Here’s Part Two of our AskDST catch-up session - featuring your questions about Marvel Select, Indiana Jones, Star Wars Battle Beasts AND DSTChuck’s take on the Disney/Marvel deal!  We’ll be back on Monday with our next batch of Star Trek questions, so enjoy this double-dose of AskDST and check back Monday morning for more!

Paul Rogus

Dear DST Chuck - Great to see you at SDCC! So any chance we’ll see a Ch’od variant of the awesome Abomination? I can’t think of any others that make sense. And please leak us sore loser Marvel Legends fans some news of some more awesome Marvel Selects! Would love to see comic book versions of the Iron Monger, classic Titanium Man or Crimson Dynamo! Classic Ultron at the gates of Avengers mansion with a demolished Vision would sell, sell, sell. Of Course Lockjaw with Medusa or Crystal could work now that Lockjaw had a mini series. Keep making great stuff. Thanks Diamond Select!!

DSTChuck: Right now we do not have any plans for variants to Abomination but you never know. As for some of your request, I can’t officially comment on specific characters, but I can say we see no reason to change course. Our plans are the same they were when we started this line, we’re going to mix core characters (Spider-Man), along with new editorial (Anti-Venom) and classic niche characters that may be seeing re-newed interested (Moon Knight). The new wrinkle is we hope to be able to keep doing the movies as well (Wolverine). Hopefully in that mix we’ll pick some characters your looking for.

Tom Smith

Hello, just saw pictures of the ultimate quarter scale Henry Jones. Good job there guys but I had a concern about the Indy line. If Henry suffers the same lack of support that killed the Mutt figure, will this be the end of the Indy line? I just really want a Crystal Skull Indy to compliment the Raiders one, and it seems it would stand a better chance at getting retailer support than Henry. Thanks for hearing me out, look forward to Cairo Indy.

DSTChuck: We’re really hopeful for both Henry Jones and Cairo Indy, we think the classic appeal of these looks will help put them over the top. If for some reason that does not hold true, we would just take a little break from Indy and let the dust settle before we re-introduce the line. We’re very happy to be able to work in Indiana Jones and are confident there is a following for these collectibles.

Tom Smith

What are the chances of a Ultimate Quarter Scale Han Solo in his standard outfit from Empire Strikes Back? Would it be considered too close in look to the New Hope Han to be considered viable?

DSTChuck: Tom, I think you are correct, in the short term we would consider them too close but if the line goes on for years –you never know.

Brent Blough

Recently heard about the Marvel/Disney deal. Will this have any affect on your licensing deal with Marvel? Or is to early to tell? Thanks

DSTChuck: I’d have to say of course its to early to tell, but we’d like to think there will be no change. The big issue when Hasbro came in was , would DST be allowed to continue and with some compromise, everyone has found a way to get along. With the new Disney deal, we’d still be taking a license to make Marvel products so that would not change. While to date DST has never taken a direct license from Disney, we’ve had many conversations and they seem like great folks and I’m sure we’ll be talking about this soon.

Justin Pannichelli

Now that Disney has bought Marvel. Is this in anyway going to affect your products.

DSTChuck: Just the fact that now I can pack Spidey with Mickey Mouse for a dream come true Minimate 2 pack! No just kidding, see response above.

Brian Petersen

The Stay-Puft Marshmellow Man is the coolest piggy bank ever! I absolutely love it. Thank you guys so much for making him possible.

DSTChuck: Hey its all our pleasure! We’ve wanted to work on this property for SO long its great to be given a chance and we’re having lots of fun with it.

Kevin Thomas

Hello again, I try to avoid this type of question but has DST/AA ever looked into doing any HBO products. I know that they have a lot of shows where it would be hard to make products for, but for a series like True Blood, Sopranos or even Carnivale, there are decent enough characters to work with. Even an HBO series of minimates box sets would be neat. Anyway, my question is just have you ever looked into doing any HBO stuff?

DSTChuck: Yes we have looked at HBO properties and because of the way they do their licensing deals, it not something we could tackle right now, but they are something we’d love to work on some day.

Hernan Gamez

Hi sir, I m collector the ultimate quarter Star Wars line , please I want to know if possible see in the near future Stormtrooper or clonetrooper in this excellent line. Thanks!!

DSTChuck: We’re going to tackle all the armored characters as time allows. We had planned on starting to get to them as we entered the third or fourth year of the line, but as evidenced by the photos of Vader we’re moving much quicker then we expected and you should start to see characters like that as soon as 2010.

Hernan Gamez

Hi sir, congratulation for the ultimate quarter Star Wars figures! great collection! please I want to know if you have announcement in the near future for the clonetrooper or stormtrooper for this line. thanks!

DSTChuck: Hernan, glad you like the line. We’d like to think we’re getting better as we go along- after all we only have 4 figures in stores (at the time I type this).

Sylvain Heyser

Hi DSTChuck. There are some ideas/requests about the new Battle Beasts line.
1/ Please include some kind of secret wood/water/fire symbol on the figure. Even a small sticker under the armor would be great. This gimmick was part of the old line and new Battle Beasts have to have one.
2/ Another important fact about the old line was the mystery. When you bought some figures you never knew which symbol they had until you had opened them. Maybe you could put more mystery in the new line by selling 2 packs with one random hidden figure.
3/ In Japan Takara released variants of existing figures like clear ones or all white ones. The same can be made with the new Minimates line as you already offered variants (Marvel). This idea can be combined with the #2 to keep the variant hidden until you open the package. That’s all until next round. Sylvain

DSTChuck: Thanks for the ideas and input. We’d had lots of interest in this line since we showed the one figure at SDCC.

Tom Whitworth

I ask this question as not a trekkie but a star wars fan as well. I know how long each model takes but as your model star trek ship sales are through the roof, I ask you why not some star wars ships like the imperial star destroyer or death star (my two faves!!!!!!) but I know this is not relevant but how about a uss voyager model I wont mind waiting 2 years but if they do come out it will be worth the wait!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! good job so far and hope you have the best of luck for the future!!!!!!!!! tom

DSTChuck: Tom, I apprectiate your enthusiasm but I’m not sure I’d classify our Trek ship sales as through the roof. We’ve never said we won’t do a Voyager, its just we have other ships we think will sell better (we might be wrong) and we want to get to those first. As for your SW question, while we’d LOVE to do ships I am SURE that’s not an aspect of their license that Hasbro would be willing to give up- and they do a great job with them anyway.

Roddy DeHart

Can you guys make a Ghostbusters Ghost Trap bank like that of the Stay Puft?

DSTChuck: We’ve got several more idea we think are pretty cool for Ghostbusters and hopefully the line will do well and we’ll be able to get to all of them.