>>10980463I think they're just way too late. The better movies are from 4 decades back. Even though I was around then, I was fixated on GoBots/TransFormers to the exclusion of almost everything else, so I don't remember the original toys.
Now, I was a little more aware when Crystal Skull spawned a toyline. I don't hate that movie like alot of people seem to and put it over Temple as #3. But that toyline was sort of a wreck. They all have weird articulation, which is all the more bizarre considering it was alongside GIJoe 25th and Star Wars TVC (Marvel U was a little later). Also distribution was bad as the latter half was nowhere to be found.
Dial was not a great movie. And the time period with the wokeness didn't help. The "kids" line was vanishingly small, at least what I saw of it. Most of the collector line didn't hit stores here until it was almost over and then just leftovers, maybe 3 or 4 figures total.
But here's another thing - I think Indy didn't work in toys for the same reason TF rarely works as a video game. In TF fiction, you don't get much of a sense of armies at war because they give all of the soldiers at least some personality. In the context of a game, it's hard to pick a "main" character and the endless drones to beat up, like Foot Soldiers or Hydra Soldiers, just aren't there. Indy works as a game because there's a clear main character and lots of faceless Nazis/Soviets to beat up. But when you get a toy line, TF is a much easier sell because all you really need is a good guy and a bad guy. Prime vs Megatron, Jazz vs Starscream, Bee vs Laserbeak, it's effectively an equal(ish) fight. Indy, OK, you buy Indy as the main hero, but there's no really strong villain for him to fight. Then they go and take away the faceless Nazis/Soviets because woke. So then you're stuck with Indy and nothing else. That _can_ work, like as a My Buddy doll situation where he comes along with you on your adventures in the backyard, but not as an action figure.
