Still hope for FILMation characters?

[eurorko]

Mattel would gain more than they think if they purchased the rights. They can afford it, they are just afraid to take the risk. If they have the entire Filmation library they have limitless opportunities to cash in on many franchises. Just think how much they could expand Matty. They could start collectors lines/merchandise on many properties.

This purchase would not be just for He-man/She-ra characters and that's a good thing. I think they are only focusing on that and if you just focus on that aspect then it is never going to happen. I still have hope that someday we will see a Shadow Weaver figure. There has to be a way.

[Penny Dreadful]

Mattel would gain more than they think if they purchased the rights. They can afford it, they are just afraid to take the risk. If they have the entire Filmation library they have limitless opportunities to cash in on many franchises. Just think how much they could expand Matty. They could start collectors lines/merchandise on many properties.

Totally. In addition to Fat Albert, they could do The Archies, Ghost Busters, Sabrina, the awesome Groovie Goolies, animated-style Gilligan's Island, Star Trek, and like a zillion other cartoon properties. Collectors would go bonkers for that stuff.

As for MOTU story content, they've been sneaking some Filmation-specific references in there (Zodac's bio is almost straight-up from Filmation, Buzz-Off and Mekaneck being pals, Saz being mentioned in Carnivus' ad, etc). Plus, there's inherently some crossover since Filmation (as well as MYP, etc) used Halperin's series bible as a basis and the bios are also using Halperin material. However, with Filmation rights, they could really expand the story by bringing in more specific information, artifacts, background material, and most importantly - all the cool original characters like Shadow Weaver, Icer, Stongarm, Scorpia, etc. I'd also dig Filmation-inspired designs of some MOTU characters they already have rights to, such as Clawful, Mer-Man and He-Man himself.

I doubt it'll happen anytime soon, but I'm hoping Mattel eventually comes to some agreement with ER or whomever owns the rights.

~Penny~

[Mr. Shokoti]

Totally. In addition to Fat Albert, they could do The Archies, Ghost Busters, Sabrina, the awesome Groovie Goolies, animated-style Gilligan's Island, Star Trek, and like a zillion other cartoon properties. Collectors would go bonkers for that stuff.

While the "Real Ghostbusters" toon was great & written for adults almost as much as kids at times, I LOVED "Filmation's Ghostbusters" as well. Sure, the cartoon may not, imo, hold up as well as some of the other Filmation toons(I like it but it seems written even more for kids than MOTU or POP were), but that franchise had so many great character designs. I got most of their toys off of Ebay a few years ago but there were still a lot of characters who didn't make the transition from toon to toy that I would love to see made.

[MegaGearMax]

Agreed. It's not like the bios aren't already full of spelling errors, poor grammar, contradictions(at least things that seem like contradictions), and retcons. How hard would it be to squeeze some Filmation characters into the canon that so far has mostly been derived from the mini-comics & MYP's toon? Sure, there may be MOTU fans that dislike Filmation, but, at least on this site, there are far more people who like it(if not love it) than don't. Why would Mattel want to forget about those people unless the rights issue is just too expensive or messy to deal with?

Since we're now seeing bio retcons, bringing in the Filmation characters should be easy.

[eurorko]

Updated Filmation Ghostbuster figures would be awesome. Bravestarr would be cool too (if they had the rights to all the characters). Wasn't Super Friends Filmation?

[Reboot]

Totally. In addition to Fat Albert, they could do The Archies, Ghost Busters, Sabrina, the awesome Groovie Goolies, animated-style Gilligan's Island, Star Trek, and like a zillion other cartoon properties. Collectors would go bonkers for that stuff.

CBS own Star Trek:TAS. I'm also not sure about the status of the Archie Comics cartoons or Gilligan's Island.

[Mr. Shokoti]

Updated Filmation Ghostbuster figures would be awesome. Bravestarr would be cool too (if they had the rights to all the characters). Wasn't Super Friends Filmation?

Filmation made cartoons for Superboy(that's where I first saw Krypto), Superman, Captain Marvel/Shazam, Aquaman, Batman & Robin, and the Teen Titans, but Super Friends was made by Hanna Barbera.

[Scorpia]

I'd love to see Matty make toy for those lines, particularly Filmation's Ghostbusters- I think they could become cult smashes!

[Emiliano]

CBS own Star Trek:TAS. I'm also not sure about the status of the Archie Comics cartoons or Gilligan's Island.

Yeo, Reboot is right Danielle:
Filmation library owned by Classic Media doesn't include Archie's, Star Trek, Gilligan's Island or any of the DC stuff.
All that stuff is owned by their own entities/licensors.

It doesn't even include Tarzan or Flash Gordon, don't be fooled by the BCI release: they licensed Flash Gordon from Hearst Entertainment if I'm not wrong.

Unfortunately, they only titles in the library with real value are He-Man and She-Ra.
Others that may have some limited brand recognition are Bravestarr, Blackstar or Ghostbusters, but none of them really shone in terms of DVD sales.

So, just looking at it from a business point of view, purchasing all the rights just to sell a few extra figures in MOTUC may not make a lot of sense.
IF MOTU was huge again, maybe with a movie or a new cartoon series (AKA: Mattel's making tons of money out of it again), then regaining control over all MOTU assets would be be a smart move, like Hasbro recently did with the TF cartoon.
Of course MOTU brand is nowhere TF brand is right now.

[Penny Dreadful]

CBS own Star Trek:TAS. I'm also not sure about the status of the Archie Comics cartoons or Gilligan's Island.

Yeo, Reboot is right Danielle:
Filmation library owned by Classic Media doesn't include Archie's, Star Trek, Gilligan's Island or any of the DC stuff.
All that stuff is owned by their own entities/licensors.

It doesn't even include Tarzan or Flash Gordon, don't be fooled by the BCI release: they licensed Flash Gordon from Hearst Entertainment if I'm not wrong.

Ah, I didn't realize that. I'd hoped all those other fun titles might sweeten the deal for Mattel. Ah well.

[Reboot]

Does kinda throw how stupid Mattel were into sharp relief when virtually ever other licensed cartoon made by Filmation is owned by the licensor rather than CM, doesn't it?

Even Hasbro - who only bought their 80s cartoons outright in the past few years, and cheaply because the "IP company" that owned the cartoons was in trouble (shades of ER!) - made sure they owned the DESIGNS from their cartoons, even if they didn't own the cartoon.

[Kevenn]

There's still room for Filmation characters to be written in. As we saw in the map of Etheria coming next year, Horror Hall and Scorpion Hill, bases of Shadow Weaver and Scorpia, are still shown on the map, like they were on the vintage map of Etheria that came with Crystal Castle back in the day.

[mykan]

You talk of one design & sculpt under one banner. Aren't the multiple heads breaking away from that? Sure, we're not getting 2002 heads anytime soon but we're still getting multiple heads. If Stinkor comes with 2 heads(ToyGuru has practically told us he is), unless one of them is just a smiling head, wouldn't that be 2 designs under one banner?

You also mention how the previous lines failed due to their attempting to break away from each other but, wouldn't leaving Filmation out be doing just that. Also, looking at Adora, Orko, Bow, and the Shadow Beast prove, to me at least, that Mattel would use Filmation designs or characters if they had the rights.

When I talked about design and sculpt, I was referring to the actual physical sculpts of the original figures - the MOTU sculpts and joints and overall size of the figures were totally different from NA; and the POP figures were even different from that - compare Teela's joints to She-Ra's. The package designs of ALL THREE lines show no relationship between any of them - denoting Mattel's attempt to make them independent of one another.

On the second inquiry, using or not using Filmation characters does not necessarily spell failure for the MOTU brand. Although I believe a lot of credit MUST be given to Filmation for putting MOTU on the map (I myself wouldn't be aware of He-Man without the show), the future of the brand cannot depend on a handful of characters that Mattel presently does not have access to. For many characters like Adora, Orko and the Shadow Beast, since they appeared with their designs in materials that Mattel has legal access to, this allows them to utilize those designs in the figures.

In my previous posting, I was simply commenting on Mattel's efforts to retrospectively correct their past mistakes by combining all of these awesome characters under one brand in one massive story - I think it's the best approach for the MOTU franchise.

[Lewd_Squirrel]

do you think tha when they get the rights to filmation, & then they start to do vehicles, we'll get the Collector?

[Morningstar]

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[Scorpia]

Great work, MorningStar! Can't wait to see the villains' side- will you link the images together when you've posted them all?

[Lewd_Squirrel]

I also wanna see Lizard Man 2, the red one, with glasses. & What about the Widgets? Otherwise, it's a great poster, so far.

[Morningstar]

Thank you very much. I will post the link of the full and HD mural image in the social group of FILMATION
Here comes the bad boys!

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[Reboot]

Great work, MorningStar! Can't wait to see the villains' side- will you link the images together when you've posted them all?

Until he does, here's a small joined version



[The posted images are all in slightly different scales, so you'd see the join - or, at least, a certain blurriness across the links - if you attempted a full-size joined image]

[MykEd]

http://www.he-man.org:81/forums/boar...ictureid=11608

Whoa, who is the guy at the far right with the boonie hat and goggles? Pretty slick looking dude. I'd love to see a figure of him!

[Scorpia]

The rest look awesome too!

Thanks for joining them together, Reboot.

http://www.he-man.org:81/forums/boar...ictureid=11608

Whoa, who is the guy at the far right with the boonie hat and goggles? Pretty slick looking dude. I'd love to see a figure of him!

That's the Slave Master from 'Orko's New Friend'. The episode isn't that great, but I agree the character has lots of potential and a great design. His backstory involves the cosmos outside of Eternia as well, making him all the more intriguing...

[Lewd_Squirrel]

The rest look awesome too!

Thanks for joining them together, Reboot.



That's the Slave Master from 'Orko's New Friend'. The episode isn't that great, but I agree the character has lots of potential and a great design. His backstory involves the cosmos outside of Eternia as well, making him all the more intriguing...

so, he's a space cowboy? kinda like Rio Blast?

[heavy-eternium]

sorry for my ignorance but mattel should buy all the rights, or they can buy only the rights of some characters if they want?

[bskcase]

I've already posted before about expenses and having tons of lawyers on both side try and handle not only copyright law and international copyright law along with trying to negoiate licenseing terms and agreements. I'm not going to go over that again, but how much do you think getting the Filmation rights would cost Mattel? Also, Mattel isn't going to eat the money it spends. They are going to pass it along to you guys.

Mattel has zero interest in paying licensing fees for second tier characters. And no matter what is said, they are second tier to almost fourth tier characters. You'll see a new cartoon and a new MOTU toyline before you see Filmation figures. The new cartoon would be way cheaper.

[Paul Justice]

With the economy the way it is, toy stores closing down, Target and Walmarts holding barely any DC figures, only WWE. I'm thinking they could just be barely staying afloat. With Barbie and WWE being its biggest sellers, and they may not be selling that well. Who knows. Buying the Filmation rights could hurt them. Which is why they are on such strict budgets with every line.

I would not be surprised if they were offered the rights to make filmation characters for the MOTUC line, but it was not worth the cost to buy them. Owning the rights would be much more beneficial because it would go beyond toys and can be used for the movies and future cartoons.

Mattel's only hope is that the toy lines continue to do well, while no one buys the Filmation DVDs or watches the cartoons on TV so the company may sell cheap to cut their losses.