Part of that made no sense. If Hasbro infringes on Boeings jet design (for SS) in 1984, they are "grandfathered" into legality?

So movie SS is not infringing because it's copying an original infringement (cartoon) from 84???

Look, the reason Hasbro didn't get sued in 1984 was because they didn't get sued. That doesn't mean they weren't guilty of provable intellectual theft; it only means that Boeing never sued them (for whatever reason).

You know who actually "wins" that court battle? The company who pays more for lawyers, i.e. Boeing. Hasbro would be wise to not attempt to challenge these big fish.

 

I am hoping we get one eventually. Someone suggested 3p options before but I've seen those and they ran into the same issue; having a disproportionate jet mode. They also got their F-4 Phantom references mixed up(the onscreen movie model is mashup also but the 3p companies mashed up the wrong versions).

The only logical theory to me is that Hasbro had to start design on the figure before Paramount decided on the jet mode. Hasbro then probably added refinements after the movie came out. Maybe this figure was also planned for release end of 2018 but pushed back until now. G1 Fireflight wasn't licensed but clearly was a simplified F-4 and I wish that was the case here....however that is why I think Paramount hasn't decided on a jet mode before Hasbro started designing the figure.

This is another reason why I wish Hasbro waited until they got the finalized designs. Takara made a big deal about the Studio Series in magazine interviews when it was about to come out. About how they used to screengrab movies on their own for reference but now(when the Studio Series was just starting) they finally had access to the ILM design files and could work from those.

So I really think this is actually the marketing team's fault for pushing the design team to work off of concept art from the Bumblebee movie instead of the finalized designs. You can tell since Bumblebee's wings can't fold back on the VW SS figure and other differences.

Maybe Takara will explain why Blitzwing turned out the way it did in a future magazine interview.

Rather than look into a 3p option, I'm okay with canting the horizontal stabilizers upward as vertical stabilizers and seeing if the vertical stabilizer can pivot downward as central fins. Hopefully this is possible.

 

I have a hard time believing that POS was actually licensed. Sideways as a not-R8 still looked closer to the real thing than Crosshairs.

 

Again, it still looks quite off, but we're comparing
This

To this

Plus the fact it actually uses the parts of the jet.

 

Ah....no wonder the cockpit and surface arrangement looked familiar... I think Hasbro was trying to make SS Blitzwing look like the Boeing T-7(stabilizers still need to be bigger though):
https://www.boeing.com/defense/t-7a/

The fuselage could be stretched and thinned out a bit and I wouldn't mind if Blitzwing's jet mode was like that, but I'd prefer something voyager sized to mix in with my other SS figures. Whereas that Zeta one is MP or larger IIRC.

 

I thought it looked white in the box package we saw a couple days ago and figured it was just glare on the window.

 

Yeah, 3A scale was a mistake.
I still like how the official looks though.

 

Licensing and copyright laws really don't sometimes.

Copyright laws were different back then, namely much looser. Plus, neither Starscream's original toy nor animation model exactly match a real-life F-15, and in Japan where the toy originated from, copyright laws practically didn't exist.

Yes and no. It's not copying an infringement, as again G1 Starscream didn't infringe. As long as they don't mimic an F-15 more than the original toy/cartoon design did, they have the leeway of saying 'we're not copying the F-15, we're merely replicating our own character as they appeared in that series."

No, they didn't get sued because back then they wouldn't have had a case. Or rather, a worthwhile case.

Copyright laws are different nowadays, a good example would be back in RID01. Takara used several car licenses for the Autobot brothers. In Japan this was fine, you can copy pretty much anything, (it's actually kind of insane) but when the toys were brought over to the US X-Brawn had to be retooled when Mercedes saw a very infringing reproduction of their vehicle, hence his odd head and tail lights. Side Burn and Prowl were fine though, until a few years later when the moulds were reused in Universe and things had changed, forcing Hasbro to actually acquire licenses for those cars in order to reuse their own moulds, despite not having needed to before.

The thing with copyright infringement is it's a surprisingly hard thing to actually prove, or at least was before the laws became stricter and more detailed, since ultimately a toy is not a 100% accurate to reality reproduction, it will always have the compromises and changes that come with being a toy. Hence why context matters when proving if a toy is actually trying to be the exact vehicle in question, or based off something else. Again, Hasbro can easily say that's not an F-15, it's just a jet with similar features, and can point to the fact that they're basing said toy off of a cartoon or comic or whatever that doesn't depict an actual F-15. they can't do that with Blitzwing, who's only fictional/prior depictions were the BB movie where he is unambiguously an F2 Phantom.

You're not far off with the "they didn't get sued because they didn't get sued," though. It's why some car modes can get closer to real vehicles than others. Ultimately whether or not a company considers their vehicle to be infringed upon is up to them, and whether they think it's worth going after. My point is that Blitzwing would've been a higher risk due to being based on a character who had zero ambiguity with what he was.

There's also the possibility that Hasbro did try to get the license to the F2 and were denied, forcing them to come up with a totally different jet lest a lookalike be taken to court with the argument "they tried to get our jet likeness and failed, so they're just copying it anyway!" But again, purely conjecture. The fact is we have no knowledge of what either company has tried to do or really thinks, so these are all just possibilities rather than me attempting to prove what really happened.

This is 100% correct. Hence Blitzwing's alt mode.

Yet the second one actually looks more like something that could actually fly. :/ (robot kibble notwithstanding  )

 

Wait, did Hasbro really not have any of the ILM files when this figure was designed? The movie is out for over a year now. There's no way Hasbro doesn't have access to them, especially when 3A was able to release a Blitzwing a while back.

I feel like they just copied the Igniter alt mode since they already had that as a reference. It's a shame since it was inaccurate to begin with (and yes, I realize they don't have the license but it's incredibly off).

 

Zeta Toys seems to be more about SORTA MOSTLY there in terms of accuracy. Not a fan of how they stylize toys clearly meant to be directly based on either the cartoon or the movies.

 

My current headcanon is: they actually designed Blitzwing to have a f4 phantom and he would be released early, but they were rejected from the licenese and redesigned the mold to use the plane from the energon ignitors toy. (Safe route)
Wouldn't be surprised if Dino got the same treatment and that would be reason why he appeared 2 times in the UPC listings

 

An entirely plausible scenario.

 

Re: copyright laws - IIRC most companies didn't care that much about protecting their IP as represented in other media in the '80s - Hasbro even got away with fudged sponsor logos on the race cars like Alitalla, Martinii, and Citanes. However, RID 2001 was kinda the turning point because it indirectly led to Alternators, then the movies and the Masterpiece line in its current iteration with fully licensed Autobot cars. So in a weird way, we have copyright infringement in the early 2000s to thank for the bevy of officially sponsored alt modes today. It's understandable why Hasbro tries to avoid pursuing licenses for Generations, though if I'm not mistaken there is more leeway with representing military hardware (and IIRC, it was or has been the case for a very long time where media such as video games don't usually have to pursue licenses from gun makers to use their weapons in-media).

 

They have access now, but it's possible that this SS Blitzwing was designed before they got access to the finalized character designs. Maybe Hasbro started designing this figure in 2017? I remember SS Blitzwing being on rumor lists for a longtime. That's why I think this figure was designed early but had its release pushed back.

 

Considering the fact that it’s only a £30/ whatever in $ toy, I think it looks fine. The alt mode is disappointing but I can make it work personally and I’ll be getting it for sure, but then again my head canon is that this was Ramjet in the movie. Blitzwing my ass. He could have done with being more of a grey than white I think it would have helped much more.

Looking at it again, I think that if the top stabiliser could slide back to the end of the tail and where his feet end up between the wings and the horizontal stabilisers, you’d get a much better looking jet. Especially since we know we can either split the top fins or have them separate like an F-18.

 

wot the shet


...I mean he kinda looks cool tho with the white helmet, ngl?

 

Sigh. Looks like Ill have to bust out the acrylic black paints and do a slight head and arms and leg parts repaint.

 

I'm assuming 3Ps don't have to worry about the legal troubles associated with licensed alt modes.

Or, at least, they can get much closer than Hasbro without risking legal issues.

 

Odd choice for the head color, though this seems like it could just be a prototype since it'd be weird for it to remain like that when the render on the box clearly shows him with a black helm.

 

Could be. He was going to come out sooner but then licensing issues forced a redesign and they had to shuffle the schedule around.