Amidst all the chaos this last week at San Diego Comic Con 2017, TFW2005 met up with Hasbro Designers John Warden and Lenny Panzica for a short interview about what was just revealed, the future of the Generations line, the current movie line, and Robots in Disguise as a whole, and a few specific queries regarding design choices! We’ve transcribed the interview from start to finish, and it can be read in full after the jump. Enjoy!
Tony B: Here we got Starscream, and the two that are Combiner Wars remolds, or reuses.
John Warden: That’s right.
TB: And then we got Starscream and everybody thinking that that’s going to be a combiner. Is there any kind of stealth thing going on?
JW: Ah, very interesting speculation! [laughter] And it begins! So I can just say this, you know I’m sure if you grab Ashley here today, she’ll be able to tell you sort of the similar song, but the Power Of The Primes is really about unlocking forces within the Transformers and although there’s a lot of awesome things that happen with the Prime Masters in terms of what the powers can be, from a toy design standpoint we’ve hidden all kinds of secret easter eggs in there. We’re going to unveil them slowly over the next few months, lots of awesome news actually coming at Hascon, big debuts there and a lot of secrets will be revealed. So we have plans on reviewing all of these hidden toy features. One of the toy features we’re actually able to talk about today is the fact that Dreadwing and Blackwing combine together to form a pineapple apple pen. [laughter] Just kidding! Dreadwing!
TB: Alright. Is Titans Return kinda like done – the line?
JW: That’s correct.
LP: Well, we’re moving on.
JW: Well we’ve got some exciting reveals this year for Titans Return, but yeah just like Combiner Wars, Titans Return is coming to a close, that chapter of the Prime Wars Trilogy is coming to a close. But, we’ve got Slugslinger which is really cool, he’s just been revealed over there [gesturing to display case], and so I guess we’ve got some really exciting things, fans should not be heartbroken.
TB: Okay.
JW: There’s some really cool stuff on the horizon, like literally we come to events like this to kinda listen to fans, we heard over and over again what fans want. One of those things is Rodimus Prime, alright, so we go back to the office, talked it over with Lenny and the designers, we’re like “We gotta bring Rodimus Prime, we gotta do it.” We’re always on message boards and Facebook posts, things like that.
LP: Closing this chapter just means we can open up a new chapter, and another maybe trilogy, another maybe another story that we wanna tell, but a whole new way to play with Transformers in the Generations line.
TB: Yeah yeah.
LP: There’ll be more, new, cool insightful things that we’re looking forward to in the future.
TB: Cool.
JW: And just because this is the third installment of the trilogy, also we have more plans for things in the future; in fact Ashley said yesterday we had plans going all the way up to 2021, we’ve already plotted that far out.
TB: That’s cool!
JW: And we actually- we’re looking into ways to cross into the rich movieverse. So we’re really looking at all sorts of ways to address the needs of fans of all ages, and fans of all different universes of Transformers.
TB: In the Google Hangout, you kinda mentioned that The Last Knight ends kinda short, like it’s done, it’s ending after the Nitro wave. Is there any other movie figures coming after that?
LP: That’s after wave 2.
TB: Right. And then Transformers Tribute, we’re just trying to figure out as fans, is there like an ongoing “Movie Generations”? Like in between movies? Is this Tribute that? Is there something else? Like where are we at with the ongoing movie stuff?
JW: Sure, so as you guys know, 2017 isn’t just a year that marks the time of another Transformers feature film, Transformers: The Last Knight.
TB: Sure.
JW: It also marks the 10th anniversary of the original 2007 Transformers Movie. In celebration of that, we’ve got the Movie Masterpiece, which is starting to take a look at that original movie, and as we’ve heard from fans today at Comic Con and yesterday, they’re- people are so excited about those. There’s a segment that’s continued to energize that. The other thing we’re hearing loud and clear is that, there are a lot of movieverse characters we just haven’t touched on, and unfortunately right now it’s a little too early to get any kind of specific details about what’s in store for the future-
LP: He’s not talking about the-
JW: No no, the Tribute is truthfully- it’s an opportunity to bring fans the 2007 Optimus Prime that they might’ve remembered when they were kids, so Tribute in general is ways that we can y’know, go back to the vault and look at taking tools that might have awesome nostalgic value or really great play value, and bringing them to fans again.
TB: So it’s a quick subline?
LP: In a way. It’s like taking an old mold and really diving into it without any extra back pedaling, adding extra deco and getting the deco right, cause now that we have seven years of research on that character, there’s extra details that we may have missed the first time around that we can really embellish upon. It’s something that we whenever we do these anthology lines, it’s actually exciting as a designer that you can get in there and get a quintessential version of that character with that tool that’s actually a beloved tool. I mean you know, and that was when we as a brand had gotten a movie, a movie was born. And we were like “We gotta make these figures.” We were really learning a lot about transformation and how that all worked.
TB: That changed the game-
LP: It changed everything.
TB: -having to figure out how to transform all that Michael Bay stuff into a toy.
LP: Yeah, I would say that influenced a lot of Generations, and a lot of the kids’ stuff too because we looked at transformation in a whole new way. Like we started to realize there’s a more creative way to transform something and thinking about, instead of doing something right-side-up, do it upside-down- like understanding the origami of it essentially. So it was a BIG turning point for us.
TB: Okay, cool cool.
JW: And I guess in response to that, I wanna reiterate, we do have exciting news in store for the movieverse, and fans who wanna understand more about that should sign up for Hascon, cause we actually have some- well no see, it’s a plug, but in reality there are some awesome reveals planned for Hascon, yeah. So there’s reveals here, uh Power of the Primes, but there’s lots more comin at Hascon; and so fans of Power of the Primes AND movieverse should stay tuned cause there’s some cool stuff coming there.
TB: I will be there! So – Robots in Disguise- is that continuing?
JW: We’re excited to bring to life Combiner Force, which is the newest installment of Robots in Disguise, we recognize the fact that there’s a lot of Robots in Disguise out there, and the series is going nice and strong, and it’s too early to talk about that right now, but yeah Combiner Force is our newest series.
TB: Titan Masters in the Titans Return boxsets, what’s the deal with their names?
JW: Oh the Siege on Cybertron set?
TB: Yeah like the various boxsets.
JW: Sure sure, yeah so those, when those sets were originally envisioned, the idea was to give fans kind of a cross-section of the ecosystem of Titans Return, and we kept back the names and the personalities of those Titan Masters, yes they do have names and personalities, they will be revealed on social media. Not coming today, probably soon. Um, so we wanted to kinda make a special thing out of it just to kind of talk about news and excitement about who those characters are. Fans might be excited and have a good laugh about the names of some of them, cause some of them are kinda digging a little deep in the lore, but yeah those are coming at a later time, yeah.
TB: One last question. Maybe over the last year or so, I don’t know how long, there were Decepticon symbols or Autobot symbols… on the toys… that were made inconsistent. Sometimes on the same figure. You’ll have movie Decepticon symbols mixed with G1 symbols on the same toy or within the same line, so I think there’s something going on with it over here (points to the figure display case) Like you got movie symbols on the wings, G1 symbols on the chest. Now those are protos so I think that might be the case there, but-
JW: Yeah I think that’s what it is. If it’s a Prime Master you’re looking at, I think that may have been an oversight.
TB: I mean the Generations stuff, which is technically not movie, but it’s got movie stuff floating in there. When you guys were doing the G2 sets, some of them had the G1 symbols, some of them had the G2 symbols.
JW: Oh, the G2 sets!
LP: This is something that’s really hard for, in particular-
JW: It’s something we try to avoid.
LP: Right. Transformers, as we know, already has a lot of different facets. We have our movie, we have our Generations, we have our G1/G2- like, we really try to keep it clean.
TB: Yeah.
LP: I think, there’s really no easy answer for that, to tell you the truth, we really try to keep it separated, but it’s more-
TB: Yeah. I don’t have every particular case of this listed here-
LP: I heard ‘em talking about it last night.
JW: Yeah, it’s a fair point, and as we recognize those, we make sure we address them.
TB: Cool, cool guys, thank you.
Johntimus Prime
If I'm not mistaken, doesn't Hasbro Asia primarily cater to the Chinese market? Takara usually handles domestic marketing in Japan, but HA is areas like China, Korea, etc. Also the reason a lot of those Asian sellers list stuff that won't be in the US for a month on eBay.
stad
I think we're overestimating the autonomy that "Hasbro Asia" has. Ultimately, Hasbro Asia is a branch, nothing more. Everyone that works at "Hasbro Asia" works for "Hasbro." It's not it's own separate company, it doesn't have it's own investors, factories, etc.
Johntimus Prime
The weird thing is that the movie universe is one of the few attempts to keep sizes realistic in the actual films, but the toys are perhaps even worse offenders re: scale than CHUG or the current Aligned stuff.
Lazerwave
The size of Blackout concerns me. It was not labeled if it was a Leader or a Voyager. Bonecrusher on the other hand. If it turned out that Brawl is a Voyager, they should fill in the gap of Ironhide or ROTF Starscream and put a Voyager Bonecrusher. But my thoughts were, depending on Brawl's size, I might as well dust off my 2007 Deluxe Bonecrusher. Because Movie toys shrink every line.
Johntimus Prime
My thoughts too. The fact we're getting what look to be vastly improved new molds of some of the best designs (I need you, Leader Blackout!) makes me content. Though I think most of us still want Leader Bonecrusher — such a cool aesthetic and design that got saddled with a dinky Deluxe mold
Lazerwave
This interview is proof enough that the movie leaks are not cancelled.
Johntimus Prime
The leaks actually started way back. Remember those rumor lists from several months ago? I believe they mentioned stuff like Rodimus Prime, combining Dinobots, the last show Decepticon combiners, fan choice Optimus Primal, etc (though I'm not sure if the G1 fembots were rumored). At that point those toys were all in either the concepting or development stages, so someone got the goods way back.
Rated X
I didnt know that. But what I do know is that "Mr. Rodriguez" is a long way from home. Sure he can go on a Trump frenzy and start firing people. But at the end of the day Mr. Rodriguez has to answer to Asian investors who are a lot higher in the food chain than himself. Hasbro just didnt buy a plot of land in vietnam or china and open up shop. They made a partnership with rich investors who are pretty much the board of directors for their Asia branch. For all we know, the leaks might have come from one of these guys, or one of their family members. Thats where things could get really sensitive. I think there will always be Transformers leaks and they will always come from Asia. Hell, even Botcon leaks came out of Asia. You cant control what happens on the other side of the world from a desk in Rhode Island.
Rated X
I dont think youre getting my point. Any accountability Hasbro USA tries to implement will be lost in translation and cultural differences. And then theres the conflicts in international law. Its probably more trouble than its worth to try hold someone in Asia accountable. The relationship between a parent company and its business ventures in foreign countries is pretty much a trust relationship. They can send american reps to conduct an investigation, but thats like me walking into your house and trying to investigate you….how well will that go lol? The best Hasbro USA can really do is hold a teleconference and try to explain their stance to avoid future leaks. Maybe the Asian corporate pannel will take it seriously. Maybe they'll all laugh as soon as the camera cuts off. At the end of the day, Hasbro USA has too much invested in Asia to just make demands over a conference call or threaten to cut ties. Its gonna take a lot of discussion s and negotiations to make Asian business executives respect American corporate ideals. Very lame ideals at that, lol.
dCon
I clearly stated that Hasbro is probably pissed off, and the "maybe" is still a definite possibility it's not like they are showing the toys off and what I meant is someone in the Industry. Maybe someone was angry with one of the Hasbro teams that worked above them. And its not like we fucking know so you don't need to be nasty.
GizmoTron
Yeah, if it escalates probably all of those things. But I imagine just firing the guy with the camera responsible over some serious breaching of NDAs would be the likely outcome.
The last name of the brand manager over there is "Rodriguez". Just because it's in Asia doesn't mean it's only run by Asians. That's not how the corporate world works anymore.
IgnikaMarcus
Again, Takara contracts the factories, not Hasbro Asia.
Also, why do think it's called "Hasbro Asia"?
It's the Asia branch of Hasbro.
They may have some autonomy, but in the end, they answer to Hasbro HQ here in the US.
Rated X
I disagree. What are they really gonna do ? Make a phone call? Send an envoy? Slap sanctions lol…
Hasbro Asia is pretty much its own entity. Thats why its called "Hasbro Asia" and not just Hasbro. They got the factories, the cheap labor, and the connections. Hasbro needs Hasbro Asia. I highly doubt there is anyone in a position of power at Hasbro Asia who is not Asian. They dont care about the US Hasbro agenda. They got their own.
Johntimus Prime
Shit, if you want to know how much Hasbro factory workers value their corporate overlords, they STILL make lunchtime specials for shits and giggles and smuggle out test shots and production samples.
EightiesKid
Hasbro has been doing a GREAT job of putting out toys that we collectors enjoy. The Generations line of toys has been outstanding for years now, going back to Combiner Wars and earlier, and now with Titan Returns, Titan Masters, Power of the Primes, we collectors are being spoiled with some great product. My personal favorite among the new toys is Rodimus Prime. I'm really looking forward to getting a Rodimus that can accomplish the transformation without have to detach and re-attach the trailer.
GizmoTron
We forget sometimes that the people working in those factories are sometimes fans just like us, too, and it's easy for a fan to get excited and want to share everything. Internet fame is also easy to become obsessed with, even if it's anonymous source fame.
Onslaught24
The differences are subtle, but it's mainly the eyes for both symbols (Decepticons' is most noticeable) and some slightly adjusted proportions. The Decepticon insignias have two different eyes which, when paying attention to detail, can really mess up the feel of the figure. Autobots less so as it's pretty much just the eyes looking slightly angrier on the movie version. Even if they get the wrong symbols on the wrong kind of figure (Nitro Zeus for example has black G1 symbols instead of movie), it at least needs to be consistent.
CrossHero
I guess people who work in such places like a toy factory mostly leak such things because they want to get some fame, some attention from other people on the net. Just google kotaku and leaker. They have an article about a guy who was a leaker and worked at toysrus who started to leak new games and footage of those just so he can get some fame on the internet.
GizmoTron
Well that last big leak came right out of the offices of Hasbro Asia, so there's definitely something they can do about that.
stad
I think he's saying, in the case of Transformers, the molds and production was always overseas in Asia, as opposed to some of the bigger 80s Hasbro properties (GI Joe vehicles) that were made here. So it's not like they moved production of TFs overseas, they've been there since the beginning.