The Bridge Direct's The Hobbit Line

[The Josh]

It sparks it for sure. I may have to call on someone f they find Legolas and tauriel to grab me one before they vanish.

 

[Red Metal]

Hey Red Metal, keep those elves in a safe place! According to herr-der-ringe.de, Warner Bros requested their licensees to retract all merchandise involving characters from the now second film like Beorn and the Mirkwood elves. These will only come out next year and the packages with the AUJ title could become quite rare!

I did not know that - thanks for the tip. I still have the ones I bought sealed, except for 4-inch Bilbo (whose quite common, since I have him in the two-pack and five-pack) and the 6-inch Tauriel (had to open the hot Elven chick, plus the blister was dinged).

As I mentioned before, there's also some kind of packaging variant with the Adventure pack Gandalf/Bolg. On the front of the package, you can see a red piece of tape blocking out the section above Gandalf's name. On the back of the package on the cardboard, there's a similiar piece of tape that matches the packaging. I gently removed part of the tape on the back to reveal that the Gandalf/Bolg pack was actually supposed to be read "Battle Damaged" Gandalf. They blocked out the battle damaged part. I get the impression that on later versions, they will not use tape and simply block out that part with the normal blister/cardback layout, so this first run version could be rare.

 

[The Josh]

That would be odd of they blocked out battle damaged. Probably just a typo on the box then.

 

[Red Metal]

That would be odd of they blocked out battle damaged. Probably just a typo on the box then.

Well, the figure itself also has some battle damage - the Gandalf has two red bruises on his face and some extra highlights on his scarf. The scarf I could attribute to paint fluxuations, but the bruises are obvious. I suspect somewhere along the line, someone didn't like the phrase "battle damaged" and it's just blocked out on this initial release - future releases will not have it on the card at all.

I might try to get some pics of it up this weekend.

 

[The Josh]

Interesting. I hope I can find some this weekend. these figures look and sound great.

 

[Red Metal]

Same TRU put out more product today - two-packs and single 4-inch figures. I was able to get my two-pack sealed set completed. Funny thing is just on the top of the shelving they had two sealed cases (one Beast and one Battle Pack) that even should the street date as Oct 1st, but apparently TRU doesn't care.

 

[The Josh]

Yeah, not sure they do an at this point it's almost October 1st.

 

[Red Metal]

With the cat out of the bag and pics available on Ebay and elsewhere, I thought I'd thow some of mine up again. Here's some of the ones you've seen before.

 

[Red Metal]

Round 2...

 

[Red Metal]

New Pics.

This series shows the current Gandalf/Bolg Adventure Pack with the "Battle-Damaged" packaging variant.

First pic: Gandalf with facial bruising. Looks like Bolg roughs him up a bit.

Second pic: Packaging front with the red sticker covering (what I assume) the "battle-damaged" portion of the name.

Third pic: Back of packaging with similiar sticker covering

Fourth pic: Back of packaing with the sticker peeled back slightly to reveal the "battle-Damaged" title.

Fifth pic: Comparison between the single card Gandalf and Gandalf/Bolg pack. Shows the bruising and highlights on Gandalf's robes.

 

[Red Metal]

First pic: 4-inch Tauriel from the Legolas/Tauriel two-pack. Skin toned plastic, crisp details, solid figure.

Second pic: Close-up of the 6-inch Bilbo. Crisp detail, no paint bleed or mess, seperately sculpted hair, and great facial expression. We're not talking Has-blow crap here!

Third pic: Close-up of 4-inch Balin from the Balin/Dwalin two-pack

Fourth pic: Close-up of Dwalin from the Balin/Dwalin two-pack.

Fifth pic: Loose shot of the 6-inch Tauriel. Note the detailed paint job and the arrows - each arrow is a seperate piece. Note that they can't be removed, but it still makes them look more real, as opposed to just a random bundle with some painted fletching.

These are the new hotness. Oct 1st, be there.

 

[Red Metal]

Quick hunt indicated that Target, Walmart, and Freddies were not yet loading in The Hobbit figures. One Freddies did look like they might be moving stuff around, so I might check there tomorrow.

I was hoping for another early score...

 

[ichabod]

Got my Legolas fix at the TRU in Times Square last Monday (as well as a 4" Bilbo and Gandalf for old time’s sake). Nice looking figures, but that’s it for me on this line.

Happy hunting, guys!

 

[cstojano]

I have to say (again) that this Goblin King is really strange and I can't imagine buying a 1"6 scale Weta statue of this guy. That's like 18 inches of pure fleshy flab.

 

[Red Metal]

I have to say (again) that this Goblin King is really strange and I can't imagine buying a 1"6 scale Weta statue of this guy. That's like 18 inches of pure fleshy flab.

I keep watching the second trailer and I think that BD really missed the mark with the Goblin King. In the trailer his skin tone is darker and he's more dirty, the BD version looks like he just got hosed down (or took a bath) and is more clean and bright.

I have hopes that PJ knows what he's doing with this Goblin King. Personally, aside from the 70s cartoon, I always thought the Goblin King should just be a bigger more intimidating Orc/Goblin. But I also can't help but think this design might also have been heavily influenced by Guillermo del Toro, since it looks like something from a lighter version of Pan's Labyrinth.

 

[TURINS~BANE]

I'm getting one.

 

[FrodoEyes]

The Goblin King is very close, if not spot on, to how he's described in the book. I thought these goblins might look like the Moria orcs, but i guess having a new breed of goblins makes sense.

I'm also unsure about a large statue of him.... but the detailing in the skin will be pretty impressive, and if he has his crown and is maybe sitting on a throne, i could be persuaded..... we'll see.

I would like a stone giant statue hurling a boulder though

 

[Glennfett]

awesome pics red.i have no idea when these hit aussie shores.i can only hope it is soon.i want a 6inch tauriel..

 

[Red Metal]

awesome pics red.i have no idea when these hit aussie shores.i can only hope it is soon.i want a 6inch tauriel..

No problem. I still need to get a set of the 6-inch figures to keep sealed.

 

[The Josh]

Went ahead and grabbed some from tru online store and my amazon ordered was delayed for some reason. Only one I couldn't find anyplace was Grinnah.