sure there are many other big items that may sell to a certain market. if hot toys can pull off a power loader as well as they did i think they could make a landspeeder no prob.

 

[Mooncat]

I only started collecting 2 years ago and as I do with most things over did it

Im up to 70 1:6th figures now with more on order, in my collection

Hasbro
Medicom
Sideshow
and now ive started customs

I estimate Ive spent about £2500 on my collection so far

and atm Im not flushed with money

Ive also spent £450 on a custom display cabinet which doesnt have the capacity to house them all - only my SW collection which numbers half of the 70

Im at the stage now where I buy the lower end figures so that Ive got my basic kit to hopefully customise them up to a decent standard

Thats now what I need to get from collecting, I pose em , I occasionally spend a few minutes looking at them

The need to have for havings sake isnt burning anymore

Having said that I cant afford Medi Jango but he is still on order

but whatever I got from collecting when i first started has had to be replaced by something else the need to work on them and customise them or at least now it does

Ive only customised my sideshow stuff by inserting wires into robes for posing them - I intend to repaint them when I find the time

The hasbro stuff Ive really gotten stuck into afterall £10 - £20 and a mistake if it all goes wrong Id deal with

If I made a mistake with a Sideshow Id be pissed off or god forbid a medi and then you had better avoid me for a month

So I say keep the Hasblo's of the world they have there place well for me they do !

 

[Prime Clone]

It hasn't jumped the shark as much as Happy Days collecting!

 

[MaulFan]

Also, a collection is "worth" how much enjoyment it brings you, not how much it can be sold for.

Indeed. I was talking to some of my coworkers the other day because I have several of my pieces on my desk, and we were discussing in general how toys from our youth are worth lots today and I told them I buy the stuff I do because I enjoy it and appreciate it for what it is, which is also why I'm not an MIB collector, I take everything out so I can enjoy the work that went into, even down to a Hasbro 3 3/4" figure I can appreciate the work and critique the pros and cons and have fun with things. I've never collected with the intent of after market turn around, I've looked up values for curiousity, but I'll only ever sell my stuff if I need the cash desparately, otherwise it's with my til death do us part.

 

[NASEDO]

The quality is not even comparable now. Hasbro was meant for 2 year olds, Hasbro jumped the shark with all the garbage it puts out. Sideshow's PF line is untouchable. SW collectibles have gotten so much better it didn't jump the shark. The last movie is only a few years old, and now we got the TV series, the Clone wars cartoon coming, I wouldn't doubt more movies in the next decade or so. Its never going to end and it keeps getting better.

 

[KitFisto]

As long as there are still quality items to collect then I'd say no. I think it came close in 1999 as someone else mentioned. he TPM came out there were SW items of just about every kind in ever store and a lot of it was junk.

There is still stuff being released that's not for everyone, but I think Sideshow, Gentle Giant, Medicom and a few others ( Master Replicas did too ) still produce some very quality stuff worth collecting.

If it ever goes back to just Hasbro figures and Burger King happy meal toys then I'd say yes.

 

[lerath666]

You know, I would love to ask this question to Steven Sansweet....

 

[lerath666]

also, go watch these videos
https://starwars.com/video/view/000585.html

 

[Agent0028]

If I had all the money in the world I don't think I would want that much stuff. I feel like after I get too much stuff its too overwhelming to take in and instead of seeing how nice something is it looks like a bunch of crap. (Not saying that stuff is crap, but to those who don't appreciate the various items it probably looks like it) Like the things on the rack, you can only see the first item and it looks like it is so full it would be really hard to look at the other clothes behind it. Plus for me I don't see much point in having it if you can't see it (exception being when you rotate stuff. Which I may have to start doing...).

It's something I struggle with in my own collection. I love my Star Wars PF's, yet I also really liked it when I had just the one Luke PF and it really caught your eye. Oh the dilemmas of collecting.

 

[lerath666]

Scary thing is, Having all that stuff actualy got him a job at Lucasfilm. He's the guy responsable for varifiying all products match the source material. Now you all have someone new to hate

 

[The Josh]

He's a great guy. Gotten the chance to talk with him the last two SDCC and he's really cool.

 

[lerath666]

He is. I felt real bad when i met him at dragon con a few years back. I asked him a question, and I think it offended him. The lightsabers on the cover of his book have incorrect colors on the blades. Lukes is red, and vaders is blue. I asked him whay that was, and he got rather defensive about it. Never ment to make him mad. Appearently, it was a painting he really liked that was usualy shown in black and white. on the original, color painting, the colors were reversed.

 

[The Josh]

That's a rough first meeting I would say.

 

[JABBATHERIDGE]

I don't think Star Wars collecting will ever become a thing of the past, since this generations enthusiasts will raise the next generation to watch the movies and they'll then get to their mid twenties, get nostalgia for the films and start collecting themselves. I think there'll always be an audience for SW collectibles, so it will never really have to jump the shark because it's timeless.

I think it will just jump the shark for different people at different times, for me SW collecting has jumped the shark. There's very little merchandise from SW that I'm interested in picking up at the moment, the occasional Medicom fig and that's my lot. I was into GG but I've kinda gone off their stuff, same with SSC and never got into Master Replicas. The only Hasbro stuff I'm picking up at the moment are the McQuarrie Concept stuff, I'm more into DC comics and Doctor Who stuff at the moment.

 

[Captain Faramir]

By the way, what does "jump the shark" mean? I've never heard that expression, and while I can kind of guess from the context, could somebody definitively explain that to me? Thanks.

 

[JABBATHERIDGE]

By the way, what does "jump the shark" mean? I've never heard that expression, and while I can kind of guess from the context, could somebody definitively explain that to me? Thanks.

The first time I ever heard it was in reference to The X Files in the later seasons.

I think it means something that's about to come to an end but is hanging on by the skin of it's teeth.

 

[lerath666]

I think the term came out of the maing of the first jaws movie, but i'm not 100% sure.
NOw it just refers to when something has goon too far, and it's not realy holding togetther any more, and it's time to let die.

Example " In the televison series Lois and Clark, the new adventures of Superman, The show finialy Jumped the shark when the Couple got married. All the tension just left the show."

 

[Captain Faramir]

Ah ok thanks.

In that case, my answer is no.