How much Merch is too much?

[canofhumdingers]

There’s an embarrassment of riches for Godzilla collectors these days. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen and perhaps the best time to be a Godzilla collector ever. We’ve got Bandai bringing us piles of new vinyls, many of which we assumed would never happen (Ebirah! Varan!) as well as really brining their A-game on some recent SHMA (Gigan!! Mecha King Ghidorah SCV, Gamera resculpt and Irys!). X-plus continues to pump out a steady stream of high end items. There’s the recent news of Spiral Studios jumping into the designer vinyl figure world in addition to their eye-wateringly expensive and HUGE statues . We even have *multiple* US based licensors pumping out numerous figure lines (Super7 Ultimates! Reactions; Mezco)! And then there’s books, both Japanese and even English language publications. There’s also piles of household merchandise like shirts, posters, lunchboxes, blankets, board games, etc. piling up. And the releases are coming out at blinding speed.

And we have unprecedented access to it all between so many domestic releases, Kinokuniya bookstores (brick and mortar as well as online ordering!), and now Buyee partnering with the Godzilla Store. It’s almost surreal.

And I find it’s possibly becoming TOO much (I can’t believe I’m saying this!! Who ever thought we’d have too much Godzilla product available?!)

I’ve long been a “buy only what I truly like, and curate my collection by pruning it from time to time so it doesn’t get too big and remains fresh with new things coming in to replace the old” type of collector. But there is SO much good stuff coming out SO fast that I can’t even only buy the things I truly like! I’m not even delving into all the various lines available, I pick and choose the best/“most desirable to me” items from the lines I am buying, and it’s still more than I can keep up with. It’s crazy! And I’m not sure if I feel happy to have so many options or overwhelmed by the variety and quantity.

What do you guys think?

[shadowgigan]

It's only become a problem for me recently. Every other month there seems to be a new grail-tier figure announced. Case in point: The new CCP Gamera. This comes after I just spent like $500 on the Zo 84. I just wish they would slow down a little bit on the ultra-incredible hyper detailed sculpts, because I can only afford to spend so much in a year.

Edit: But I know collectors that are spending upwards of $10K a year on this stuff. So the new target audience might be upper middle class and above, at least for the higher end stuff. Idk.

[Mac Daddy MM]

It's weird to be living in such a time, for sure. It seems we get new announcements every week on things. Some things I know I'll pick up, others I know I'll pass on. I used to think owning a handful of X-Pluses was a cool thing, and then comes $3000 Godzilla polystone busts and stuff, which I know I'll never own. I got most of my older releases bought that I've hunted, so now it's just keeping up with new releases.

[canofhumdingers]

I’m genuinely surprised there’s a big enough market for this steady stream of really high end enormous statues. It’s not just the cost, but the space needed to display them. Especially if you buy several. But I guess with 8 billion people there’s enough out there to support production runs of a few hundred of ‘em.

One thing I’ve really enjoyed the last year or two is the oddball merchandise. My kids love playing Godzilla Jenga and that tabletop miniature style board game from Funko (Godzilla Tokyo Clash). Personally, I’ve been loving the Godzilla movie poster blanket. It has one Japanese theatrical poster from every Japanese film from 1954-2016. I keep it in my home theater and use it every time I watch something there.

[JVM]

There is no such thing as "too much" especially when kaiju merchandise is more affordable and accessible than any time before. You just keep collecting until you run out of money or until you get bored, I guess? I can't keep up with any of it. There is so much coming out and it's hard to keep up with buying every single thing and I'm absolutely flunking it.

[JAGzilla]

I just bailed out completely last year. I don't have the money or space to even come close to keeping up with what I'd want, and I'm just not going to stress about it. This hobby can become a burden very quickly.

[Petezilla]

I feel exactly like that, too. While it is extremely exciting to finally get so many great items it is also starting to become depressing, because I simply can't afford everything I want anymore. And then there's the exorbitant price hike in item costs. You could get your nicely painted 6" BANDAI vinyl for 800 JPY ten years ago. You're now paying at least 2000+ (sometimes even 4000+) and for a new 6" figure with often little to no paint on them. You could get a bigger ULTRA-ACT figure for like 4000 to 5000 JPY. Now you get a smaller S.H.Figuarts for 7000+ JPY. MonsterArts have almost doubled in price since the line started, too. I won't even start with the more niche brands. It is just became too much to pay for every month...

I collect BANDAI only and I needed to stop collecting their great S.H.Figuarts Ultraman line some time ago, because I just can't afford all the stuff they're churning out every month anymore. 1 item every 1 or 2 months was OK, but shelling out another 15.000 to 20.000 JPY for 2 to 3 Figuarts Ultras each month month IN ADDITION to my BANDAI Godzilla & Gamera completism syndrome just became to much to financially handle. I used to get older out-of-print figures every now and then, too, but recently I struggle to keep up with just what gets newly released.

This hobby slowly turns from immense fun to psychological stress due to the sheer amount and cost of all those neat things...

[JVM]

For the level of quality and screen accuracy we're getting in most of these products, they seem extremely affordable on the whole. If you start compromising those values, no collectors will actually buy them and we lose the whole market.

[JAGzilla]

For the level of quality and screen accuracy we're getting in most of these products, they seem extremely affordable on the whole. If you start compromising those values, no collectors will actually buy them and we lose the whole market.

Which lines are you talking about? SHMA has ballooned in cost while quality has been spotty and accessories are mostly gone. Bandai MMS are getting more expensive while paint is often minimal and sculpts are all over the place.

[canofhumdingers]

I find I’m running into two issues lately with the total glut of stuff being produced.

First is budget. I set a monthly budget a long time ago for my personal collecting entertainment. It includes any spending on toys, books, movies, games, model building, etc. It’s a reasonable amount that allows me to get plenty of cool stuff without having any effect on our actual budget for important things like mortgage, bills, groceries and stuff. I could increase the budget easily without any significant impact to those other things but that kind of defeats the purpose. I set the budget to keep spending on these non-essentials to a reasonable level and also to help limit the amount of stuff I accumulate. But with the sheer amount of Godzilla merch coming out I could easily spend my entire annual budget and more just on Godzilla and still not be able to keep up.

Second is space. I’m pretty much at the limit of what I can reasonably display. As I’ve said, I periodically purge and sell old stuff to make way for new things I want. Problem is the new stuff is coming out at such break-neck speed I can’t prune things fast enough. I find I’ve purged most of the things I’m currently willing to part with and what I have left is stuff I still really like and want to keep for a while. But that doesn’t mean I want to abandon or even just pause collecting for a while and miss out on anything new for a period of time.

Basically collecting for me has become an active balancing act of time, space, budget, and an items desireability. It’s a balancing act I enjoy. But the quantity of merch coming out now is throwing that process out of balance which has raised new questions that I haven’t quite found the answers to yet.

[Creature22]

I feel that it’s a bit oversaturated, if not expensive, in more ways than one. Our culture already has a somewhat toxic relationship with nostalgia that companies tend to exploit, and this makes things a lot more overblown/obvious now than they were in the past. Obviously none of this stuff is necessary, but it feels like it has gone from being just “unnecessary” to being overtly unnecessary, if that makes sense. I kind of feel burnt out by a lot of it.

Personally speaking, I’ve been trying to jump ship. I intend to move, cutting my collection down to a single bin, so I’ve passed on nearly every new item being released as a result (with the exception of Bandai reeling me in here and there). For the most part I buy second-hand, but the Buyee/Mandarake pond also seems to be drying up and getting more expensive. I’m losing enthusiasm on one end and being priced out on the other.

[Star Falcon]

Good thread as it's easy to get sucked into the echo chamber and FOMO of missing out sometimes! I do think it's good to have some new lines come in to keep Bandai and X-Plus on their toes as i felt the quality dipped at one point at least with SHMA. I've come to terms of being happy with a moderate sized collection and picking up just 1-2 things a year, as well as selling off some items that don't do it for me any longer.
If nothing else, external factors have had the biggest impact on slowing me down - general cost of living as well as increasing responsibilities as the main earner for our family.

[Platypus Prime]

I've started only really looking at something if it's entirely unique to me or if it's a major upgrade. Like how I've skipped almost all Godzilla variations, as I have the Music Box one, a SCV 2000, and a NECA Reactor Glow and Poster Color. Four 'nice ones', for me, is PLENTY. I did get the Playmates giant '54 as it was something I didn't have, a good big 'beater' for my nephew.

I replaced my king Ghidorah completely, going from this:



To this:



Hedorah was an easy preorder, Rose Biollante too. I'm still waffling over a Mecha-Godzilla as I have so much 'upright dinosaur' stuff already, same thing goes for Gigan. Any upgrade to my MMS Gamera will have to depend on what they show. In the end, I want my monster shelf to have a variety, rather than reflect any certain movie. And there's just so MUCH out now, I have to draw the line somewhere.

[LSD Jellyfish]

The issue becomes an issue when one of two things happen, usually in tandem.

A) You don't appreciate the last figures you just bought.

What I mean by this, is that you rapidly buy figures one after another and have little time to appreciate the ones you just bought. For example, a month or two ago, I bought new figure releases of Daimajin and Megagurius. I have a special place on my desk where I put newish figures I've purchased (or occasionally just personal favorites) so I can easily look at them in passing. However, very recently, I've also been purchasing a lot of old Iwakura figures, and those have rapidly been cycled through. Just last week I got Varan and Eva Unit 02, and while those will be on my desk for a while, I feel like I'm rapidly cycling through new figures, and not enjoying/appreciating them just as much as I used to.

B) You buy figures not because you really want them, but you're worried if you don't acquire them now, they'll be impossible/much more expensive to purchase down the line.

This is especially true for Bandais, SHMA Monster Arts, and other "non-specialty toys". What I mean by this is that these are figures that are part of a specific line, where they're relatively cheap/affordable for retail value on release, but may skyrocket in price in the future.

It doesn't really apply to some of the more "artistic"/specialty figure companies. Sure, there may be a specific Marusan Coloration that you might want, and it might go fast, but at the same time it's likely that if you can't find or purchase a new marusan you like now, down the line there will be a new one you'll want to get. For example, I regret not buying the Hedorah Marusan pack from a year ago. But, now I know in a couple of weeks they have a Christmas coloring, which I like just as much. Unless something horrible happens, there will always be some sort of new marusan figure, that will be unique and cool. You have to accept at face value that you'll never be able to buy all the Hedorahs or whatever, unless you're super rich, so the fomo sort of dissapates.

[Fermix]

What LSD has said really resonates with me and my experience towards the end of my collecting Marvel Legends. Got to a point where I was buying figures I didn't even want just to complete casts. I'm trying my best to curate my collection now. Sometimes I slip, but I try to regularly stay on top of it.

[G1985]

The issue becomes an issue when one of two things happen, usually in tandem.

A) You don't appreciate the last figures you just bought.
B) You buy figures not because you really want them, but you're worried if you don't acquire them now, they'll be impossible/much more expensive to purchase down the line.

I feel personally attacked I would add a third category:

C) You buy the newest version of a particular kaju, even though you find it less appealing than the old version you bought ten years ago.

[Platypus Prime]

It's that "C" you mention that keeps me from replacing Music Box Godzilla. I know many found the effect lackluster, but in a dim room, I have not found anything comparable.

The "may not be able to get X affordably in the future" thing seems to be less and less of a concern. It IS true that it may take several YEARS before the cycle rolls around again, but there are very few things, especially in the "A" list of monsters, that don't get a re-re-rerelease every so often. Even the Monsterarts version of Mecha-King Ghidorah, which I totally gave up on finding a decent version of, popped up as a possibility recently, and it's different enough from my SCV Ghidorah 2019 that I don't think it would look like a repeat. But my collecting was mostly Transformers, and for that fandom, the idea that a character WON'T be remade is just unrealistic anymore. So long as the demand is there, eventually the market seems to get around to it.

[G1985]

It's that "C" you mention that keeps me from replacing Music Box Godzilla. I know many found the effect lackluster, but in a dim room, I have not found anything comparable...
....my collecting was mostly Transformers, and for that fandom, the idea that a character WON'T be remade is just unrealistic anymore.

Likewise! I like to own the best possible version of my favorite suits. As I consider the Music Box G to be the best (articulated) figure ever made of the 1989 Goji, I often find myself questioning the need to own more recent figures of that suit. I had my hopes set on the announcement of the Super7 Ultimate line, but in my opinion their 1989 wasn't a "better" representation so I didn't purchase it.

To your other point, I've been collecting Godzilla figures for nearly thirty years now. There are a LOT of older figures that I used to think would never be remade or released, but I've been very successful at finding almost *everything* that I've ever hunted for (via eBay, Madarake, etc) simply by learning to be patient and diligent. I've found that, more often than not, the surge of desire to preorder that next latest greatest thing goes away as quickly as it comes, especially after you watch the secondary market fall back to retail cost months after the "I missed the preorder" demand is met.

[GodzillaXGomoraFight]

Space is my biggest issue with all of these new figures coming out. Just got Varan and realized that he can't fit in my current display. I might have to take down my hat collection now to make room for new figures.

Recently, I am also starting to realize that I am getting tempted to replace recent figure purchases over the last 10 years with new ones. Next year alone SH Monsterarts Shin Godzilla Night Version, Gigan, and Bandai Limited Godzilla 84 are likely to replace my NECA and Revoltech figures. If Hiya Toys continues its run, the Rodan figure might also replace my NECA figure from 3 years ago. It is crazy to think that in only a few years figures that I thought were gonna be the best around for years are already going obsolete.

I am also starting to track my spending on figures. Monsterarts are definitely pricey and add up with only a few purchases.

[JVM]

For the level of quality and screen accuracy we're getting in most of these products, they seem extremely affordable on the whole. If you start compromising those values, no collectors will actually buy them and we lose the whole market.

Which lines are you talking about? SHMA has ballooned in cost while quality has been spotty and accessories are mostly gone. Bandai MMS are getting more expensive while paint is often minimal and sculpts are all over the place.

The Movie Monster Series line is basically bottom of the totem pole these days because they are trading off styling and accuracy, while MonsterArts has replaced it as the flagship line and in my personal experience, it has a lot more to do with the sculpt quality than the articulation. Mezco has been maintaining X-Plus quality with figures thar are $20 each basically, albeit sold in multipacks, and NECA seemed to do well for their price point even if they obviously were well behind anything else. MonsterArts and X-Plus seem to be heart and soul of the collecting community and I've not really seen anybody complain about the prices for those products, people seem significantly more satisfied with MonsterArts or X-Plus than they ever would a Bandai or a Playmates. Collectors care more about accuracy and for the level of accuracy they want, those prices are pretty much all bargains.