UPDATE: Apparently the figure is only being delayed “due to a production issue with Princess Leia’s robe.” She’ll be back on shelves “later this year.”
So hot on the heels of the last dustup over the lack of female figures, Jedi Temple Archive reports that Hasbro has pulled the Ceremonial Princess Leia figures from Wave 7 and Wave 8 of the Black Series, replacing her with… A stormtrooper and a clone trooper.
Yakface, one of the first to bring this to the attention of the wider fandom, started the #whereisleia and #wewantleia hashtags.
Devin Faraci at Badass Digest wrote about looking for action figures for his niece, the latest in a familiar refrain:
The fact that Hasbro is canceling one of its few Leia figures means that they’re only keeping the status quo. Would more girl toys sell now, as the demographics of fandom shifts dramatically? No one can know when the toys don’t exist. I wanted to go and spend my money on female characters for my goddaughter, but I was not offered the opportunity. Young female fans should be able to walk into Toys ‘R Us and find a toy based on the largest and most popular stories in our pop culture that speaks to them. It’s as simple as that, and when the only option is a sexualized and subservient variant – why would they want to buy that? Why would their parents want to buy that for them?
Sure, there’s that Ahsoka figure coming and it seems like Boushh disguise Leia is still on, but canceling any of the few Leia figures they were hyping just over a month ago isn’t exactly fostering good faith in their intentions.
Yeah, this doesn’t look very good for them. Sometimes figures get shuffled around due to production issues, so hopefully that’s all it is; a Vintage Collection Wedge was pulled from the planned case assortments and reissued months later since the head wasn’t working, and the recent 6″ Chewbacca was delayed so they could redesign the box to fit him better, for example. If I had to guess, I’d bet the cloth elements were giving them grief. Hopefully she doesn’t join the ranks of lost figures and still finds a way out…though it may be difficult since these are the last waves coming before the TFA stuff. I’ll definitely ask them about this at Celebration, as I’m sure will many others.
It doesn’t match Leia anyway.
I, too, hope Leia is just being pushed back a bit. The figure looks like an improvement over the last Ceremonial Leia and I’d buy it. I’m glad to send a message to Hasbro that we value this and other female figures. I’m going to wishfully predict that this figure will be in an Episode VII Evolutions pack along with a Leia from The Force Awakens.
So…in all seriousness…what the hell are these merch companies going to when VII comes out and Rey is the out-and-out lead character? Will this franchise still be “for boys” when the main character is female? This continues to baffle me.