DCD Pops its Con Exculsive Cherry

It's been a long time coming: DC Direct will officially issue its first Convention Exclusives at this year's San Diego Comic Con and Wizard World Chicago. Opinion is strongly divided on whether this long awaited entry is a bang or a whimper.

On offer will be retooled versions of the Batman and Joker figures from the recent Batman & Son series. The Bats is a black & grey version of the original blue and grey and interestingly the Bat Prongs are less stumpy than the original. The Joker is a bigger retool with a straight jacket and bare feet similar to his appearance in the recent Batman vs. The Joker statue. (Thought: I hope this new Joker is steady on his feet - my Batman & Son Joker toppled off the shelf so many times I had to put him away!!)

The packaging of these exclusives is outstanding. The style of the design and artwork is very similar to the boxes for the 13" figures and it seems that the packaging inside allows for good looking display in package if desired.

I've read a lot of complaints about the choice of figures for these con exclusives, but it seems to me this is a bit short sighted. Sure, I'd rather DCD was putting out B'wana Beast and a Silver Age Brainiac as much as the next collector, but are we really the target audience for these exclusives? It seems to me this is a great opportunity for DCD to pull in a wider range of fanboys and girls, and capitalising on the Batman / Joker hype from The Dark Knight movie is a pretty sensible move.

The flipside of course is that by offering retooled figures as opposed to originals the core DCD fanbase is less likely to chase these down and go crazy over them the way us crazy fanboys / girls (fanpersons???) tend to do. Doubtless a whole swag of these will still end up on eBay at ridiculous prices.

All up I think these are a great effort for the big picture and I don't think DCD is deserving of the bad rap some are giving them in this instance. Obviously this little Aussieland resident won't be hitting the cons to pick these up, but I'll be hoping one of my reliable Yankee mates will help me out so I don't have to go down the auction road.

Now, DCD, about that B'wana Beast................