marklud
Main Eventer
Joined on: Jun 5, 2009 21:10:30 GMT -5
Posts: 1,739
|
Post by marklud on Nov 17, 2019 17:43:39 GMT -5
Like Jack said, this was a topic that's totally different than the single-property episodes they had done. If you're going to try to tell a comprehensive story about wrestling figures, you either cut some corners or need a multi-part documentary. Their audience is people who watched wrestling during the 80's and 90's and probably haven't given it a thought since - not those of us who spend our day bantering back and forth about figures. And for those people it was an entertaining watch that probably hit enough nostalgia pops to do its job. My only real critique is that they had a ton of footage from the OSTM guys, who have a pretty forgettable wrestling footprint. I'm assuming Mattel refused to participate, which fits with their Fort Knox marketing strategy. They ended up spending more time on the handful of years OSTM were making figures that could barely be found in stores than the 2 decades that Jakks held the license. Totally agree. I get that the OSFTM part was the "hook" -- the best part of the special was how the Galoob-OSFTM/Remco/LJN love triangle led to LJN getting the line and the first big wrestling line. That was AWESOME. But unfortunately they then kept spending too much time on that hook -- a lot of follow-up on the next Galoob/OSFTM figs, which are beloved but not anywhere as important as the entirety of Jakks and Mattel when we're talking about full wrestling figure history here. Those are more of a footnote (as much as I like them) compared to Jakks/Mattel. And then to give Jakks/Mattel just a few throwaway minutes was a mistake. I totally get that you can't squeeze the history of wrestling AND wrestling figures into a tight 45 minutes, and I get that they're aiming for a more general audience. But just a little bit less general history of wrestling and a little deeper dive into the figs (with more on Mattel/Jakks) and this could've been great. Instead I dug the first 15 minutes and felt the rest was kind "meh." Tried to appease too many parties with nowhere near enough time to do that.
|
|
Di-Di-Dis-Distribution Problem
Mid-Carder
Elite baby blue attire H or Bolt boots, or P & G or Roman God
Joined on: Mar 1, 2018 16:03:17 GMT -5
Posts: 476
|
Post by Di-Di-Dis-Distribution Problem on Nov 18, 2019 12:52:07 GMT -5
The complete omission of Popy is startling...
|
|
👑🇵🇭⭐️
Main Eventer
WF 10 Year Member
King Of The Ring 2007 - Team Undisputed
Joined on: Feb 4, 2013 13:46:47 GMT -5
Posts: 4,674
|
Post by 👑🇵🇭⭐️ on Nov 18, 2019 22:51:38 GMT -5
Saw it. Loved it. Want more. I'd like to see an episode just for Jakks, and an episode, or in this case, an ongoing series for Mattel on the WWE Network.
|
|
ellisd
Main Eventer
Joined on: May 26, 2009 0:30:49 GMT -5
Posts: 4,756
|
Post by ellisd on Nov 19, 2019 7:32:42 GMT -5
I enjoyed it. Being a wrestling figure fanatic, I wanted more, but I understand that it’s not geared to us but more to a general audience that can say “Hey I remember those!” I learned a few things. I didn’t know Remco was in talks with WWF first, or that Galoob almost ended up making WWF figures. I didn’t know that OSFTM was some of the guys that came from Galoob. I had heard about JAKKS being started by the guy from LJN, but had only heard about that in the past few years so I’m sure that was news to some watching it. The only problem I had with the episode is the ‘BCA figures were garbage’. I personally think that BCAs are better figures than LJNs, Hasbros, and TTL. Now I know that’s just my opinion, and there are a lot of people that love LJN and Hasbro, so it’s probably an unpopular opinion. Advances in facial sculpting/scanning and articulation have come a long way since the BCAs, but up till that point BCAs were the most articulated and playable wrestling figures we had gotten. LJNs had no articulation and the action features on Hasbros were fun but limited playability imo. I think what he should have said was “Before real scan, TTL figures were garbage”
|
|
maske2g
Main Eventer
Joined on: Jan 31, 2011 7:00:54 GMT -5
Posts: 2,972
|
Post by maske2g on Nov 19, 2019 10:04:03 GMT -5
The show in general has been a let down. Spend 30 minutes cramming in the origins, and 7 minutes glossing over the rest. Same format for all. However, I get that its supposed to be about the toys from 30+ years ago.
|
|
@Chair.Shot
Main Eventer
WF 10+ Year Member
Joined on: Jan 31, 2012 4:38:24 GMT -5
Posts: 3,853
|
Post by @Chair.Shot on Nov 19, 2019 13:27:56 GMT -5
I’m really not sure why so many people are negative about this episode. Was it perfect? No. There was plenty of room for improvement (most notably the amount of time spent on the actual toys)...but I think too many people here don’t understand how these things work, how hard it is to rewrite things based off of what was said in interviews, and also how hard it can be to get footage or pictures of the actual manufacturing process (especially from the 80s and 90s). So a full-on documentary would be difficult to make and it wouldn’t be to the enjoyment of the casual viewer. What this episode did, as mentioned, was tell the stories that had the most human interest and mass appeal.
Now what I would like to know is what story did they censor or skip over towards the end of the episode? Can someone fill me in on that?
As far as Matt Cardona’s involvement...maybe his sound bytes were trash. Maybe the video didn’t look good. Maybe nobody there actually liked him and they decided not to use him. Maybe, just maybe, his footage didn’t fit into the story they decided to tell. Whatever the case is, there is no good excuse for The Toys That Made Us to not respond to him publicly or privately.
|
|
RedDevil
Main Eventer
Joined on: Aug 8, 2017 18:43:00 GMT -5
Posts: 1,546
|
Post by RedDevil on Nov 19, 2019 15:18:36 GMT -5
I was always going to be disappointed due to my own unrealistic expectations of what I wanted the show to be, which I suspect was the case for most of us here. I enjoyed watching it the second time much more for basically that reason - it still could’ve been way better, and a lot of time could’ve been better spent, but there’s enough to enjoy once you know for definite what the show ISN’T going to be I think. We’re unlikely to ever get anything better on the subject unless WWE themselves decide to produce a 4-6 part series for the Network or something, which probably will never happen so this is better than nothing. The other three episodes were very good I thought, but then I only know about Turtles of them, and even that not in any real detail. Maybe if I knew about them as well as I know about wrestling then I’d have hated them instead
|
|
ozz
Main Eventer
Joined on: Aug 1, 2011 16:37:04 GMT -5
Posts: 1,394
|
Post by ozz on Nov 19, 2019 16:03:13 GMT -5
They had Ron Rudat from Hasbro on a prior season's GI Joe episode. I was hoping we'd get him in this wrestling figure one. Maybe he wasn't interested to do it again or maybe who-knows-what.
|
|
raylancrowder
Mid-Carder
Joined on: Sept 15, 2018 8:41:27 GMT -5
Posts: 120
|
Post by raylancrowder on Nov 20, 2019 9:54:45 GMT -5
Man, that Jewish Lightning stuff got old really fast.
|
|
britishbrickfan
Superstar
Joined on: Aug 19, 2019 7:02:28 GMT -5
Posts: 765
|
Post by britishbrickfan on Nov 20, 2019 10:25:21 GMT -5
They had Ron Rudat from Hasbro on a prior season's GI Joe episode. I was hoping we'd get him in this wrestling figure one. Maybe he wasn't interested to do it again or maybe who-knows-what. I don't understand why anyone believes Ron Rudat still cares about the Hasbro line? to him, it was just another job. That was evident from the YouTube interview he did on the topic.
GI Joe was his own creation, but the Hasbro line, he was merely working on that for the duration, but it wasn't "his" idea or his own creation, he just worked on it.
That's the grim reality - fans seem to believe the staff working on making these figures have some special place in their heart for them all - most of the times (and I speak from experience in my own line of work here) staff doing the job just remember "Yeah, I worked on that.... it was fun at the time!" and that's all it is to them, their job.
It's the same reason why loads of figure moulds and rejected pieces end up in the bin, the staff just think "I'm done with that, so it's trash!" whereas years later, collectors seem to ask "HOW COULD YOU BIN THE PROTOTYPE HEAD OF _______!!!!" and they just don't seem to get it, the staff at toy companies view these pieces as irrelevant once their purpose has been completed.
|
|
omegaman88
Superstar
Joined on: Nov 11, 2019 17:04:10 GMT -5
Posts: 536
|
Post by omegaman88 on Nov 20, 2019 16:18:49 GMT -5
The Wrestling episode was fine, but it needed Ryder.
The TMNT episode was superior imo.
|
|
|
Post by Darkhawk on Nov 20, 2019 20:24:29 GMT -5
The episode was a letdown for me, it was very boring compared to TMNT and Power Rangers.
|
|
ozz
Main Eventer
Joined on: Aug 1, 2011 16:37:04 GMT -5
Posts: 1,394
|
Post by ozz on Nov 20, 2019 21:41:44 GMT -5
They had Ron Rudat from Hasbro on a prior season's GI Joe episode. I was hoping we'd get him in this wrestling figure one. Maybe he wasn't interested to do it again or maybe who-knows-what. I don't understand why anyone believes Ron Rudat still cares about the Hasbro line? to him, it was just another job. That was evident from the YouTube interview he did on the topic.
GI Joe was his own creation, but the Hasbro line, he was merely working on that for the duration, but it wasn't "his" idea or his own creation, he just worked on it. That's the grim reality - fans seem to believe the staff working on making these figures have some special place in their heart for them all - most of the times (and I speak from experience in my own line of work here) staff doing the job just remember "Yeah, I worked on that.... it was fun at the time!" and that's all it is to them, their job. It's the same reason why loads of figure moulds and rejected pieces end up in the bin, the staff just think "I'm done with that, so it's trash!" whereas years later, collectors seem to ask "HOW COULD YOU BIN THE PROTOTYPE HEAD OF _______!!!!" and they just don't seem to get it, the staff at toy companies view these pieces as irrelevant once their purpose has been completed.
Maybe because they'd likely have paid him? I didn't say anything about him clamoring over it; don't assume I have the same fantasy as other people because you see it all over the place.
|
|
|
Post by 6 seasons and a movie on Nov 20, 2019 22:04:11 GMT -5
I liked it but wish they would have covered jakks and Mattel more.
When Ryder was first talking about being cut out I thought he was just being a bit of a baby about being left out. But after thinking about it, the show is called "the toys that made us" and in the intro it has kids grow up and be like the toys they played with so having Ryder and even Hawkins in would have made it for the show title more.
|
|
|
Post by k5 on Nov 21, 2019 0:12:46 GMT -5
halfway through it and it’s been fun so far.
|
|
bigwrecked1
Jobber
Joined on: Nov 20, 2019 23:32:58 GMT -5
Posts: 1
|
Post by bigwrecked1 on Nov 21, 2019 12:00:15 GMT -5
The episode was entertaining but lacking. It seemed more into the business side of things vs. the figures themselves. Some people have said that the episode was not meant for collectors. I couldn’t imagine a casual is enthralled by the way licenses of defunct promotions passed between the companies.
I wish they weaved some legendary figures and their stories. For example, the Hasbro holy grails which popped up in recent years.
|
|
Medieval
Main Eventer
@mattelwwe_medieval
Joined on: Jan 22, 2015 12:46:43 GMT -5
Posts: 4,638
|
Post by Medieval on Nov 21, 2019 14:51:43 GMT -5
I finally watched it. I have no complaints I enjoyed it.
|
|
crush
Main Eventer
WF 10+ Year Member
Yes, i know it's weird...
Joined on: Mar 8, 2012 16:07:14 GMT -5
Posts: 4,600
|
Post by crush on Nov 22, 2019 15:11:46 GMT -5
Just caught this today and I thought it was really good. Not quite sure what people were expecting (and TBH it seems like a lot of the comments here wanted this episode to be be something Toys That Made Us isn’t) but I though they did a respectable job getting the history of American wrestling figures into a 45 minute television episode. And FWIW, being someone involved in some level of collecting all there, the TMNT and MMPR episodes had just as much “missing” as the wrestling figure episode. That’s just the format of the series.
|
|
|
Post by TheChamp420 on Nov 22, 2019 21:26:27 GMT -5
These should be like 2 hours not 45 mins lol
|
|
Deleted
Joined on: Apr 24, 2024 22:55:53 GMT -5
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Nov 23, 2019 15:12:31 GMT -5
One thing that I did enjoy that I don’t believe I knew previously was that the LJNs were supposed to be bendies but the retailers loved the 2 ups so they were forced to go with em. Yeah, never knew that. Pretty cool bit of trivia. The school yard rumor back when the first wave came out was that they had springs in their legs lol. Which I guess came from the Big John Studd figure doing a somersault flip in the first commercial.
|
|