UPDATED: G.I. Joe Retaliation release date pushed to 2013- How does this affect Hasbro?
Friday, May 25th, 2012 by Pixel Dan
UPDATE: Hasbro has finally made an official announcement concerning the status of the Retaliation toy line. TNI has the full press release.
“There is a limited amount of G.I. Joe Retaliation product at retail now, but in light of the movie moving out to March 29, 2013, the majority of the movie line will be made available early next year in time for the film’s release.”
Well, that’s pretty much exactly what I assumed would happen. You’ve got to think that this cannot be good for Hasbro. Retailers already seem to not like stocking G.I. Joe figures as it is. This can’t make G.I. joe look any better to those retailers who all assumed stocking this product would be ok since there is a movie to back it. And now, Hasbro has to wait almost a year without any new Joe product. Ouch.
If you are interested in any of the first wave stuff, I’d recommend grabbing it now if you see it. I have a feeling these will end up being the hard to find items come next year.
ORIGINAL POST: Out of nowhere, Paramount and Hasbro announced that they are pushing the release date of G.I. Joe Retaliation from June 2012 to March 2013 in order to convert the film to 3D. ToyNewsI.com has the full press release.
It’s crazy to think that after all of the promotion that has gone into this film Paramount thinks the best thing to do is push the release date almost 9 months just so the film can be in 3D. Is 3D really that important? Does it really affect sales? It seems to me that many people are over the 3D thing at this point. I’m sure most people would have been just fine with 2D.
But here’s my bigger question: How does this affect Hasbro and the release of the Retaliation toy line? These toys have already started hitting stores. They’re out there. Hasbro also put a lot of focus on this line of movie toys at New York Toy Fair in February.
Hasbro hasn’t made an official announcement about the toy line as of yet. I am very curious to see what kind of problems this may cause, if any. Will Hasbro pull the toys? Will they just not release any of the next waves until next year? Or will they just put it all out anyway even though the movie is now almost a year away?
It’ll be interesting to see what happens, that’s for sure.
