This fall, Hasbro will celebrate the combined strength of the scary season and the galaxy far, far away with two new Halloween-themed figures: a skeleton-deco clone trooper and, for lack of a better term, a Were-Wookiee, both coming to the popular 6-inch Star Wars: The Black Series line.
“There’s a lot of fantasy in both Halloween and in Star Wars,” Eric Franer, Hasbro’s product designer for Star Wars, tells StarWars.com. “A lot of the outfits just lend themselves well to that kind of aesthetic. There are a lot of scary-looking aliens. There’s a lot of, like, gnarly looking characters.”
“We had the original holiday-themed figures — the winter and Christmas figures. And those were very successful, and we were delighted with how they came out. We knew we wanted to expand into other holidays,” Franer says. “Pretty much top of mind was Halloween. It was just the next one that lent itself to Star Wars.”
“We were thrilled with all of them,” Franer says. “Ultimately, we landed on two characters that were immediate, easy gets as Star Wars characters, while also being immediate gets as a Halloween figure.”
The final figures are super cute, featuring clever details and an eye toward originality that fans of Star Wars and Halloween will absolutely love.
“The porg was definitely my favorite,” Franer says. “We had a little Santa porg that we had looked at, and I was like, ‘Oh yeah, I could maybe make like, a shirt out of this.’ Then I realized that many of those details could translate well to a vampire. Having the really aggressive widow's peak, the suit, the tie, even his wings.
We deco’d the inside of his wings to be red, to imply the interior of the cape that Dracula has. And then we wanted to make sure that he looked a little bit more monstrous and not just like a human, so we deco’d his face to be that kind of off blue and added fangs in there for him as well. It was a really fun thing.”
With the release of these figures, Franer added to the connection between the saga and Halloween while expanding what Hasbro can do with The Black Series.
“It is a ton of fun to put my little design spin on something that doesn’t necessarily follow exactly what might have been done in the past. It kind of forges a new path. It also helps us to pave the way for the future. Like, if we want to do more figures like this, this helped us to do more characters like that. And luckily, the reception’s been very positive to it,” Franer says. “I’ve had many people reach out to me saying how excited they were about it.”
What are your thoughts on these collectibles? Let us know in the comment section!
Comments
Best
New