Well, leave it to “notpicard” of the JoeCustoms forums to put my feelings perfectly in MANY less words than I did.  What he posted is pretty much exactly my thoughts and opinions on the matter, and I’m happy to see them expressed:

” think there are a few lessons to be learned here, but I don’t hope MC gets stuck in the deal.

Personally, I see it as an act of good intention that they are trying to release items that we clamoured for. We shouted, they listened. It’s like Kay-Bee Manimals Lesson: Chapter 2.

I think the real lesson at hand is that the timing was toooo late on both of those counts. Had the Kay-Bee Manimals been released when there wasn’t new product on the horizon, I think they would have done better. Likewise, had these been released when the collective attention of the community was pointed toward “new” sculpt stuff, they would have sold pretty well. The total is $132.97 for everything shipped IF you don’t wait to have it all shipped at once (which does run the slight risk off sell-outs). That comes out to $19 per figure shipped. How far is that really from the prices of the con sets? Yes, it is high, but we should have expected that from a MC offering. And had they been timed right, I don’t think price would be as much of an issue.

Another way to look at price is to compare it to the going rate of the samples that leaked from chinese sellers. Airtight bottomed out as the cheapest guy to get around (iirc) $30. But Falcon maintained value at well over the cost of this entire set. So I can see MC thinking $19 each w/shipping is a good deal.

I’ll definitely be buying and I hope to get some extra accessories to finish out the parts I am missing from my sample pieces.

Maybe in the future, Hasbro can give MC a faster heads up on items that are not going to be made. How long were these delayed by Hasbro with no official cancellation? That is probably the largest chunk of the timing issue before MC stepped in.”

Can I get an “amen”?  That’s the point I was trying to make before my rants on fandom in general got in the way.  😉