After reading the recent article about the Japanese designers who worked on Universe, Animated and the Movie recently, I realized, weve seen japanese exclusives for the movie line, and altered painjobs, and Henkei for Universe of there, but do they get the Animated line at all? Are they revised for the International Market?
So far as no, not yet. Yes the Taktomy guys help design, but the figures are probably only available there as imports of the US stuff. Though a Taktomy release of the Animated brand would leave me hopeful for a Ramjet...
Its likely Hasbro will do what they did with beast wars:metals. They will wait till the animated show is completed so they can air it all in one shot. They will probably only release selective toys from the line. I doubt we will get everybody but the one we do get will be more show accurate.
Im just really surprised they didnt release these over there instead of some of the other lines, you would think the anime styling would be quite popular.
More than likely, they're going to wait until it's over in the US, and then release them next year after the movie stuff is done.
If they do it at all, that's what I expect they will do. Assuming the third season is the last, there will be 42 episodes (breaking up 'movies' into 3 eps each). I could potentially see Animated being a hit in Japan, if the dubbing isn't borked up. Some of the more popular TF series in Japan are the "less Japanese" ones (G1, BW), And Animated has a nice mix of new style and nostalgia that might appeal to them. (emphasis on "big maybe", since Takara-Tomy have largely shifted to a collector base regarding TFs)
IF (and right now that's a big if) it does get released, I suspect it will be treated much like Beast Machines was. It'll get aired a year or more later, all in one shot, and the only toys will be the "best smallest" version of each character. Heck, part of me wouldn't be surprised if all they did was release a store exclusive Activators and that was it.
