Hmm. Where to start? Well, here's how I see things.

1- Young Justice. JLU was dropped in favor of Young Justice at Target. But from what I see in stores, Young Justice isn't selling all that well. Is it?

2- Green Lantern. The line has stalled completely. Clearances all around and nothing new planned or headed our way, save maybe some Big Lots action.

3- Batman. Any Batman(Brave and the Bold, Batman Classics, The Dark Knighttwo packs) All are just placeholders for the upcoming glut of The Dark Knight Rises product that probably will sit due to retailer overordering, just like every other movie based toyline. No, it will sit due to retailer overordering.

4- DCUC or whatever it's destined to be called. This is the closest to an all-encompassing DCU line that we have, since there is no longer an Infinite Heroes or Justice League Unlimited. Distribution in my area is an absolute joke with this line whether it's selling or not.

I find it telling that Hasbro can keep a successful 3 and 3/4 inch Marvel Universe line going, but Mattel cannot.

Mattel's DCU Toy Fair 2012 presentations had better be knock-it-out-of-the-park level awesomeness. Because I am not impressed with anything out there right now. Sure, the Four Horsemen's work kicks ***, but as a master license overall, Mattel isn't coming close to mining their DCU potential. Not even close.

Your thoughts?

I not real happy with Mattel at the moment. They have poor advertizing and then they like to dangle the carrot in front of your face when comes to getting some of these items. Its just poor customer service to me. JLU was one of the greatest collection of figures ever. Im not sure what happened to YJ or Green Lantern. I know you cant blame it all on Mattel when the Cartoon Channel can not keep the shows on the air to peak peoples interest. Im a fan of YJ but I have not seen an episode in my area since August. I mean come on. They have a second season to show so get it on already! Get the Green Lantern on already quit playing around. Get those characters out there. Quit playing around. I also blame mattel for some of the Characters they have presented us with also. For instance with JLU, Why in the world would you make a 4 pack of characters (second or third string at that) that had never been on the show and try to sell them like the Doom Patrol or the Gotham City Villians. I did get them but I mean there are still Characters that have been on the show numerous times and have never been made like Vandal Savage or Morgan La Fey, Toyman. I have been real disapointed at Mattel for not making them but come up with some of the most obscure characters to put in a 4 pack to sell. I love JLU and I have all the characters they ever made, Im a die hard fan but Mattel i think you could have done better and done JLU better. I am now off my soap box and return you to your local station!

When Mattel got the license I thought it would breathe new life into Batman figures, which were stagnating at the end with Hasbro. The first Batman Comic style figures in 2003 were awesome, even the Animated style Batman figures were good too. However, Mattel copied what Hasbro did and kept giving us Batman variants and the last three waves of Comic style figures were shipped and sold overseas.

Then along comes DC Super Heroes and Mattel botched that line too. It did allow them to re-release some of the Comic style figures that were shipped overseas but they had three consecutive Superman waves of figures at the same time as they had Superman Returns figures on the pegs and it killed off DCSH.

So they try again with DC Universe Classics and DCUC is amazing, but after the first few waves of figures it was all but impossible to find in stores. The quality control was lacking too so if you did happen to find a figure in the stores, it just might have some flaw on it like one hand bigger than the other or left and right limbs switched or poor paint.

When fans bitched online, Mattel blamed us, the very people that supported them as the reason that lines like JLU and DCUC were faltering. Not to mention the debacle that is MattyCollector and Digital River. Mattel has mismanaged every line of Batman / DC figures they ever did. So slowly, I became less and less enthusiastic about Mattel having my favorite license.

You keep stating this as fact. Is it really so hard to conceive that maybe - just effing maybe - there was more than one reason that Target dropped JLU? No? Okay. I mean, really. You don't think that Target would have wanted both JLU and YJ if it thought money could be made off of both? You don't think that Mattel would have wanted to sell both lines to Target so that they could make more money? If Target can carry Marvel Universe, Super Hero Squad, Thor, Captain America, Spider-Man, Iron Man, and Marvel Legends, why wouldn't they be able to carry both JLU and YJ?


Yep.


Yep.


Infinite Heroes sucked. If that's what they're capable of doing in the 3.75" scale, they're better off staying out of it until they can do more.


Yep, damn them for releasing hundreds of DC characters in the last four years. Damn them to hell.

Maybe if WB and DC could get their sh-t in order and give more of their characters some decent media exposure, they could compete with Marvel. Since the Batman franchise is huge but hardly family-friendly, Green Lantern crashed and burned, and the jury is still out on Superman, they're in desperate need of another hit franchise.

MoMoney, Target dropped JLU because they wanted Young Justice to replace it as their #2 DCU line. As to why Target needs to label Mattel product as their #1 or #2 or #3 line, who knows? But this fact was given to us by ToyGuru when point blank asked why JLU was dropped by Target. Sales were not the primary given reason. As far as Mattel was concerned, JLU was a sure thing for 2011. Target 'said' they were taking JLU on through 2011, so both Mattel and Target seemed to think that JLU was still viable at retail. I didn't see or hear Mattel complaining about us JLU fans then. Only when Target decided to not carry JLU did the whole issue of sales come to the forefront. Target was their one and only customer for JLU, and that one and only customer didn't want to buy. So somehow, the JLU fans took the blame for that one.

Conventional wisdom is that a toyline needs a TV show or film to support it. Understood, and I'm sure someone at Target put two and two together and saw that YJ has a currently airing show when JLU does not. Yes, this contributed to Target's decision.

I'm sure that declining sales had something to do with it as well. I am not clueless to that fact. However, nobody at Mattel wants to accept responsibility for JLU's absolute crappy distribution, case packs, and top tier management decision making regarding JLU. THOSE factors destroyed JLU more than anything.

But I wasn't trying to turn this into a JLU thread. I do enough of that already I honestly believe that Mattel has some long term and present day problems with their DCU license(Naturally. They seem to have a very short term mindset and strategy overall) Why is it that there is no 3 and 3/4 inch mainstream DCU line at retail? Why is the distribution for DCUC(and other past DCU lines) so sporadic? Still, to this day!

Target, and all other big box retailers, drop previously successful toy lines like JLU in favor of "new" toy lines. This just happened to be Young Justice. DCUC is getting a new box and a new name and will be marketed to retailers as an entirely new line. Why didn't they do this for the succesful animated properties?

Mattel's big failure, in my opinion, is not recognizing the DC Animated Universe as an important asset. Young Justice, JLU, and the new Green Lantern series should have been combined into a new line, similar to the current Batman Legacy figures. Maybe Mattel will wise up one day and create DC Animated Classics, but at this point I think they just do not see value in DC's rich animated history. It's very frustrating.

It is possible that more kids watch DC Animated movies and TV shows than read the comics. Mattel should get a clue and treat the lines accordingly.

As a collector of DCUC and the six inch YJ lines, I'm pretty pleased with what Mattel has done with the license. I'd give them a B overall. 20 waves of anything other than Star Wars is quite in accomplishment, especially these days.

Here's hoping the sub gives me a few dozen more figures to fill in the collection. I don't have high hopes for the new DC six inch line, however, especially with what I've seen in the first 2 waves.

DCUC was never impossible to find at retail with the exception of wave 5.

Depends on personal experience. I saw a total of 3 figures from wave 3 at retail.

Not here in the greater Los Angeles Area. I don't think I ever saw waves 9 - 15 at retail. If I did it was a random figure that no one wanted.

Howard - I'm not sure why you find it impossible to accept that there just aren't that many fans buying JLU anymore. Case packs, distribution, Target, blah, blah, blah.

They tried the line every way they could on Matty to keep it going- Singles, 2-packs, 3-packs, 4-packs and 7 packs. And they sold the SAME amount. With in 100 units. For 2 years. they wanted to keep it going. For them it's a slam dunk because there's not that much new tooling needed.

You love the line. I love the line. Toy Guru loves the line. Lots of people here love the line.

NOT ENOUGH COLLECTORS LOVE THE LINE. Not enough to keep it going. Not even HALF enough to keep it going.

I wish that weren't true. But it is.

That's why JLU has ended.

I've found it's rather subjective. Here is Colorado, I never saw these at retail:

wave 3 - only at KB
wave 5
wave 8
parts of wave 9 - only at Target
parts of wave 10
parts of wave 11
wave 15

Well I guess Texas is better for DCUC

Exactly. Maybe they were all over your area, but clearly not all over in all areas. Distribution has been an issue with Mattel for years with all of the Batman / DC lines.

I do give Mattel a lot of credit for keeping JLU going as long as it did. It is one of my prized collections and has a prime spot in my display. I also give Mattel a lot of credit for keeping DCUC going as long as they have. DCUC is a great collection of awesome figures. Still Mattel has had issues along the way and I guess I’ll never truly understand why.