SDCC is upon us yet again and with the IAT folk staying home this year, it’s time for our Armchair Coverage. We’ll be up late scouring the very best links with the best news and images and compiling them here for our readers. This article covers Preview Night displays and Day One Panels including Transformers!
| Preview Night Coverage is below | Day One Coverage is on Page 2 | Click here for Friday & Saturday Coverage |
This year, Preview Night caught some of us a little unaware. I’m used to the first night having one or two little nuggets with most of the reveals slated to debut later in the week. This preview night was different. Some sites got their images up extraordinarily early and there were plenty of gems for the rest of us to marvel at. Here’s what we liked for Preview Night…
MOTU Classics: Throughout the day, Mattel used Facebook to tease collectors with images of the setup. Between the Grayskull and Hall of Justice dioramas, it looked like they would have an incredible display. TNI was the first to show us the filled cases and the displays lived up to expectations! Initially, the only new MOTU item in this awesome display was the reappearance of the blue-winged Zoar (top left) and a blue-winged Stratos (weird), but an extra placard in one of the MOTU cases dropped a huge bombshell. In this picture, a small sign for the subscription reveals the next six Club Eternia figures after Carnivus. It’s almost too small to read, but it lists the following figures: October – Roboto, November – Grizzlor, December – Buzz-Off, January – Bow, February – Vikor, and March – King Hsss.
Did Mattel leave this list out as misdirection (Vikor??) or has the list been revealed? We’ll know for sure on Friday at the Mattypalooza panel. Honestly, the list sounds almost too good to be true, but if the list is spoiled we’ve still got the subscription figure, and any non-subscription figures that we still don’t have the first clue about. We’ll have those answers in about a day-and-a-half. Until then, check out these pictures of Whiplash, Carnivus, & Grizzlor in package from AFP. As some speculated from his backpack, Grizzlor appears to be loaded and ready for battle with four weapons. Poe has a great close-up of Grizzlor on his blog.
Finally, we have an odd one courtesy of Pixel Dan. On his Facebook page, he posted images of the special raffle item commemorating She-Ra’s 25th anniversary – a Silver She-Ra. I’m not sure if her articulation works, but if it does, it looks like Spirt of KG has company in the ultra rare category!
DC Classics: Again, Mattel teased us on Facebook with pictures of a fantastic Hall of Justice setup and ActionFigurePics has got some great pics of the the full display. We’re loving the setup, and even though it’s a villain free-for-all on the left, we lament the lack of a Toyman in the Classics line – the Legion of Doom is incomplete…
There doesn’t appear to be any teasers in the DC cases like Zoar or packaged Grizzlor, but Michael Crawford brings us fantastic closeups of DCUC14 & DCUC15. It looks like the GA Starman is sporting a green version of Obsidian’s cape there – let’s hope that gets fixed. We also see the variant Martian Manhunter with his alternate hand (I don’t think we’ve seen it before) as well as the packaged GL 5pk & the Kyle Rayner 2up. I’m still wishing for Kyle in his classic costume, but this 2up looks better here than it did in ToyFare! I’m more excited to see the rest of that line. The GL 5pk looks sharp in package, but we must not forget the figures contained therein aren’t going to be the best. Friday afternoon will be the big DC reveal for Mattel.
Other DC Lines: With this being preview night, there’s not much to see in some of other DC sections yet. The Retro Hero Wonder Woman is on display as is a new Action League poster that features even more characters – including a Starro! Speaking of Starro, the Brave & the Bold line appears to have been reduced to an all-Batman line called Total Armor. Since it’s all-Bats, it’s looking more and more like Vault may never get those Starro accessories shown at last year’s SDCC.
There are small displays of JLU and DCIH in the Mattel booth, but I’m not seeing anything noteworthy in them just yet. Those pics can be found in the general album that TNI is using for Mattel/DC product.
AFI has a pic of the DC Mez-Its. I’m going to have to try really hard to not be a sucker for these. I do miss Mighty Muggs.
FOUR HORSEMEN: Yesterday, we brought you the sneak peak of the first Symbiotech release: Tygos & Tygolith. Tonight, AFI gives us a nice shot of two other Symbiotech prototypes. Thanks to that shot, we finally get the name of the unknown prototype – it’s Bipedix & Bipedon! And check out the unpainted proto in that back – that’s none other Tygos riding around in the Tygolith armor recombined to make its own vehicle! How cool is that?
The Four Horsemen also have a print on sale at their booth of most of their properties in one cool collage. This print will be available online at a later date.
Marvel Universe & Marvel Legends: Remember that little Marvel Legends poll from last year? Where all of the internet decided to get Deadpool & Black Widow v2s instead of a never-before-made figures? (I’m still bitter!!!) Well, our patience has finally been rewarded with those winners finally making their debut at this year’s SDCC. I do have to admit that Black Widow looks fantastic and I love the variant gray costume. We also get Warpath in his traditional colors and his X-force costume, but can someone tell me what’s up with blue/yellow Deadpool? I don’t get it! I can rest easy with ‘Pool and Widow, ML voters, because you did finally get me the Valkyrie that was I wanted from the Hulk line. Here’s a link to the ToyArk ML gallery.
For the smaller MU line, there was a a little more to see. I need to spend some time on my MU Checklist to get it updated, so I’m not completely sure what’s new here, but I’m loving the Thanos, Constrictor, Arno Stark, the tiny Ant Man, and I still can’t get over how HUGE that Galactus is.
For a look at the larger scope of Marvel products, TNI has a large Marvel gallery already set up.
If you’re into video, AFP has a video walkthrough of the Hasbro Marvel display.
Iron Man 2: Man I love this line, but there was so much going on I had a hard time understanding what I was seeing. It was like a never-ending sea of little metal men. Lucky for me, ToyArk had already stepped in and analyzed who was who. For Comic Series Wave 4 we can expect a Modern Whiplash, Mandarin, Dark Reign War Machine (cybernetic Rhodey!), and Ultimate Armor Iron Man. On the movie side of things, there were even more figures on display. Again, ToyArk sorted things out for us. Wave 4 of the movie line looks like it will be full of the drones while the future waves will rely heavily on repaints – but there are some cool ones – I really like this black/gold Mark V for example.
GHOSTBUSTERS: Mattel wasn’t waiting for the Ghostbusters panel to show off some new Ghostbusters items. AFI has pics of the first three Retro Ghostbusters in their RGB costumes. It’s nice to see the colors, but where are the 6″ figs?? Also on display, without Slimer and their Xmas hats are the 2nd movie Ghostbusters. Peter’s back to his movie accurate costume, but Winston is sporting a first movie head with the mustache left unpainted. That’s annoying. Look for that pack at TRU this Christmas. Finally, in the “cool but surely expensive department” is the PKE Meter Prop.
Sideshow: Sideshow is always out of my price range, so I can’t bear to look. Michael Crawford looks to have an extensive gallery for this great company that’s broken up into sections for Hot Toys, Joes, LOTR, Star Wars, Marvel, and a couple miscellaneous categories to boot.
NECA & Mezco: TNI has a huge gallery of NECA product up including product for Harry Potter, Gremlins, NBX, Watchmen, Christmas Story, Terminator, Jonah Hex, and more. I haven’t been checking in on NECA lately, but I know they’re the home of Heroclix now. Still I was more than a little surprised by Iron Maiden Heroclix…
For Mezco’s offerings, including more shots of those cool DC Mez-Itz, look no further than the Michael Crawford’s coverage.
Diamond/DST: TNI has an small DST gallery up while Michael Crawfrod spent some time photographing the Universal Monsters product.
BATTLE BEASTS??: Man, this one took me a minute to figure out what I was looking at… Nestled in TNI’s DST section was this awesome little Octopus dude. I wanted him instantly, but what was he? The little card says Battle Beasts… but he’s not a Minimate! There looks to be a crocodile, a monkey, a rhino, and an iguana. Some are hit and miss, but I love the Octopus.
Star Wars: I haven’t had a chance to peruse anything for Star Wars yet, but AFI has a 5 page gallery of Star Wars pics in their SDCC coverage.
Transformers: I haven’t seen much Transformers news for Preview night, but TFW2005 has a small gallery up. I’m not seeing that much exciting there, but if you’re into the Power Core Combiners there should be a few things for ya. I do have to admit I’m really waffling on my decision to pass on that reissue Blaster I’ve got a childhood connection with never having him and he looks so cool in that pic.
G.I. Joe: For my Joe fix, I headed over to CoolToyReview and checked out some nice pics of the seemingly modest Joe display. I don’t think there was anything I hadn’t seen earlier in the year, but Joes are still a bit behind from 2009 JoeCon so that’s not a surprise. All I know is that I still don’t have that awesome Arctic Snow Job…
For some close up pics of the new Joes, I recommend Hiss Tank if you’re a member. If you’re not a member there (and can’t click to enlarge the pics), hit up AFI to satiate your Joe needs.
Monster High: This one’s just for Vault. He assures me that Monster High is amazing. I’m somewhat skeptical, but MWCToys has a gallery of these dolls up so maybe those two are on to something…
I think that gets us caught up on the good stuff from Preview Night. Special thanks go out to the great sites beaming back coverage from SDCC: ActionFigureInsider, ActionFigurePics, Articulated Discussion, BattleGrip, Cool Toy Review, CriticalMess.Net, Hiss Tank, Jedi Temple Archives, Marvelous News, Mattel on Facebook, MWCToys, Open Your Toys, Pixel Dan, Poe Ghostal, Raving Toy Maniac, TFW2005, Toynewsi, & ToyArk.
Right now, the only remaining two figures I really want are Battle Armor Skeletor and Panthor. I doubt we’ll see them, but I’m really leaning towards getting the Club Eternia sub. Someone talk me out of it!
No, you must suffer with it like the rest of us. 😛
Bow! Vikor!!
How am I doing? 😛
Someone on another site mentioned something about how it seems Mattel is betting on a lot of people getting the sub this year which is why they held off on A-list characters like Ram Man and Mekaneck
I would absolutely HATE it if the sub incentive figure is someone “necessary” like Panthor or Man-E-Faces.
Well, it’s He-Man… does that count?? 😀
Ya know, I don’t understand why Battle Armor Skeletor hasn’t shown either. All the parts are there, it would be a high profit margin item, IIRC it shouldn’t need ANY new tooling, the major change being paint app on the changeout plates, right?
Even then, if that seems to obvious a money grab, Panthor is another no-brainer.
Maybe they’re waiting on sculpting some twin swords for BA Skelly. Wouldn’t that be just like Matty…
An edit function is something I can look into. 😉
Skeletor’s battle armor is different from He-Man’s and the plates were sculpted, not printed. So he would need those 4 new pieces, but that’s not a huge investment. I still think we’ll one one as a quarterly figure in 2011.
Thank you, I’m sure others would be happy as well!
Now, consider, if it was a choice between having the ‘correct’ sculpt for Skeletor’s BA (and maybe not getting it) or re-popping the He-Man parts in proper Skeletor colors which would allow it to be produced super cheap (and thus, it gets done), how would you feel?
It’s one of those things that keeps a person up at night, innit? 🙂
I honestly wouldn’t mind the armor being the same (though I selfishly want the Skelly armor so we can get it in Faker colors), but the plates gotta be new. 🙂
I can’t believe Mattel put that list out! That is hilarious!!!
There’s a million things that have to go in those booths. The only sure bet was for it to not exist or for Scott to keep one copy safe with him. The hired help is exactly that…
On Poe’s site, do you see that the Grizzlor doesn’t have that stupid tribal loincloth in package? Thank HE, it’s removable!!!
lol, HE sure is good to us.
As long as HE isn’t Matty.
Or is Matty on one big ego trip?
Retro Wonder Woman looks junky.
Some of the action league stuff looks good on the poster, but are we realyl going to get it when the main line is going south?
Well, no offense to those fans, but that whole line is somewhat junky.
I love the line for exactly what it represents and what they are achieving with it. I suspect that any one younger than me can’t understand that and I’m fine with it. Makes it easier for me to buy the figures.
Must have Starro Action League!
Also, I might be the only one who cares, but Diamond seems to be going a new direction with their Battle Beasts now. It’s definitely not Minimates anymore. I kinda like the stylized look.
I just like the Octopus.
What I think is more exciting about the Ghostbusters shown is that it says it’s a TRU boxset on the display card. Holidays 2011 here I come!
I’m just hoping it has a nice low & comfy retail price point! 😀
why do you have hypertext reading “blue winged zoar” that leads to a picture of a blue winged stratos? brain fart?
I meant top left not top right. I’m on auto-pilot. 😛
@Dayraven
Blue Winged Zoar is on top of Castle Grayskull!
@Steve Harrison
With a phenomenally successful line that sells out in moments and was initially priced with much lower volume in mind, I refuse to hear as many tooling excuses, especially when eacg character can be reissued and sold out again.
From the revealed list, we’re seeing a bit more ambition that way, we know Roboto will have gears of some sort. King Hiss won’t be very reuseable either. I want a Battle Armor Skeletor, he was one of my favorite figures ever! I’d want him done right, not with a repainted “H” on his chest. I’ve got a Skeletor, so I can wait.
Thanks, FakeEyes!
I can’t wait for Battle Armor Skelly. It’s silly how excited I am for it.
Fake, I agree with you. I do. MOTUC can be a paradigm shift for the entire concept of action figures. There is really very little risk and reasonable rewards Vs. the crap shoot of licensing.
Call me crazy but I suspect the Avatar (blue space cat people, not airbending) line didn’t give a good ROI.
As DR has said in the past and you echo, the line was priced out with the expectation of being low production run, probably on the order of under 5k a figure (which would be the norm for other lines sold via comic shop) and I think, again no hard numbers but gut feeling, I think they’re way past that, which means there’s sweet, sweet money coming from the line.
Yeah, Mattel can stop bitching (and penny-pinching) about tooling costs with MOTUC. You see them finding any way to repurpose any of that Avatar stuff? Not me.
(saying that, were I a 3 3/4 Joe collector I would buy up as many of those gunship toys as I could because that rocked)
The estimates on the initial six figures (remember the line was only planned to last from He-Man to Hordak [& Faker doesn’t count]) was 10k for the main two and 7500 for the rest. And yeah, if the guesses are true and they’re more than double past that, there’s money to be had. We’re seeing it in things like Battle Cat and Gygor, but not as much in the regular figures. Kinda weird.
Well, using some guesswork and assumptions…Battle Cat sold huge because he’s part of the ‘core cartoon heroes’ group. He-Man,Battle Cat, Man-At-Arms, Teela, Orko, Ram-Man, that’s the main cast. Gotta have them.
(which means Mattel is being REALLY DUMB in not getting Ram-Man out there. I can come up with a number of excuses other than tooling costs for them but screw it, just do it already!)
Gygor, I figure that has to be mainly scalper bait. The legends of ‘unreleased in America’ toys fuel all manner of insanity and tho Gygor never got past the proto stage back in the day, I’m sure the thinking is how ‘valuable’ he’s going to be, specifically to the Italian collectors market via eBay.
Ah, what do I know. I’m just a crazy man.
(were I in charge? Part of my task right now would be looking at all existing tooling and playing with creating some new, original figures as well as cranking out the classics. Why not Faker Teela? )
faker teela? now you’re just talking silly… that’d be like… i don’t know, like scareglow getting a battle cat or something! crazy talk! 😉
i can give some small leeway on ram man cuz if you have all your must-haves, why would you keep buying? i actually think king hsss is hitting a little premature, based on that reasoning… that said, i’m not exactly passing on him!
i completely agree though, it’s time to quit cheap dicking up around. to me, i look at the fact that the toys haven’t already been attempted to be pushed at retail as solo figs as a failing… BUT, let’s say we take it slow. motuc is selling VERY well. it’s time then, to invest in something a little bigger. he-man is out there, but let’s advance the position… license he-man out to like marc ecko or whoever’s hot in clothes right now and do a new official line of gear, shirts, jackets, trucker hats… things that can be done fairly cheaply, and yeild a fast return. school is going to be back soon, new he-man stuff for kids should be hitting NOW! folders, pencils, light up sneakers, stuff like that. some would say, kids are not aware of he-man cuz there’s no cartoon.
really?
cuz last year, i did a little market research. on a rainy day, we took the boys to a burger king w/ an indoor play area. the wife brought her laptop, i brought tri-klops. i set him up next to her laptop. no joke, 5 kids, the only five that weren’t half mine, in the place, stopped by to ask me who he was. the boys all said he looked cool, and so did one of the girls. they violated STRANGER DANGER for tri-klops. it’s just a matter of putting the toys out there, i promise. you know why? cuz despite no media, there’s NOTHING like these available right now, NOTHING. these would immediately catch the eye of the kid in the toy aisle. especially if we could get the price point down a bit. if they could market he-man at 12 bucks a pop, he’d be back on the top of the market be christmas. i promise. cuz he’d have NO COMPETITION!
plus, i’m a dad… my kids have watched TONS of stuff from my childhood w/ me, not all of which went over, but some did… and he-man wins baby. they like the new adventures, they like millenium, they’re a little less enthused on vintage, but they still watch it from time to time. they know what i’
ve exposed to them. if i were in the aisle buying them school supplies, sure they might get a hulk thermos and a ben 10 backpack… but it wouldn’t even take convincing to get them masters of the universe hand sanitizer or folders. parents do still make decisions for kids, and i’d still buy that stuff for mine. and mine would dig it… and surely, i’m not alone.
Now who’s talking the crazy talk? Market Research? MADNESS!
I could have sworn I saw some ‘retro’ lunch bags and backpacks for MOTU a year or so ago, along with vintage Hot Wheels branded items. Didn’t seem to be doing well.
I think the problem is, Mattel seems to believe that a ‘toy’ cannot be a ‘collectable’ and vise-versa. Yet they constantly blur that line with Hot Wheels. Remember a couple of years ago when they tried to re-introduce ‘Sizzlers’ to the marketplace in totally vintage packaging? MAN, seeing the ‘fat track’ set filled me with tons of nostalgia (and I still have mine!) but they sat and sat and then went on clearance and vanished. What happened?
Oh, Zero advertising for one. Pricepoint was another. Limited car selection and from my experience back in the day? the ‘gas pump’ charger just never did squat, only the plug in electric one did the job. And, sadly, I think the retro packaging was a turn-off for today’s kids.
But it’s about getting the toys into the HANDS of kids. Your own experience seems to prove that. Even without seeing the cartoon.
But the thinking seems to be circular, doesn’t it? We can’t sell these toys without a cartoon. WE can’t justify making a cartoon without more interest. Without national exposure we can’t sell these toys. Hey, I know, we’ll have a big national roll-out with a new He-Man movie! But we can’t get the movie going without more awareness of the brand. (and then there’s the “we can’t do THAT, that makes the movie like a toy commercial! We have to be dark! edgy! Radical! EXTREEEEEME!”)
*sigh*
So much that could be done. Ah, well, let’s get ready for that Teela/Power Girl 2-pack that’s bound to hit TRU. 😉
I was secretly kind of hoping the Retro Action Real Ghostbusters would be cool, but I see that Mattel dropped the ball again. At least they have traps, but, man they look lame. I am unreasonably disappointed in the neutrona wands being movie-styled instead of cartoon-styled, too.
Well, more money to keep, I suppose.
They’re like a tease. The colors, the blue accessories, and the somewhat likenesses all combine to get you excited, but the overall package is disappointing.
Not ragging on ya, just saying, many of your links to TNI are now broken. Looks like they’ve moved things around more in their gallery thus breaking your earlier links.
Darn that Jay Cochran! I ran through and double checked all those links before I went to bed this morning!! LOL
Thanks, TSR! That’s the first thing on my to do list…
Okay, I think I got ’em all. I did something a little different and tried updating as I found stuff, but it was wrought with problems…
you know, i’m of mixed feelings on king hsss. i LOVE the character, and very much look forward to him… but to be honest, it seems a little early to release such a heavy hitter. one, i certainly would have finished out the horde before i did any snake men, but hsss tends to be the motu line killer. vintage released one wave of product after him and died, millenium released one wave of product after him and died. while motuc seems to be rolling along well, it does scare me a bit.
LOL Hsss kills the line?
I think holding off on Snakemen would probably have been a good idea. They should have tossed Kobra Khan out there like a teaser.
Noisy, we’re doing some on-the-floor coverage at Critical Mess from SDcomics. Among other things, SD has also conducted an interview with Scott Neitlich (to be seen Monday or Tuesday, after Mattel okays the final transcript). He says Scott was very forthcoming in his answers.
(Here’s the board link to the news as we get it, and we’re doing article recaps at the end of each day: http://www.criticalmess.net/index.php?board=17.0)
Anyway, one of the pieces of info SD got today was confirming that Ted Knight Starman’s cape IS in fact just a placeholder– it’s a green version of Obsidian’s cape– that was their best option available to them for display this weekend. His cape WILL be correct on the final release. Scott wanted to make sure that info gets out on the net. Don’t worry JSA fans!
Thanks, Rod! It didn’t occur to me check you guys out over there. Oops! I’ll keep apprised and have your links in the Day One Coverage tomorrow!
And glad to hear the cape was just a display issue. I’d thought as much but you never know with Matty.
That PKE Meter is too cool.
If it came in a 2pk with a giga meter, I’d be screwed.
I know the proton pack is the “it” piece, but the trap would be the coolest thing to have as a replica piece methinks.
Mostly interested in the King Grayskull reissue and the deco isn’t some Battle Damage variant. And if King Hiss is shown, that would be great but at 8 months to March 2010 it is a long time to wait.
I mean March 2011..duh.
I hope the KG deco isn’t bad/really different… my worst fear is that I will still have to go back and get the original. I’m pretty sure we’ll see the March figure tomorrow.
What I’d like to see tomorrow is the six figures (up through March) and then a teaser for May (if it is indeed the Faceless One).
BTW, for those of us who are WWE fans… the future of the elite legends looks mighty fine to me OOOOHHHH YYEEAAAHHHHHH!! i’m PSYCHED!!!!! we got mach AND warrior AND the rockers AND demolition AND hillbilly jim AND mr wonderful… some of which jakks gave us, some of which were not the best versions or particularly easy to find, so color me a happy WWE fan. now, if only we can get a harley race, a gorgeous george, a freddie blasie (from his wrestling years) and dammit, i want mr hughes!! i want a giant gonzalez and a great khali too, along w/ my ANDRE THE FRIGGIN GIANT!!!… and WTF is going on w/ current WWE champ SHEAMUS? still nothing for sheamus!! nothing last year, nothing this year. WTF is that?
Macho Man was the one hold-out I was waiting for to see if I’d finally buy any WWE Legends; so Mattel finally has my money there.
I also hope we get Uncle Elmer, Nailz, a decent Big Boss Man figure, the Beverly Brothers, Ludvig Borga, Johnny Polo, Slick, the Steiner Bros, Big Poppa Pump, Paul Ellering, a decent Jeff Jarrett, Owen Hart, and the Smoking Guns.
They do those, and I’m pretty much set; I got everything else I could possibly want from Jakks.
i think you’re SOL on the genetic freak and the master of the stroke… they just got toys under the TNA license w/ jakks, so i imagine they’ve verboten at mattel… the rest of your list though i like. the jakks BBM really kind of sucked, didn’t it?
OOH, i forgot, owen is out barring a big shift of heart (no pun intended) from his wife, she’s suing them right now for mentioning him in some DVDs. apparently, she’s still pissed about them kind of killing her husband.
i would think, if we’re getting hillbilly jim, uncle elmer has to be in the cards eventually. i hope. but yeah, nailz… ah nailz… and we just got the road warriors, ellering should also be in the cards.
MOTU is the best line ever!! The figures look gorgeous!!
genetic freak? Master of the stroke? Um…could you be more specific? I’m guessing one refers to Johnny Polo…….
genetic freak is yet another sobriquet that scott steiner wrestles under, as is the big bad booty daddy. the “master of the stroke” refers to jefff jarrett, who’s finisher is the stroke.
johnny polo would be fun, but it was mainly a jim cornette rip off. i much prefer his work as raven (though to have figs of both characters would be sublime!)
Those streams better be in an accessory pack. I don’t want to have to buy guys again for them (But we all know I will).
Winston’s head emphasizes Mattel’s cheapness. (no wonder they didn’t sculpt the mustache) As does RGB figures being mego style. (can’t get away with reusing bodies… hmmm… oh wait!)
BUT. $50 PKE meter… well, that might make up for everything.
the very suggestion that ML might be due for a comeback makes my loins quiver.
I thought it might.
I will kill for that LSH 12 pack. I mean it. As long as I don’t get caught, I will kill for it.
And then they MUST do a set of all the gals. yes they must.
With that roll call, that sure sounds like ’70s Legion to me, which makes me all tingly. I can’t help it.
DCUC wave 16 looks brilliant Riddler and Creeper looks great.I dont like that Hot Toys didnt show any of new figures but I really need to get Ezio from AC 2 hes gonna be my first Hot Toys figure I loved the game.DC Direct Batman AA toys looks fantastic!=)