Episode 626- Ben Robinson Master Replicas

0:01 King ways fas beer look is acting very weird. Captain Pyke Sisco's wife king On SENDI after like Boimer, Tendi starb and some is very hard, Sport Drive Black, Alert Toorgio has gone perserved, Feature Bad Marth, Edward is Andys Pakistan and Wolf is wed check Up's wearing red Tea's cat Kimpacs that you has said enough for that penny of make it. So everybody, let's. Go about the series. You calling us live up your phone, now about the series I'm coming to you on three services.

0:46 Now we talk about the series, Come Books, the Ross Shone Down. Coming tell us as we sit in. Jem Well, good morning trekkies and trekkers around the globe. I'm not used to saying that because usually we're not on with you guys on Sunday morning. But in this case we made an exception because we have a very special guest with us right here live in the studio. We have Ben Robinson and I tried to go to the IMD page and break it down, so if I miss anything that when I'm about to introduce you, I apologize.

1:32 There was a lot there, but basically Hanes Publishing sought advice on creating the USS Enterprise Owner's Manual, and Ben wrote the manual and it's entirely Subsequently, he authored much of the follow up publication, the Klingon Bird of Prey Owners Manual. He was employed by Eagle Moss Publishing a senior project manager. His ultimate title at Eagle Moss was that of Editorial Manager of Global Developments. He also saw the Star Trek Graphic novel Collection, star Trek Discovery, the Official Starships Collection, star Trek, the official bus collection, star Trek Online, Star Trek Collection, Star Trek Universe, the Official Starships Collection, star Trek the Next Generation Build, the USS Enterprise seventeen oh one D and Star Trek Lower Decks, the official Starships collection for Eagle Moss Heroes Collector. On February ninth, twenty twenty four, he was announced as being hired as the new senior brand minute Manager for Master Replicas, and he's also taking over as and getting rid of the remainder of the Eagle Moss stock I think I got everything, Ben.

2:44 No, no, no, my close. So you missed out for the first fifteen years. There's just so much there. Way back when, back in ninety seven, I started on something called the Star Trek Fact Files didn't get published in the US in that form. But then I was the editor of the Star Trek magazine this one here for five years and interviewed loads of people and their friends with loads of people back then. So and then there were a couple of things like DVD collections in France and Japan that nobody knew about and obviously master because we just noted the action figures, and a new line of small ships. And I wrote that shelf back then, the Star Trek books. So the ones I'm particularly proud of are the two Star Trek Celebration volumes. And I co wrote Yeah, And I co wrote Dan Curry's book Artistry of Dan Curry, and edited No Visitors book Open Channel.

3:53 And I've probably forgotten a few things, but that's kind of the bulk of it. When I looked at your peer, I was like, Wow, how there's just so much here that goes back decades and decades that trying to cut that down to a paragraph was difficult. And I apologize for missing some stuff. Nothing to apologize for. I apologize for having taken touch of it was money. No, wow, So you know I wanted to ask you. Paul is our resident toy expert, so I'm going to leave a lot of the toy questions for Paul. Uh So I'm gonna I'm gonna stand clear of that. But I wanted to ask you about your involvement in the Star Trek graphic novel collection. I have all of those, and I wanted to ask how you how you got involved in that and what it was like going through all those old classic comics and compiling them.

4:43 So that was so God. This is a long, complicated way getting the story. Evamos was principally a subscription company when it started out, so they were always looking for things that be collected. Other companies had done very successful Marvel graphic non collection. We've done a very successful DC one which I did, and inevitably, because we had such a good reputation with Star Trek, the idea of doing a Star Trek one came up. What, of course, is interesting about the history of Star Trek comics is, until relatively recently, it was incredibly varied. So if you look at the number of different companies that have had the rights over the years, it's like you're going to Marvel Clay, you get Marvel doing it, you get DC doing it, you gold Key. Before that that, you have the companies names slipping in my mind, and I know the guy who set it up. So there was a lot of very different Star Trek, Comic Graphic, Nobil publishing or comic book publishing. And one of the really interesting things was trying to pull it all together and to make it what you know, as comprehensive a collection as we could.

5:56 So that was. Yeah, there was a lot of research went in so that I hadn't read, you know, on and off over the years, but I didn't have a comprehensive knowledge of it. And Rich Handby is the man who does, and we brought him in to help us. I think probably a little later in the day that we should have done. But that's the short version of that one. Well, one of the things that I really liked about that collection, as you just said, is it included DC, Marvel, gold Key, pretty much all of them are wrapped into one collection, which is why I subscribe to it. Yeah, I mean that was the goal. I mean, that's always the goal with these things, is to to bring things together to give people some kind of insight that they haven't had before and to make everything uniform as well.

6:42 I think you know we all have I presume we all have that collecting instinct where you know, we like things to match. We like a nice shelf, nice shelf full of matching things and get annoyed when the books change, hype all of that kind of stuff. So yeah, they that was the idea, was to bring it into a kind of bore, unified collection that it had been available before, and. It worked beautifully. I also I wanted to ask you about the Eagle Mass collection and all they stopped and now you started back up again. But there's a new collection, and I'm confused with the new minute. The new collection is that part of Eagle Mass or is that something different?

7:25 So Eagle Loss went bankrupt, so not because of the Star Trek stuff at all, but because it was a company transitioning from one business model to another. And you know that the owners were very keen to sell the company, and they didn't day over over invested in stock and took took some risks they should have done. And after Eagle Mass, all the rights that Eagle Moss had kind of reverted to Paramount and they had the right technically they had the right sort along. So the first company they signed was to Egstini or Planeta, who operate under the banner fan Home, and they brought me into help develop those ships for them. So those ones are the kind of nine inch ones, nine or ten inch ones, and I've been doing that for them and we're chugging along quite nicely on that. But what there wasn't at that point was the original kind of Eagle Moss scale, the kind of smaller ships in that kind of four or five inch kind of range and master replicas where I was working at a lot of success selling off the old Eaglemos stock at that size, and they managed to get Paramount to give them those rights. So for a long time it was only only fan Home I had the rights, but in the last few months that to change. So now it's going to be a new line of smaller ships that are obviously with everything we do, we try to do something that's a continuation of what's

8:56 gone before rather than a replacement. So it's going to concentrate on ships that were never released at that scale. Excellent, And you know I have one more question before I pass you along. I love the the Haines manuals, and of course the kling On Bird of Prey one is sitting right here on my shelf, and I wanted to ask about, you know, working on that. You know, where did you get all the information? And it's a pretty in depth book. So where did you work with Mark o'krand, I mean, how did that come about? So? Well? What happened was that Haines approached Paramount about doing a Haines Enterprise manual and I happened to be in New York and met with them and I said, you know, I can probably find someone told write this for you, but I'm to be honest, I am probably the best person to do it. And I then ended up doing that.

9:54 It's free lance and it was a big success, and they came back and they wanted to do another one. But the difference between the Enterprise and the Bird of Prey is there is a lot of There are a lot of enterprises, and there's a lot of information about those different enterprises. When it came to the Bird of Prey, there was a lot of information that had to be filled in. So I called Rick Sturnback and put this to him and we worked together to try and fill those gaps in so you know, a bird of Prey doesn't have warp mis cells, so how does that work? Or you know, how does the cloaking device work. So we worked with a three D model called Ed Giddings as well, who actually ended up doing a lot of work at Eagle Masters as well and still don't work for me Master replicas actually, and we built, we created the sets. Rick filled in the kind of technical stuff of the rooms that we've never seen, so you know, we've never seen a Klingon Bird of Prey engineering room on the Green, but where it came up with the concept for the for the book, which we had then illustrated, and I then kind of filled in some of the gaps about kind of the kind of cultural stuff I guess, and that involved like really exhaustive study over every episode, every reference that had ever been made, and trying to pull it together and then just fill in a bit of the connective tissue, which actually was great fun, still very you know, and I tried to tie into kind of historical presidents on Earth. So you know, when I

11:28 was talking about how the Klingon the sort of navy as it were, was arranged, I kept thinking about Peter the Great and how that was done, and I, you know, I loved the idea that there's like a kind of architect guy who has to design the ship and then all these these Klingon warlords are coming to him and saying I want all these guns and they're like, well if you have all those guns, it won't fly, and having to negotiate and get that kind of stuff together. And then the best thing about that was the actually I didn't know this was going to happen, is that the clicking device which redesigned Rick and I designed for the Haines Manual turned up in Star Truck the card. Dave Blast actually went and made it cannon. So that was a that was a nice moment.

12:14 Well, I got to say that's one of my favorite reference books, and thank you so much for all the time and effort you put into producing that for kling On fans such as myself. Thank you. Call Wow. And I'm going to turn you over to Paul because I know he's chomping at the bit to talk to you. So Paul, the mic is yours. Chomping at the bit doesn't even begin to cover it. My friend, Ben, this is an incredible treat for me to be able to get a chance to do to you and ask you some questions. Terrible admission. If the amount of plastics someone had generated that one was responsible for in somebody's house could be represented in terms of like their ownership of your house, you probably you had to have a third mortgage on me here, my friend. So, I mean I've been going all the way back because you were with like Eagle moss On like the Bond car.

13:12 Well, yes, so we actually started out the previous company, so nobody cares about this, But I originally worked for a company called Midsimer Books who packaged. He did the editorial work for a company called G Fabrie, and G Fabrie was a company that did the book. That's right, I remember those, yeah. And the big build up dB five as well, which is still my proudest achievement, I think. But my I'm just you know, the unrepentant collector sadly right, I mean, just you know, the library back here has got a ton of your books in it. I've got like all the Bond stuff, the Batman part Work Car series, and just you know everything that Star Trek related. That's so many things that I've got on my displays that you know, we would just never have if not for like Eagle Moss to have a Nomad probe model, never would have had that, if not for all of you, right, never would have had that. And when you move from the smaller ships up to the bigger like six eight inch styleships, yeah, ten inches yeah, ten inches yeah. And then I'm like, okay, well, finally we can stop wishing.

14:19 And then they're like, oh no, now we're going to go into Battlestar Galactica. Oh no, you think you're done. Oh no, now we're going to go into the expanse right. And you know, I'm like, I think I've got my Rosinante and I'm happy. But Ben's like, oh no, you need an XL Rosinante, right, And it just keeps happening. So it's been great, man, and just phenomen I think, bringing us things that we've never had before, or never even really in some cases dared to think that we would ever see. You've dug in and been able to produce and guide into being, and it's phenomenal. And what I don't know if the other tr experts may know Ben, but Ben the same From Fantasy Film Royalty. A right, I mean you really really do. I mean my information will such sometimes sketchy, I admit, but says that your grandfather was the legendary Bernard Robinson, who was the production designer for most of the most infamous Hammer horror films from the late fifties to early sixties. Please tell me I'm not wrong about this.

15:25 Oh no, you're not wrong at all. That was Yes, that was absolutely what my grandfather did. And I'm sitting you can't see this, but I am sitting at his drawing desk, his drawing type of where he designed Dragoner and Frankenstein. In so amazing, amazing. I was a picture that like when you were a small boy, the Christopher Lee is hanging out at your house. Sadly, my grandfather died when I was a baby. I did meet Christopher Lee, though, and this is why, you know, I told this story somebody times. But so my grandmother who met my grandfather, who's my step grandmother, She met my grandfather because she was making bats for a drag tler and she sort of dragged dragged Christopher lea out of a conversation said, oh, my grandson is dying to talk to you. And I was sort of slightly embarrassed, but I was I just said, you know, I wanted to thank you because you was meant to my grandfather, which he did. And as I was talking to him, I could see this man hovering over his shoulder, and it eventually dawned on me that the man who was hovering was Dave Proud. So I was talking to Dragular and stopping Darth Vader from joining the conversation.

16:37 Fantastic man, bedtastic. But what a what a lineage? What a lineage? Is just amazing And just you know, as Jim was saying, going over your CV, you apparently just never sleep. I mean, you were just posturally constantly moving from one area to the next. And I think if you cut your finger on camera, Star Trek would bleed out. I mean, you've just been so immersed in that franchise. You're you know, you're as long as I can fathom. So just amazing. Eight years I think I've been working on Star Track. Now that's a terrible confession. Wow, that's a lot of enthusiasm though, but has not waned. I have to say, I'm you know, a lot of the people, I'm very fortunate and a lot of people who work on the show became my friends. So I was talking Tonna A Lottle earlier this week, and I talked to the hand all the time. And you know, I'm very fond of Ara Bear in particular, but a lot of other people I've you know, I've been fortunate enough to call my friend Johnny's it's one of my best friends. I mean, you know, there's fantastic people.

17:40 You know, And just for everyone who may not have been, as you know, well versed in Ben's products, you know, throughout the years and things, it's just like every time, at least from my experience, has been when anything comes through the old Eagle Mass Channel or the Master Replicas or whatever it may be, quality level is never something you have to worry about, right, And things are so meticulously well overseen, and the designs are just splendid and they're built to last and just really good quality merchandise, I mean, and just stuff no one else would ever deliver, and to delivered with a lot of passion. So I just think it's amazing what you've done, so incredible incredible appreciation from this corner of fandom, sir.

18:21 Thank you. I hope we continue to make you happy. There's a lot more to common. Well, I'm very very excited. It's pretty new news, right, But it's just like for you know, I think you know, I mean, there's just always a large ass of Star Wars merchandise out there, right, most of us see that. But when you're a Star Trek collector, it's feast or famine, right, And you will go years sometimes where nothing comes and you're like, okay, well, you know, and a lot of people have attempted to go deep with the with producing Star Trek action figures, and you know, they get a little bit out of the station and they don't really ever build up any velocity. I mean, it's I don't think I'm missing anything in my playmate's Star Trek collection.

19:08 I mean it's it's pretty deep. And they went nuts, they really did. I mean, they produced so many variety of characters, right, and that scale and that design of characters. Big fan of that, and I think a lot of us were really hopeful when Playmates re emerged to start producing them again a couple of years ago, and then baffled at what happened, right, And I don't know if at some point you want to weigh in on your perspective of that, but yeah, character choices that they launch with, well, there is that. But I think it's more than anything, it's a business model thing. So if you are a traditional toy manufacturer, you are trying to sell a very high volume and you're trying to appeal to kids, and good or bad.

19:58 Star Trek is an aging demographic. You could look at the five of Us here or in None of Us seventeen and it's a collector market rather than a kind of mass market toy brand. And I think the problem is that a lot of companies that come in have tried to do this, have tried to do it in a kind of traditional toy way where you know, you go to Warmot or Target to get these things and they're as cheap as they can be, you know, And the problem is if you're competing for shelf space with WWE and Star Wars, you know, it's just really tough. So what we're trying to do is change the business model.

20:40 So saying look, we're going to make these overuse phrase, but you know they're by fans for fans. We're going to make them specifically for fans, we're not going to try to pull in a casual audience. That means they have to be a little more expensive, and that's why, and they'll sell in smaller numbers, but that will only make them more collectible, and you basically have to buy them online. They may turn up in a few places. But and that business model we hope, which is the business model we used for the ships, is sustainable and not ridiculously over ambitious. And as long as enough people sign up and we get the kind of enthusiasm and passion that we hope for with any lot, we'll be able to go on forever.

21:29 Fantastic, fantastic. But it's just it was such a surprise to me, right because I think a lot of people were initially a little trepiditious during that transition period where it's just like, okay, here's Master Replicas. What will happen? Will they be able to produce things that we'd heard earlier would come and then you you know, frankly, I think Master Replicas is over delivered right in terms of what's been made available. It's just been Wow, look at all this stuff, Look at all these things that are coming out, and then we're just like a new Star Trek figures, I mean OZ and then the first I'm trying to remember how many you initially showed, like six seven different months, I know a lot from the latter season of a card. And then the two lower decks figures and they look amazing and they're they're scaled with the Playmates figures. Yes, right, so you can put them on the same shelf and you know, and have some like you were talking about my book spines must be the same height. I mean, that's that's fantastic. To be able to take the older figures and the new figures and display them together is kind of a fantastic thing.

22:36 And so it's like we've got I'm frankly really excited about this particular line of figures just because of that scale is just I think that's a sweet spot scale. And there are just so many unproduced figures from the Playmates never got into. They did a lot of great things. I mean, they gave us like a Magato, they gave us you know, Telosian. They did some great things, you know from you know especially you know, I'm a big original series guy, right because that's you know, you know, seven eight years old watching Devil in the Dark for the first time, getting all traumatized, right, I mean, I think it kind of messes with you. But I think there's a lot of stuff, and I'm sure David might have some examples here of classic characters that we never got that I think a lot of us still kind of hope at some point that we might see And I don't know if well, for.

23:32 The moment, our rights only start with Discovery, so we can do Telusian, we can do Veena because they turned up on Discovery. But there's more than enough to do for the modern show. And you know, I think one would hope expects that more classic stuff will turn up on Strange New Worlds as well. Yeah, well, we can do Pike. We do Pike. Our Pike will have to be a little bit more disturbed than that, because you'll do the. Pike from Strange New world or from Discovery. Exactly, Yeah, exactly exactly. And you know, I don't think we'll be meeting the end one thirteen creature. I do you kind of hope we're going to see the ancient ones on Strange New Worlds. It kind of feels like we should.

24:14 Because we're seeing Roger. So yeah, so that would be amazing. I mean if the if Strange New World because if as a version of Rock I would be over the moon. I think that would be one. He's an android. They could be thousands of him out there. Yeah. Yeah, So I think we just put this together just as a to kind of just illustrate a really deep bench of all classic figures that we just never see. Right, Yeah, it would be. I hope eventually our right might extend to that, but for the moment, for the moment, you'll have to make do with the hundreds of characters that we can do from Strange New Worlds, Decks, Prodigy, yeah, Section thirty one even so, and stuff like Academy. So you know, there's there's a there's a better stuff to get through. I think going back to what you were saying about about Playmates, I think that was really important to me was that this was you know, inevitably every time a new company comes in and you're kind of starting over. But I thought, well, look, there are a load of guys who have a load of Playmates figures, and they don't want to get another version of those characters. They don't need another another Kirk another spot though, of course they can have another Kirk and the spot, they'll just be the Strategy World's ones.

25:34 But you know, they need something that's new, that's different, but that goes along with what they've already got, so that that was very much the plan. It's like, okay, let's let's add to what you've got rather than replace it. And we have some very ambitious plans for playsets that I can't quite reveal yet. But thing I seem to remember reading somewhere though that one of the first ones you were going to be doing was a rock talk figure from from Prodigy. Yeah, rock top from Prodigy. I think we probably do Hologram Janeway first, just because will have to be a special.

26:14 Because those are the ones we wanted that Playmates dropped the ball on. I mean, they just you know, they're here's coming. I mean, I think everybody even pre ordered Hologram Jane Way and then I'm sorry, we still have the you know, all you know picards sitting on shelves at Target that no one's buying, right, like you were saying, you know, it's just it's a brick and mortar curse. Yeah, but yeah, and so I mean, obviously the idea is to kind of fill in the gaps. So for Prodigy it would be you know, it's the characters they didn't get to, so it is Hologram, Janeway and rock Top and Majell. Fantastic. Those are the that's where we'll start. I mean obviously, Well, in the case of Prodigy, I think we probably will come back and do a Jacob zero. So we will go back and do those ones again, but you know, we've got so much to get through.

27:15 Those lower decks. Figures are gonna fly, I hope, So they are gonna have to fly. They looked amazing, I mean really, and I think that there's a pretty substantial hungry audience for for merch on that show that has just not been delivered to And I think that when when I saw those and they just popped when you show them next to the Picard figures, right, They're just they're phenomenal. They're just so good. It's like the literally like the show has come to life in plastic. You know that's easy. Yeah, I mean, they really lend themselves to to that treatment. It's very satisfying. I'm wondering if I can show you a picture. I just wonder if I can do this without showing you pictures, I shouldn't show you.

27:55 Oh you can. You know no one watches this show, Ben, come on, I mean it's it's fun. You can tell us anything. I mean, we you know some guy and like of Moss talk is watching. That's it. You know somebody like you know the reverse of my desk. There are some Seriously, there are three really cool things on my desk that I can't show you. Nda is all these little things. Yeah, make the announcement. We really need them to get the biggest attention as possible. Oh you know what, man, I would be remiss if I didn't offer my sympathies for what happened at the Nuremberg Toy Fair. Also, you guys were victimized in a pretty scandalous way, and I know that that probably really threw any No one ever expects anything like that to happen.

28:41 But what a monkey right in Germany? I have to say, yeah, I mean that's something that I can't talk about. Well, I can't talk about what was starting because we haven't announced what it is. But there's there's a there's something incredible unexpected to come cling that's of kling Nah even more well, kind of in the way you're expecting. In the way you're expecting. I really can't tell you. It's just so after the unexpected.

29:21 Excellent And how how long do you figure it will be before we know what that unexpected thing is? Is there a neat on your calendar that you can share with that it. Would have been this month, but partially because of what happened in Nuremberg and past. Because we're waiting on some people in Hollywood, it's probably next month. Maybe that's the problem is you don't want to take people, Oh, look, this is coming, and then it's like, well I don't but I don't know when you know, And it's just honestly, you will never guess it. You may all go, uh, why are they doing that? But yeah, there's something coming that's just silly. We keep our eyes open, right, And it's like I've been guilty of like stalking the Master Replica's Star Trek page right where it shows the two icons for figures for March, and yeah, like you know when of those come up?

30:13 Man? When do I see which one must will be? Let me just see if I can show you something. Okay, Yeah, I'm just trying to show you a picture of the lower dex ones, but I have to click loads of things, keep talking, keep saying interesting time. Well, I just I'm excited to see what those will be. I'm assuming they'll be figures from March that you've that you've teased already. There are some figures coming in March, but there are things that I can't the things I can't tell you about unexpected. Sure, are you what do you expect the cadence to be in terms of like how often you announce new new every month? Y? Yeah, that is that is good news, my friend. That is great news because I think that that's I hate to harp on playmates, right because I think you know, but uh, you know they had one and done with that wave, right and everyone was like, what are you going to show us what's coming? Show us what's coming? And we never got to look at what you know, future plans were going to be, right and uh and so we never and then it just died on the vine. So just knowing that there's going to be that, you know, a more vivid frequency of God, that's great and I think that keeps it where it's you know, uh, affordable for collectors too. It's like, Okay, I can, I can do two figures at that price point and that's not going to kill me. It's like that, you know. And like you said, you know, because it's Collector Niche targeted, right, you should expect them to be

31:44 a little bit more expensive, right, I mean, because. You know, and keep the price down as much as we can. But again, the quality, if if it's anything like the quality of the vehicles that you've released in the past, it's it's going to be extremely high. And uh, and I'm just super, super super excited for those. So is is there anything that you can tell us about your particular wish list of things figure related in terms of Star Trek that you're especially excited to see coming. The two figures that we haven't done any work on yet, but I'm most excited by it, and it are or take us and the Hemmer. I don't know why, but I really really want those figures. I mean that the goal of the thing, I guess is to be comprehensive, you know. That's that's the thing is. It's not just Okay, here's Picard, Riker and Wolf. You know it's going to be Here's Rot, here is here's Magell, you know, here's t Len you know the that's the thing that kind of gets me excited and and and like you said, sometimes when something comes out, you just look at it and go, oh that works. So all the lower deck stuff, and unfortunately I can't. It's asking me to restart before I No worries, No worries. I have a fantastic picture of Marina Boimner and Tendy.

33:15 I don't think we've seen the Tendy figure yet that I'm group. But that's great, A little a little smaller group of them, but yeah, Tendy is one. I think a lot of people are very excited by attending. I would be very happy to have a feline ships doctor in my collection. I think there would be oh yeah. I have all sorts of plans for Yeah, there are some there are some cool things. That will do well, that will be great. And Hearing Hammer is a figure coming. Yeah, that's that's exactly that's that that will be remarkable. So I love that. That's where you're going. I think that's uh, you know, it's just everyone's been hoping that strange New worlds would eventually find somebody who could do justice to it and so super exciting, super exciting. I do want to veer off Star Trek just briefly for one moment, because you know, I've you know, I like to hear what's going on.

34:10 I'm always good, excited about what's coming soon, you know, ear to the ground and stuff like that. And I know there's a lot that you can't tell us. But one of the things I heard recently that you did get a hold of it in terms of you know, ips, was that you've got some access to the license for some obscure eighties film what is called again, guys, was it Blade Runner? Was that what it was? I'm yeah, yeah, that that somehow you've got Blade Runner, and that I just about you know, Oh, I won't say what I did, but I got very excited. I very excited, almost spit my Pellegrino across the room. And I I think the big question on everyone's minds is is like, okay, we've we've everyone's got spinners here and there. You get a spinner that someone's designing, that's great, but but we've never really had legit figures before from Blade Runner. And I know you may not be able to talk about that if you can. I'm delighted.

35:12 Well, I can tell you that it's technically what we have. The spin of we're doing is in twenty fourteen, is in Blade Runner twenty forty nine, but is best known for being in Blade Runner. The rights on the original Blade Runner are incredibly complicated, and it's not that people have them and won't give them to you. It's that they have to. You have to go and get twenty seven different people to sign up and go, you know what, Actually I don't have any right, I don't care go ahead and do it. So that is something that it kind of have worked out how to do. I met a man who knows how to do it, has done it before. So it's funny you mentioned this because we were just talking about our interest in Blade Runner twenty ninety nine this last week, and obviously it's too early for us to and well, we don't have the rights.

36:11 We're just trying to get the rights. So if that goes well, I think our appetite for all things blade Runner would be even greater than it is now. Excellent. I think I'm reading your tea leaves, Ben. The original film is a bit tricky. It's a bit tricky, Super challenging, especially where a lot of the cast are no longer with us, right, So yeah, I gets three. And you get into difficult contracts where it's like, well does Ruca Howe's estate have rights? Does you know? What's the situation? You know, and you get into things on alien for example, you have to go and strike a separate deal with Sigourney Weaver for her likeness. You know, the studio didn't sign those rights from her. So that is the potential difficulty with actual Blade Runner. But it does sound like a good idea.

37:07 Oh, if you were able to deliver figures from the original classic film, I think you would be parting the seas. I mean people would be, you would be amazed at It's still one of the holy grails I think of collectors, especially in the six inch range. No one's pulled it off right, and it would just be remarkable. But whatever the the you know the secrets are that are coming. Just just know, Ben, there's a very avid audience out there excited to clicking pre order buttons with you. I have. One of the cool things is Blade Runner related, and it's right in front of me when I can't hold it up in church.

37:50 But such a tease this guy. It's in pretty good shape for the first sort of pass. So I would hope that within the next couple of months we will announce the thing that. We would do for playing. Okay, very exciting, Well I am. I'm just thrilled again at this opportunity to get a little preview of things. And again, it's like a large s right now. It's like we have the good fortune of everything you're doing. Do you want to talk at all? I mean it's I think there's a lot of room for everyone, and a rising tide lifts all boats. Do you want to weigh in on what Nassell's doing with their line? Yeah, I mean Brian Brian, who I got to know a little bit after they featured the Eagle or stuff on the Toys of Vaders. Brian Brian's a proper deep cut star trek fan. I'm very interested that he's gone as deep cut with the first half dozen figures as he has. That's four if they announced to him. I'm not a certainly seeen for sot forth in uh a new comic con. I think it's interesting. I hope that they succeed and that that you know that they've they're not too deep cut. I mean this comes from a man.

39:09 I mean I have been, you know, deeper in the cut than most people. But you know, this is from the man who made the main long garbage scout. But I do hope, you know, I mean, I the Brian's always been very nice to us, very kind. They were very supportive to our release. A emailed me to congratulate me, so you know, I wish them all the best. So obviously, if you're going to make a choice, do you want those? Yeah, I mean that's that's that's kind of it. And he's going to be distributing in stores as well, isn't he? Is he going to try to do that? I think we just lost Benzardia.

39:55 Sorry, move the mic. There we go, we got you back. Yeah. Cool. Well, I think there's a I think the market's going to be thrilled for both. I think but you know, I mean, I know where I hang my hat of allegiance, right is I'm you know, I know, you know, bona fide quantity from what I've seen, and this is going to be quality is going to be great. So super excited. I feel like I've like been sucking all the air out of the room here though, Ben, I want to make sure that our other trexperts get a second here, and I hear something going off downstairs. I just need to go adjust, so let me pass the I don't know what it is, a tea kettle or something. I'm not sure, but I'll check it and pass this over to to perhaps Charles or David for a second. I know they must have some wonderful questions as well.

40:42 Yeah, I think we're going to go to David. I think, okay, cool, Hi, welcome to our show, and a pleasure to have you on here. So yeah, I don't know if this is related to you at all or anything, but I were curious if you know anything about what had been going on with the Lego di tractor had been coming out. Have you gotten any work on that at all? Or I don't know any more than than anybody else. What I do know with Lego is they are a very important toy manufacturer that is a big deal having a Lego license, and that for a long time they were very selective about about what they would do, and they've had a kind of range of strategy. So now they're reaching out to a wider range of brands that will So before it was like Harry Potter, Marvel, Star Wars, you know, I mean like real Triple A A properties that had a massive following. And they it's not just Star Trek. They are experimenting with a kind of slightly less Triple A kind of brands, you know, things that that I'm sure there is an appetite for, but maybe not as you know, not in the kind of numbers that there are for those mass brands. So very interest to see what they do, obviously, and also they've got that thing where you can go and lobby them for first up, so you know, I'm sure everybody should be going there and like going, yes, I want the entire

42:13 interior of Vija. Yeah. I just throughout my years, I were collecting Legos for the longest time, and there never was a snow Track. It was always Star Wars, Pirates, you know, all that kind of stuff. When I first heard about Stowtrack, I was like, Wow, that's actually coming through now finally. No, but yeah, I think my next question would have to be what do you think it's the biggest change in the collectible industry or years. Oh, that's very interesting question. I think we're actually in the middle of that change at the moment. Probably the biggest change I can think of during my lifetime is to do with comics. Was you know, when I was I was, I was very fortunate comics were growing up at the same time as I was, so I was reading Claremont Byrne x Men or Frank Miller Their Devil, you know, and I really enjoyed seeing The Dead Devil back on Disney Plus. But when they made the shift from newstand only where you you know, it was all about keeping it cheap and it had cheap print to the the direct market stuff which was printed on nice paper and all of that. But then you see what happens with that is that everybody gets more and more expensive because they start pursuing the collector. So instead of it being like a thing that was made for everybody that became collectible because it was in short supply, people then started to make things specifically for collectors, to the

43:47 point where it's now quite a substantial industry. It is the big growing trend. You know, kidd olt is increasing and you're seeing either toys for brands that you wouldn't expect to have toys, so you know, I was involved in a conversation about Severance in the last couple of weeks. Yeah, I don't think, you know, when I was eight or nine, nobody would have made the equivalent. No one would have made Severance when I was but no one would have made the you know, no one would have made toys for them. Now, having said that, I did have a Coojack annual when I was about eight, which was entirely inappropriate. It was all about, you know, taking down drug dealers and murderers. But yeah, that's so the whole kind of kid alt thing, the whole kind of adult sophisticated toys is only going to grow. And I like to think that we're in the kind of vanguard of a movement towards collectors being able to get the kind of product that they want because it's online, rather than because it's mass market. You know, by when you go online and you can pull all those fans and those collectors together more around the world, Suddenly you can and if you're relatively modest in your volumes, suddenly you can make things that they want rather than being a kind of and I you know, rather than it being aimed at the biggest possible number of people.

45:20 Wow. Cool, it's interesting, I think, Uh yeah, I think that's all the questions I had for you today. But I would definitely like to pass it over to child here. So thank you for answering my questions. Yeah, welcome, Ben. Not a whole lot of questions to throw out. I know, I'm like Paul. I've got a wall full of boxes of Eagle Mass stuff, and I got bags dashed over there of all my Eagle Mass books. But I just threw up one and then I'm going to pass it back. To Paul because I know he's still itching for more questions.

46:02 How about with Prodigy? What about Traveler Wesley? Yeah? Absolutely, yes, on the list, no question. Yes. I mean I think pretty much everybody in Prodigy is on the list, you know Chacote. Yeah, I'm trying to think who else the first officer on Yeah, absolutely everybody. And we'll get there. We'll get there everybody. I mean, you know I can and uh X will do. Dr Mickey, you know we will. The the. The idea is no limits. Yeah, I think in lower decks, I think it's to Lynn.

46:45 I think we need one of her too. Definitely want to She really became part of the crew when she showed up. Yeah, Telen and Magell. I mean, there's these very similar characters in terms of young Vulcan women. But yeah, that both absolutely on my list and very very popular characters, I think actually, and that's the kind of thing that would slide by someone who wasn't watching the shows, you know, passionately and regularly. You know, they'd be like, oh, they're not one of the main cast backs. Yeah, pretty much is by the end of the series. Yes, well, I'm going to pass it back over to Paul because I think he's probably got a couple more questions going.

47:25 I just start picturing like a Ransom character in figure form or a Shacks character, and I just can't stop laughing. I mean, just. Nonsense, the Ransom version without his shirt on. You know, it's got to be done. It's got to be done. I mean, but those are going to show up on everyone's desk like mad I mean, they will not be able to contain themselves to just meet you know, the Collector universe alone. Those are going to just be nuts. So I just wonderful preview of what's to come on here, Ben, I know I want to be because we're all very very keenly aware here that it's tea time where you are well passed. Actually, our clocks change, so it's quite civilized time. Actually, I don't want to live.

48:08 I'm like, you know, we hate monopolizing you. But this has just been a tremendous treat to be able to have this. And uh, you know, I think from all of us at Truk Talk and want to thank you for everything that you've you know, marshaled into existence in the past, but more importantly, wish you in these crazy times we find ourselves in these days, right, wish you just bottomless success with everything coming. It's very exciting. Well, I just think depends on us doing stuff that people want, you know, and that's the that's the goal, and to do stuff, you know, like I said, you know, I always think if we can deliver something that people I can't believe they did that. I am so pleased they did that. And like I said, the kind of deep cut thing, one of the things only have to be more teasing. I'm going to do so one of the things that I can't announce it's on my desk.

49:04 Appeared in both lots and lots of episodes of the original series and only one. There's a paradox for you. Lots of lots of original series episodes. You're not only one. You're not going to go. It's such a deep cut like thing that only someone who had looked at literally every frame of a particular thing would have noticed and then done a bit of research to find out. How come after chat GPT, I guess. So GPT does not know the answer to this question. I have one mother question. I would just ask you because I know you're just you're I know you're a huge Star Trek fan, but I know that you're a well two more questions. I want to ask you from one thing, what is your favorite episode of All Star Trek.

49:53 You have a personal favorite that you just love? I do, well, I do, but I can't. I'm not sure I can narrow it down to one era. If I can give you one for each show, we can do that. That's one of my favorite games. So my my interestingly, my favorite episode of the original series does not I mean, okay, let's just discount Sitting in the interfel because it is phenomenal. It's the you know, it's just a kind of level above not just our joke, but kind of almost all television after Sage Forever. My favorite episode of original series is Eron of Mercy, and it's bizarre because it doesn't turn up in all those kind of top ten lists, and I don't understand why not.

50:39 You know, it has some of the best Kirk's Bock dialogue in the entire series. It has the introduction of the Klingons, you know, core is just phenomenal, a choose scenery like no One's business, and it has that you know, perfect ending where you know, Kirk saying to the organ is I demand the right to make what? Oh, hang on a minute, This is not a very sensible thing to be saying. So I have a really soft spot for for End of Mercy, And of course you know it's gene Kun thee who I am obsessed by. So that's my favorite episode of t O S for TNNG probably changes around a little bit, but I kind of think probably Tapestry, I mean, for Jim, the sense of the Father really writes really highly for me as well, and of course then we had to play that and of course yesterday's enterprise it's not you know, let's not do that, uh. For d S nine Uh, well, again, let's not let's discount in the Pearl, Moonlight and From the Stars, but it's not called for Far from Stars.

51:52 But my favorite is Duet. I just think it's phenomenal episode and and A is fantastic in it, as is Harrison Unice. He's just out of this world. I mean, it's one of Nana's favorite episodes as well. That's a fantastic episode for Voyager. I'm going to be a little bit unusual, so I'm going to say The Gift, which is the episode in which seven becomes human. One of the reasons I love that once much is because it's written by Joe Minoski and Joe doesn't talk to people, but he went through a brief period of talking to me, and I think he's one of the most intelligent people to ever write for Star Trek, and his stuff is so tight and so moving. But it also it was just this was the moment for me that The Gift was like it it's the episode in which Voyager is really real. It's the episode that kind of like you came away from that episode so excited and we're like, this is this is just fantastic.

53:00 For Enterprise. I think the Pilot is still one of the strongest things. I think it was very, very strong opening, and unfortunately I don't think that Price quite delivered on the promise of the Pilot. As much as I would like to have seen, some of the things they pursued weren't the things I would have pursued. I guess my other pet peeve is that I think Star Trek is not about going where no man has gone before. It's about going by one or two people have been before. If you go back and watch the original series, it's very rare they actually go someone where no one's been before. They go where someone who's done something wrong has been before. To go where a slightly questionable person has been before is what happened, whether that Roger Corby.

53:43 Or where some has already gone yeah. Exactly exactly, or where someone has come and like being kick apped by a computer, brainwashed by a computer, or you know, created an entire civilization of commonly androids. So yeah, so yeah, that was just a pet peet. And then from the Modern Chairs, I don't think you were quite as easy to pin down individual episodes because you big story arcs. But I'm a big Locker fan from the first season of Discovery. I thought Locker was just the most exciting thing to happen to star Trek for years, to have a character who was like morally questionable. And I'm still slightly disappointed at that he turned out to be from the Mirror Universe, because I just would love him to still be wandering around and you know, and and Prime Locer. We still don't really know what happened at Prime Locker, so he could turn up in Stranger Worlds.

54:43 That's my lobby for that. If Henry and Akiva are listening that, I still think there's place for Prime Locker. Jason Isaacs is amazing. He's so great. I agree. I just love that character. It's kind of morally complex character who is just you know, and he what's great about him before you can get in the more universites. He's effective, you know, he gets shit done. So I love those those kind of early episodes like Butcher's Knife and those kind of episodes of Discovery right at the beginning run about episodes four or five, six, that kind of territory again for Picardo, I don't know that you can pick a particular episode. I really liked the first season. I think it's underrated, and I think that that whole kind of Picardo arc was really strong.

55:36 And then Strategy Worlds are well, there's so many I love so many episodes of Strategy world I have to say, I think it's it's paradid asper I get me Latin wrong. The trial episode with with Number one in the second season was absolutely one of the best episodes of Star Trek there had been for decades at that point. And then the Kirk episode that comes immediately afterwards with I think is a phenomenal character. Again, she's great. I kept waiting for Samuel T. Coggley to show up in the trial absolutely why is he not there as defense?

56:18 I'm trying to think, you else, kids? Who else can we have? I mean there's obviously loads of or somebody. Matt. I can't feel like Matt Dka needs to turn up. I really greatest performance ever in cos from my opinion, I just William Wyndham just blew the doors off with that. He was incredible, completely believed that this guy is another captain. You know. Just think. One of the things I love is the idea that Kirk was not especially cool. He's just like there are twelve guys like him out there and they're all equally cool, you know, And that's one of the things I love about Adson mounth Is. You absolutely believe this guy could. He's amazing. He can't wait for them to as that season three premiere date and it's like, yeah, come on, bring it on. Well, we got to let you go, but I want to just ask you one more question because I'm just this is such a great thing to have here. We all have fantasies about ips becoming toys that have never become toys right that were like, Oh, if I could just get a hold of this, you know, we talked about Blade Runner right for me, one of the ones I've always dreamed about, right was I grew up being terrified by all of the monsters and the original Outer Limits. I was just like so many great monsters that just were horrifically disturbingly rendered for the era.

57:32 It's oh, just like melting and dripping, and oh, just this is the greatest. If somebody would do toys of that, I would go nuts. You're probably too niche h, I hear you. I think you know, maybe that's a kickstarter. I hadn't thought about that. We could maybe do like a line of outer limits. Ah, that's just so cool to limits action figures. I don't know who the right I'll tell you the one that made me laugh is that things that we can't get. So when we've done the Galactica ships, the obvious place to go after that was I was put quadges because the designed for the end of the we ring the universal, our content universal, and so can you license park quages to us? And they're like, what, what's spark Quadges? I mean, it turns out it's the rights to buck quadges are really like as bad as Blade Runner are really complicated and and you know it's it's not a toll clear who actually owns those rights. So that, sadly is impossible.

58:41 One on my long list that I think we might be able to do, but I just kind of need enough people to convince me they really want them, and then we had to pay a lot of money to Disney. Is the black hole kind of think that there would be that there are those of us who were you know, that was the next thing we saw after Star Wars. Yeah, so that I'd like to do, and I think that's possible. I mean, the rights are available it's just about the money really. On that one thing. Disney ass a lot, right, I mean, I'm sure, yeah. But you know you can combine it with other things on that we just it's one of those ones where you're going to your boss, isn't saying I really think we should do the black Hole? They're like, really, are you sure? What have you been drinking?

59:23 Then really you. Really want to do the black Hole? Yeah? Yeah, I think so, But it's a bit of a risk, a bit of a punt, and obviously you'd have to do you know, you'd have to do the worry boss, we need a sickness sure, amazing amazing stuff. The other one I guess that comes up is is two thousand of the ships from two thousand and one that they're kind of possible. Another fantasy of mine. And then then I promise we'll let you go. But it's just in that exl scale that you did so many of the ships. If somebody would do some of the classic like Irwin Allen and you know, I know I product the Enterprise and what I tried for a while to do those like things like the like the spin Drift from Land of the Giants, the Voyage to the bottom of the sea. Ships like the Flying s Up I still pulling out hope somebody will make a protein.

1:00:18 Kiva Goldsman is just signed to do or to redevelop all those went out on the property. Really so that potentially new TV shows coming based on a I P. So if those hits that you know, that would probably reignite enough interest to make it viable. And then if you get people in by offering them the new stuff, then the possibility of doing some of the old stuff by emerge. Fantastic voyage what a ship, I mean, amaz just. Needs a little bit, it just needs again. It's one of those ones where you need some kind of evidence to present to your bosses. That's like, okay, you. Know Rediscovery in be a new to show that they're still an appetite for it.

1:01:02 Exactly if the shows, you know, the Show's come back and Big Kids, I think then there's a chance. And I think those rights are you know, those rights are available. I mean the ones that are the really tricky ones are the ones where it's like they're just nobody has the rights. You can't even if you want to. You've got all the money in the world and you're prepared to lose it all. You know, you're hard pressed to. You can't do bot Rogers, you can't. You know, it's pretty tricky doing reginal right run not impassible tricky. Well, you're a miracle worker, Ben, that's all I know. So and you've always been that way. So as far as your you know, esteem in the fan community, So I think we should probably think about letting you go because it's we've been you know, you've been incredibly Your time and your and your expertise and just these little glimpses and previews of what's coming is just such a treat And from all of us here at Trek Talking, we salute you, my friend, and and we stand to you know, pre order buttons at the ready waiting.

1:02:05 Makes a difference. It makes stuff. It makes stuff. I know people kind of think why would I pre order? And one of the things that happens is when you get pre orders, you have more confidence in things and you were able to you know, push ahead and take more risks and then do that kind of deeper dive stuff. So there's a reason to pre order for people, but it's entirely up to you with ideas to make stuff people want, so you know that's the goal. That's excellent, Uncle Jim, I'm going to pass this deep back to your man, parting shots, parting words for our dear friend. Well, I just have just one question. You left out Star Trek, the animated series in your favorite episodes. I know what ours, We've talked about it. What's yours? It's gotta be Yeah, yeah, I mean Dorothy. So, I was lucky enough to get to talk to Dorothy Fontana quite a lot over the years, and Dorothy, you know to me that that episode is like of all the the arguments that you could look at look at the animated series and go and yeah, I'm not too sure Giant Vulcan should be cannon, though Mike McMahon has made them cannon or lower next. But Yesteryear, I think really stands. As you know, Dorothy could have could absolutely have told that story on the original series, and he's very you know, very very unhappy. I think that an animated series wasn't considered cannon. But yeah, it stands. It

1:03:35 stands as a very important part of the Star Trek. For me, absolutely. And one more thing, as a bellow Klingon fan, can you tease me on any possible release of anything cling on related or are you not allowed to say? Well, I can tell you that we have finished our Wolf action figure from Excellent. He's in the line up at the beginning, so yeah, Wolf's on the way. Otherwise, yeah, little ship. So I think there's probably you can't go too far wrong with another little cling on Bird of Prey. I think that's that's there. It's another project. There is just that it's an inkling in an eye and it's just a podcast thing, but that is a very very cling on thing that we've been talking about for that as well.

1:04:28 Any idea that we might see Laurel from Strange New Worlds? Yeah, yeah, yes, absolutely, Well Discovery, Well, I don't know if she's turning up in Strangers. I have no idea about that. I would be surprised if Floril doesn't turn up on Strange New Worlds. It kind of feels like they will do some kind of cling on arc at some point, you kind of I would if I were them, for sure. Yeah. I mean one of the things that it's the fun game, isn't it is? What is there that they should revisit on Strange New Worlds? Hang on. I personally love Moromlins, but you they're kind of out some else, is there, Yeah, I mean the ancient ones.

1:05:09 I'd love to see, uh, like characters like Matt Dakka. You know, there's so much sort of fun stuff to be done in that space more and Urians always. All right, Well, thank you so much. Ben. We really appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedule to track talk with us. Thank you so much. Well, thank you you have a great rest of your day. Thank you you too, great success, Ben, Thank you so much, my friend. Thank you, coupla. All right, guys, so that wraps up our show for this week. And I want to take a moment to say thank you to Paul for hanging out in trek talking with us tonight.

1:05:54 Thank you, Paul. What a pleasure man. Absolutely any any opportunity like this amaze so lot of fun. And now thank you so much to Charles for hanging out with us from Las Vegas. Thank you, Charles. Thank you, Jim. Future thing is to take from my wallet. And of course thank you to David, our miracle worker for making everything work out in the show. Thank you so much, David. Welcome. It was a really good pleasure of meeting you Ben. A lot of fun and I want to let everybody know that Thursday Night Comic Corner is back. We're going to be talking about Star Trek Lower Decks episode or issue number one and the one shot from section thirty one on Thursday show. So join us back on Thursday.

1:06:37 I'm your most excelland host Uncle Jim saying to everybody hailing frequencies are closed. Please everybody stay safe and be good to each other. Star Trek fans are the best fans. Good afternoon, good. Day, I'm not sure. Yeah, by what time is it? Uh? Spatial spatial anomalies? Yeah, all right time. Thanks, thanks a lot, guys. Prosper h