Ok this is a call to all #fangirls if you will support me in my effort to get @HasbroNews figures of Hera and Sabine retweet this or DM me!
— Teresa Delgado (@icecoldpenguin) February 17, 2014
Toys, they bring great joy to kids and adults alike. Toys take many shapes from action figures to playing cards. Star Wars has been a pioneer in the world of toys and marketing since the late 1970’s. I have always been proud to be a Star Wars toy collector but today I am not so sure.
Star Wars Rebels is coming and this actually made me excited for action figures. I traditionally do not collect them, instead I collect certain characters. When the Vintage line was out I only picked up figures fromReturn of the Jedi and The Phantom Menace, from any other lines I only pick up Ahsoka, R2-D2 and Darth Maul. However, I had planned on getting all the Star Wars Rebels figures until Hasbro announced the first toys they would be releasing, all male characters!
Greg Weisman has been talking for months about having female characters as leads. This has gotten me so excited for Star Wars Rebels. I was even able to overlook the fact that the first announced characters were all male and a droid. Here we are after Toy Fair and we find out there are no female action figures slated. We even had to pick apart the news in order to get names and information about Sabine. Hera we did not even get to see until she was featured on other Star Wars Rebels merchandise from other toy manufacturers. To this I say shame on you Hasbro and Star Wars.
Hasbro has said they do not make female action figures because they don’t sell and other toy brands have said the same. How can you say that when you do not make enough of them for us to be able to buy them in the first place. I am also pretty sure the only figures I can find on the shelves are male characters no one wants!
My friend Jason Ward at Making Star Wars has written a wonderful piece that sums up my feelings. He and I share the same opinion about this issue. I am planning on fighting this injustice and will keep you guys updated on how I intend to do this. We have to break the stereotypes and the gender divide in the toy arena.
Here’s an excerpt from his artticle.
If boys are excluding women from their imaginations, it isn’t biological. It is cultural. It is something we are collectively doing wrong as a society. Something we can fix and we cannot begin to fix if there are no female toys to play with.
Star Wars is for everyone. There are boy heroes. There are women heroes. Please don’t be such quitters. Don’t throw your hands up and say “boys don’t play with girls and girls don’t play with action figures.” That simply isn’t true. As a child I played with action figures with girls many times, and they played with my action figure more than I played dolls with them because they were more fun.
Star Wars is forever and Star Wars is for everyone. Perhaps if Hasbro cannot adhere to that philosophy, they’re not the toymakers Star Wars needs? I will say this, I believe they can be. I believe Hasbro can solve this problem. I hope the Star Wars fanbase challenges them and holds them not only to the standard of detail we demand in Star Wars products, but also to our cultural standards we demand are upheld as well.