There are Always… Possibilities - A Wish List for the Playmates Toys New Line

With the announcement that Playmates Toys would once be making Star Trek toys came the further detail that Varner Studios was also returning to do the design and sculpting of the toys.  Though the first series has not officially been revealed, a little Photoshop work by some other collectors have given us a pretty good guess on who will make up the first wave.  Almost immediately a lot of collectors have started building their wish lists for what we all hope will be a line that integrates in to the hundreds of 4.5” figures we already have.

As such, here is my wish list for wave 2:

Admiral James T. Kirk - Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan

There is no more glaring omission from the 90’s Playmates line than a lack of the original crew in the maroon movie uniforms.    As I shared in one of my first posts, the Classic Star Trek series Lt. Saavik is one of my favorite figures.  They got all of the uniform details right, and the figure is just perfectly executed.  Beyond that, we only got Kirk, Scotty, and Chekov as movie figures from the Star Trek: Generations line.   I don’t know why the movie line got reduced articulation since later series went back to the standard articulation points and even added the thigh swivel with the Voyager waves.  So, in addition to the reduced articulation, there are also numerous costume design flaws that take away from the overall quality of the figures.  The black piping along the chest flap should continue down to the bottom of the jacket, but these figures   End it at the belt line.  The back of the figure is the most troublesome, with the large belt loop at the small of the back missing, and the details around the divisional rank band at the shoulder completed in accurately.  By releasing Admiral Kirk in this uniform Playmates could have a popular character to “anchor” the wave and deliver a figure we’ve been waiting 25 years for.

Captain William T. Riker - Star Trek: Nemesis and Lower Decks

I don’t know when William T. Riker has been more popular than right now.  He obviously had many memorable episodes as part of Star Trek: The Next Generation, but the focus on Data in the Next  Generation movies made it feel like they didn’t know what to do with Riker. 

Jonathan Frakes’ return in front of the camera in Star Trek: Picard and Lower Decks has raised Riker’s profile and it would certainly be a fan-favorite to add him to the wave.  

While a First Contact style uniform figure of Riker was part of the Target exclusive “Starfleet Command” series, it is one of the most disappointing figures.  It reused the Chakotay and Harry Kim mold, which left Number One shorter than Picard and Data whereas he should have been taller.  Plus, it used the same Riker head that had been used for every other Playmates figure, and a more brushed back hairstyle like the 6” and 9” figure portrait was desperately needed. 

Captain Benjamin Sisko - Star Trek Deep Space Nine Seasons 5 - 7

I know a lot of people (myself included) have made a custom version of Captain Sisko in the gray and black “First Contact” uniform, and it would be great for Playmates to do an official release of him.  The Sisko is obviously the most important character from Deep Space Nine, and so if the new Playmates line is really going to cover the 55+ year history of the franchise then he sound be the first character to represent that series.

If a Captain Riker figure is made then, realistically, Sisko could reuse the entire body from that figure.  Jonathan Frakes wore Avery Brooks’ costume in Star Trek: Generations, so the two are similarly built.  

Ensign Sylvia Tilly - Star Trek: Discovery Season 2

With Michael Burnam and Saru in wave 1, I think Ensign Tilly is the next best choice for more Discovery characters in the line.  And given that Discovery is one of the series currently airing, it would make sense to continue including its characters until the crew is fully represented in plastic.

I will admit that I am not caught up on all of Season 3 of Discovery.  I like parts of the show, but I just haven’t gotten as invested in it and its characters.  I hope to see the main cast all made as figures, but characters like Lt. Stamets just aren’t as interesting visually and therefore as “toyetic” as others.  The inclusion of Anson Mount’s excellent Captain Pike, and the teases of Number One and the Enterprise was the real reason I followed Season 2 as closely as I did.  

Subcommander T’Pol - Enterprise Seasons 3 & 4

Playmates Toys can’t be faulted for the lack of Enterprise characters in the original 90’s line since they lost the toy license in 1999 and Enterprise didn’t premiere until 2001.  I’m sure there is a parallel universe somewhere in which the Star Trek: Generations figures were made with the same elbow and knee articulation and matched the on-screen uniforms, and therefore the Star Trek: First Contact figures were kept in the 4.5” scale and sold as well as the regular line, and this butterfly effect kept Playmates Toys making Star Trek figures until at least 2001 to release a wave or two of Enterprise toys.  But alas, in our reality we know that was not the case.

I decided to go with T’Pol as the first Enterprise character for a few reasons.  One, with Kirk and Sisko already in my wish list wave I didn’t want it to just be all the captains so that meant no Archer.  For another, Playmates was always good about including female characters so it felt right to add another female to the wave.  Thirdly, the pink, salmon, blue, or purple catsuits T’Pol wore in season 3 and 4 create some visual distinction compared to the Starfleet uniforms.  And lastly, given the popularity of Playmates’ 7 of 9 figures, and the fact that T’Pol was just as blatant an example of “eye candy” as Seven on television, the parallel in action figure marketing seemed to make sense.

Romulan Commander - “Balance of Terror”

Star Trek has never been a good guys versus bad guys type story, but that doesn’t mean that aren’t a wide variety of adversaries across the various series and movies.  One of the most iconic adversaries is the unnamed Romulan Commander from the classic episode “Balance of Terror”.  While we got Koloth to represent the Klingons from the Original Series, the absence of a classic Romulan is as tragic as this character portrayed by the great Mark Lenard.  

Wave 1 is all Starfleet (or former Starfleet in the case of Picard and Discovery Season 2 Spock) characters, so a “bad guy” would be a great way to broaden the scope for Wave 2.   

Of course, none of this speculation will matter if Playmates reveals the first wave of figures in full and they end up being 6” scale or a totally different aesthetic than the original 4.5” line.  I know some other internet detectives have analyzed the announcement image and calculated that the proportions and shape of the hands match the 90’s line… so we can all hope that Playmates learned something from its mistakes.