Thanks for the support guys! Since San Diego came and went without any sort of announcement I felt like we should remind Sideshow again what we would like from the Premium Format line. I think the Production Design Team will get sick of my weekly e-mails, but I would rather take 10 minutes of my week to keep asking, I'd rather keep trying!
I sent this off to Sideshow a couple days ago.
"I'm very happy that the new LOTR maquette line is being received so well. I have ordered every piece offered for sale up to this point.
I'm also a great supporter of the flagship Premium Format line and am particularly interested in making sure that efforts are continuing to complete a full fellowship in that scale. With no new news regarding PF's coming from Comic Con I'm concerned that efforts to complete the remaining Fellowship members has been put on the back burner.
Since PF's tend to be released on a slow schedule and there are already plans for Saruman, Sauron and a Ringwraith on Steed, I'd like to see a turn away from the "Dark Side" and a greater push for Boromir, Gimli, Samwise, Merry and Pippin.
Thanks for listening."
Their customer rep (always VERY helpful) gave this reply.
"We are very excited about the newest additions to our Lord of the Rings product line and plan on continuing to expand this line for years to come. Often times, the schedules of release for certain products are determined by the licensors themselves. As such, we are working diligently to release a greater variety of characters but it is not always possible to do so per our licensing agreements."
It's good to hear that the maquette line is receiving serious attention and will continue "to expand this line for years to come".
I'm not sure what it says about PF releases, except perhaps that licensors may be more particular when it comes to larger scale figures and were perhaps not satisfied with any PF that was close enough to being finished for exhibit for them to appear at Comic Con. I'm
QUITE sure Sideshow would have liked nothing better than to show any new PF on the horizon at the biggest convention of the year if it had been at all possible. So, I'm sure we're all disappointed at the lack of news, but I don't think anything in the PF series is being slowed down by Sideshow itself.
It's already August and Spooktacular is only a couple of months away. Let's hope we get a little PF offering then. In the meantime I'll take anything they've got in the way of hints, rough sketches and upcoming highlights.