The official word on Faramir

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First of all, I find this kind of reasoning very discouraging as a collector. When I decided to collect the busts I assumed they would finish what they had started. Had I known that whether or not they would make Eowyn and Faramir was entirely up in the air, I probably wouldn't have made that decision just then.
Even if I cared at all about Narnia or Kong, I'd be very wary of collecting the merchandise now. That can't be good for sales either.

Furthermore, I thought the people at Weta were LotR fans, but I don't know how a LotR fan could conceive of such an extensive line of collectibles without Faramir in it. It's not a matter of picking and chosing, it's a must. I can see how they'd want to do monsters over humans where there's a choice, but Faramir ought to be one of the core figures that enables you to branch out into monsters in the first place.

And as for selling well, I was under the impression the entire range sold pretty damn well when it picked up steam. The ebay prices and the inflated edition sizes don't indicate any lack of interest, whether it be monsters or humans, major characters or extras, statues or busts. Not everything sells equally well, but there's nothing to suggest Faramir or even Denethor wouldn't have sold enough.
 
If they were struggling to sell 3000 pieces before, maybe they just didn't want to risk the loss with this one as well.
If they lower the edition size on him they would have to rase it on something else to bring in the money ... how viable is that at this stage.
Mind you Im only going on what RT said, they need to sell something like 1500 -2000 to break even.
 
I was watching the Extended Edition TTT Director and Writer commentary a couple of days ago , and in this Peter Jackson states that it was very important for him to pick a Kiwi for the part of Eomer . He said he chose Carl Urban because he wanted a Kiwi to play one of the "Principal" characters in the movie . If PJ considers Eomer to be a principal character , then should this not also be true for Faramir . Hell , I thought Faramir had more screen time and greater purpose than Eomer in the movie , yet Eomer gets a bust and Faramir gets nothing . I don't understand how a principal character could be left out of the line , and I don't buy the "humans don't sell" excuse . I own dozens of statues that look just like humans(Elves , Hobbits & Dwarves) and most of these are sold out and selling on eBay for a $#!* load of money ! Am I supposed to belive that these statues sold better because they have a pointed ear or a bit more hair on their feet ? I also own all of the actual human statues and it is the same case with those . AARRRRGGGGHHHHH ! :bang
 
It seems to me they've lost sight of the big picture.

"Human statues don't sell well"

That is surely true if you consider lame dying no names, or poorly sculpted large ES as your benchmark.

But key characters always sell well... and if they're sculpted and painted well, with a low ES, they sell like hot-cakes. Fans simply can't say no!

Bottom line, this is a lame excuse to explain away 'selling out'. Two Balrogs, hords of nameless orcs, repeat big 3 peices (Original Balrog = Mini Balrog, Cave Troll = Mini battle troll, Wiki = KotD).

Just pathetic - Im sure we'll never hear the real reason why they ended the line missing several KEY figures. :rolleyes
 
i thiink they decided not to do that as a business decision. not because of the fans. they probably also couldnt get all the products out on time. it makes me think that they need to get ALL the products out by the end of this year instead of producing them til the end of the year and distributing it after the license expires. thus less product.

this will also explain why subsequent statues have been of lesser edition pieces than former ones.
SIGH... this pisses me off...the fact that business came first before their loyal patrons...but it is a business.

if you think of it as a business decision, i (we) can also make a business decision to NOT buy certain items. however, we seem to be more dedicated fans of the books and the movies and the collectibles to care about certain business decisions.

...i just cant believe it...nope, no way... pisses me off even more. i could think of better excuses than that.

i think the next question to weta should be will they revisit the line again? then and only then can we expect the items we want. but come on... a multitude of orcs and helms. medallions that were overproduced (if i may say so....) but overestimating the demand of certain items which floods the market and drives prices down. who's fault is that?

just venting....
 
I don't think the "they ran out of time" angle holds up. They knew how much time they had, and they knew they had to make choices. They must have planned ahead, and they made some pretty questionable choices. We didn't know it was going to end quite so soon and in this manner until recently, but the people that made the line obviously did. They had years to do a Faramir, not just the last minute.

Which is what upsets me most about the whole thing, all that time that I was collecting and awaiting an Eowyn bust they apparently had no intention of making one. Might as well have told us that in advance.
Better overal planning would've avoided the situation. Make sure the important stuff is taken care off before launching into busts of random Orcs with arrows stuck in them.

Hopefully Weta's learned from the job of making the collectibles. Not that it'll do me much good, but it might improve the collections of fans of Narnia/Kong/whatever they do next.
 
Well business decision or not they would have sold a Faramir bust and/or statue, I really feel the whole thing ended abruptly.I emailed them directly and got a response along the lines that they never intended to do ALL the characters!!! but we ended up with how many Orc/Troll busts/statues in the end? Needless repetition if you ask me!!!! Very disappointed!!!! :eek:
 
Humans don't sell well??? so Aragorn, Gandalf, Theoden are like aliens???>:
 
And remeber the edition size for the Elessar statue was originally 1500 then it was upped to 3,000.
 
They never intended to do all the characters? That's even more lame. We never intended to do a piece for Faramir who was in two films but we had to do a Gil-Gilad bust since he had 2.5 seconds of screen time. At least give me a non-lame excuse. >:
 
Basically it was a pick and choose thing, nothing to do with image rights or whatever. They just felt that human characters don't sell.

I think there may be some over reaction to this SHORT statement. It doesn't tell us the context in which it was said. Giving the benefit of the doubt, it reads to me that, rather than do a human, 'Faramir' in this instance, they decided to give us the other recent items. Some acclaim which has already been given, in this thread, to the riders. It doesnt pay to dwell on the negative, rather, see the good and move on.
 
We still don't know from whence this information has come (and yes I said whence :lol )?
 
for the record

hehe, a bit off-topic, but "whence" implies "where from", so essentially you could say "whence came you?"

I have a feeling I know where FE got his info . . .
 
Re: for the record

"Thank you for your inquiry about our Lord of the Rings polystone line.

We apologize if anyone feels that a secondary character or two may have
been left out. In a story that offers so many characters it was never
our intention of doing absolutely all of them. Sideshow and Weta have
made a monumental effort to bring a wide and varied a line of
collectibles as possible to fans and collectors around the world.

Per our announcement, the Mumakil and the Corsair statues are the last
pieces in the Sideshow Weta Collectibles polystone line. We are excited
about these pieces, especially the Peter Jackson as Corsair statue, as
it is a fitting tribute to the man that so beautifully brought Tolkein's
story to film.

If you have anymore questions feel free to e-mail me at
[email protected].

Thank you very much and have a great day."


Thats the email I got when I wrote into air my view on the rather abrupt stoppage of production! And yes we know it was announced but I mean what nearly everyone else here is saying that the line is not complete and the excuses we are being given are really pretty poor!!!
Siseshow we love you but come on, a bust of Gil Galad and NO Faramir or Eowyn busts, come off it now!!!
 
Re: for the record

Tolkien is spinning underground now with the news that a few of his primary characters are not being made into polystone!!!:fart
 
re

what a cop out!
how can they say human characters dont sell well.
Make the newborn Uruk with an ES of 4000 and know the true meaning of NOT SELLING!!!
Put Eomoer on a horse rather than 3!!! sculps of aragorn,
Look at all the older statues of main characters with ES of 2000 that are all sold out now, look at the second chance page and theres about 3 LOTR characters topps!
Heck even non main characters sold out, look at the Galadhrim archer on secondary market, Easterlings (humans!)
Really annoyed and really lame excuse, would buy 10 haradrims if they would swap them for 1 Faramir!
ps, iv got Grima and he's great, it scus he's not evil enough to be a bad guy, and not good enough to be a good guy!
:p
 
Re: for the record

A while ago I wrote a long post about the dissapointment in releasing yet another Aragorn statue, as well as another statue of Legolas / Gimli instead of releasing a true horselord piece.

I'm still confused as to why they made the "Arwen in a white dress" instead of the powerful image of her on horseback. By the same token I'm also estranged by them releasing Eowyn as Dernhelm instead of HER in the white dress... And what about this weird decision to make a Gondorian Pippin where it was evident that the majority of the fans / collectors wanted (needed) a Fellowship Piipin to get that group complete?

And did we really need three Gandalfs when there was still no statue of the High Elven warrior? Or Faramir? Or Denethor? Or -indeed- Eomer on Firefoot?

Now they're releasing a fan favourite: the Mumakil. And yet, they decided to give is a sad dying pose instead of the charging rampant beast that everybody expected/wanted.

Sure, Grima did not sell very well at first. But neither did Strider, the Stone Trolls or the Watcher. Or Boromir for that matter. Each and every one of them sold out though.
Also keep in mind that Grima can hardly be called a popular character, which is quite the opposite of Eomer or Faramir.

No, I am extremely disappointed.
 
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