Barry’s Blueprints of Hits and Heartbreak

[Barry]

(I can't actually post in the Forum News & Announcements section, so I thought I'd start the thread here.)

Instead of digging up old threads for me to just drop in an image or two, I thought a fresh thread was in order.  If you’ve got any questions or requests, I'm open to being asked, but answers may vary depending on the subject of the question.

 

[Barry]

Shang-Chi movie 2-packs.  Shang-Chi & Xialing, Wen Wu & Razor Fist (replacing Death Dealer).

 

[buttheadsmate]

I just won't be able to continually express my delight at the stuff you are showing us but will "Bloody Beautiful" do ?

 

 

 

 

[Trekker 42]

Oh those Ten Rings would’ve been wonderful accessories. I imagine these were meant for Walgreens?

[luke314pi]

Seeing those is so bittersweet - I would have loved to have them and they look amazing! 😍

[elhonez]

MCU mates are always so distinctive, with crazy ornamental details and textures. These look great Barry!

On a personal note, unrelated to unrealized plans, did/do you have a favorite corner of the 616 that you would like to have done more with? For example, we know Chuck is a Spidey guy -- what's your jam?

[Navaan]

Gosh dang, those are dope... I had to make my own Shang, those would have been wonderful.

[minifigvig]

i had way too much fun browsing through the minimate section on your site, and thanks again for sharing in all the different threads!

[Barry]

9 hours ago, Trekker 42 said:

Oh those Ten Rings would’ve been wonderful accessories. I imagine these were meant for Walgreens?

Yes, they were Walgreens.

8 hours ago, elhonez said:

On a personal note, unrelated to unrealized plans, did/do you have a favorite corner of the 616 that you would like to have done more with? For example, we know Chuck is a Spidey guy -- what's your jam?

Spidey’s my favourite Marvel character, and I loved being able to add as many villains from his world into the collection.  I’d always like to see more Spidey villains, or variants of costumes.  Lady Octopus and white suit Doc Ock were long desired figures for me.

Daredevil is my second favourite, so I was always suggesting DD waves loaded with villains.  I probably started pushing ideas for what would become the Wave 84 set around Wave 60 or so, but it was usually moved back because of timing. The closest it got to happening before 84 was Wave 75, but it shifted from solely DD to tie in to all the media at the time.  It was too soon after Wave 84 came out to try for more, but it would have been nice to see Gladiator or Owl, amongst other villains, down the line.  I’m sure I would have started pushing again for more DD soon with the popularity of Born Again.

My other interest wasn’t a specific area of the comics, but rather trying to update all the old comic characters from maybe around Wave 20 back to Wave 1.  It wasn’t anything I was actively pushing to do, and I don’t think I ever told anyone about it, but when opportunities came up and it made sense then I tried to fit those characters in.  For instance, the Wave 80 Iron Man was unspecified, and it would have helped greatly to be reusing parts, so I made it the Stealth version.  Or, I needed something under the chest of the Heavy Armour Cable in the X-Force box set, so I made it a redo of Wave 11’s Cable.

I knew this idea would never get finished since I couldn’t see updating Ultimate or New X-Men, but I did keep a list and crossed characters off as they happened.

6 hours ago, minifigvig said:

i had way too much fun browsing through the minimate section on your site, and thanks again for sharing in all the different threads!

Thanks, I’m far from finished updating it since it’s a lot of work.  I don’t mind sharing stuff here, whether the series was released or not.  I know it’s a lot to look at in the galleries.

Thanks to everyone for the comments, I greatly appreciate them.

[Navaan]

1 hour ago, Barry said:

Yes, they were Walgreens.

Spidey’s my favourite Marvel character, and I loved being able to add as many villains from his world into the collection.  I’d always like to see more Spidey villains, or variants of costumes.  Lady Octopus and white suit Doc Ock were long desired figures for me.

Daredevil is my second favourite, so I was always suggesting DD waves loaded with villains.  I probably started pushing ideas for what would become the Wave 84 set around Wave 60 or so, but it was usually moved back because of timing. The closest it got to happening before 84 was Wave 75, but it shifted from solely DD to tie in to all the media at the time.  It was too soon after Wave 84 came out to try for more, but it would have been nice to see Gladiator or Owl, amongst other villains, down the line.  I’m sure I would have started pushing again for more DD soon with the popularity of Born Again.

My other interest wasn’t a specific area of the comics, but rather trying to update all the old comic characters from maybe around Wave 20 back to Wave 1.  It wasn’t anything I was actively pushing to do, and I don’t think I ever told anyone about it, but when opportunities came up and it made sense then I tried to fit those characters in.  For instance, the Wave 80 Iron Man was unspecified, and it would have helped greatly to be reusing parts, so I made it the Stealth version.  Or, I needed something under the chest of the Heavy Armour Cable in the X-Force box set, so I made it a redo of Wave 11’s Cable.

I knew this idea would never get finished since I couldn’t see updating Ultimate or New X-Men, but I did keep a list and crossed characters off as they happened.

Thanks, I’m far from finished updating it since it’s a lot of work.  I don’t mind sharing stuff here, whether the series was released or not.  I know it’s a lot to look at in the galleries.

Thanks to everyone for the comments, I greatly appreciate them.

Daredevil villains? You ever do Lady Bullseye?

[FightTheDead118]

Hey Barry, just out of curiosity was Hellcat ever pitched or designed for any wave? I always felt like she was probably the biggest character who never got made, at least outside of cosmic stuff

[buttheadsmate]

"update all the old comic characters from maybe around Wave 20 back to Wave 1 "    was a policy that  became increasing obvious noticeable 

I have often considered (& stated) that 2008 was a Minimate watershed moment , the Golden age for Marvel comic Minimates . That's not to say that there weren't other Silver  ages 

Despite my love of Minimates I am also a continual critic of them , not just for the sake of it, just for constructiveness . The thorn in my side has always been 'The Thing'  , a Minimate character that never quite ended up 'perfect' .  A list of perfect Minimate characters would be easy for me, there are many .

Barry , please let us know your 'favourite', your 'perfect' & maybe your 'least favourite' .  Reading through your posts I can see you shared the general disappointment in the F&F Battle Ravaged Spider-Man , obviously a production-mistake .....maybe you can let us know your biggest 'disappointment in the final product' .

 

Edited July 14 by buttheadsmate
sp.

[thereasonsy]

13 hours ago, Barry said:

Yes, they were Walgreens.

Spidey’s my favourite Marvel character, and I loved being able to add as many villains from his world into the collection.  I’d always like to see more Spidey villains, or variants of costumes.  Lady Octopus and white suit Doc Ock were long desired figures for me.

Daredevil is my second favourite, so I was always suggesting DD waves loaded with villains.  I probably started pushing ideas for what would become the Wave 84 set around Wave 60 or so, but it was usually moved back because of timing. The closest it got to happening before 84 was Wave 75, but it shifted from solely DD to tie in to all the media at the time.  It was too soon after Wave 84 came out to try for more, but it would have been nice to see Gladiator or Owl, amongst other villains, down the line.  I’m sure I would have started pushing again for more DD soon with the popularity of Born Again.

My other interest wasn’t a specific area of the comics, but rather trying to update all the old comic characters from maybe around Wave 20 back to Wave 1.  It wasn’t anything I was actively pushing to do, and I don’t think I ever told anyone about it, but when opportunities came up and it made sense then I tried to fit those characters in.  For instance, the Wave 80 Iron Man was unspecified, and it would have helped greatly to be reusing parts, so I made it the Stealth version.  Or, I needed something under the chest of the Heavy Armour Cable in the X-Force box set, so I made it a redo of Wave 11’s Cable.

I knew this idea would never get finished since I couldn’t see updating Ultimate or New X-Men, but I did keep a list and crossed characters off as they happened.

Thanks, I’m far from finished updating it since it’s a lot of work.  I don’t mind sharing stuff here, whether the series was released or not.  I know it’s a lot to look at in the galleries.

Thanks to everyone for the comments, I greatly appreciate them.

We could have gotten an updated Firestar… I’m going to go eat my feelings now.

[cylonchaney]

This thread makes me feel like we are George in "The Foundation" where he has to sit with the board of trustees going over Susan's estate and all of the stuff that would have been his but now ...

I tried to embed a clip from Youtube but wasn't allowed by the rights holder. Sigh.

https://youtu.be/zxqqxrPwxgM?t=530

[Barry]

23 hours ago, Navaan said:

Daredevil villains? You ever do Lady Bullseye?

She was never drawn, but was often on lists for the wave that became 84.

 

20 hours ago, FightTheDead118 said:

Hey Barry, just out of curiosity was Hellcat ever pitched or designed for any wave? I always felt like she was probably the biggest character who never got made, at least outside of cosmic stuff

Pitched, but never drawn.  She was in the wave that eventually became 80 for awhile.

 

20 hours ago, buttheadsmate said:

"update all the old comic characters from maybe around Wave 20 back to Wave 1 "    was a policy that  became increasing obvious noticeable 

I have often considered (& stated) that 2008 was a Minimate watershed moment , the Golden age for Marvel comic Minimates . That's not to say that there weren't other Silver  ages 

Despite my love of Minimates I am also a continual critic of them , not just for the sake of it, just for constructiveness . The thorn in my side has always been 'The Thing'  , a Minimate character that never quite ended up 'perfect' .  A list of perfect Minimate characters would be easy for me, there are many .

Barry , please let us know your 'favourite', your 'perfect' & maybe your 'least favourite' .  Reading through your posts I can see you shared the general disappointment in the F&F Battle Ravaged Spider-Man , obviously a production-mistake .....maybe you can let us know your biggest 'disappointment in the final product' .

 

I think I’m the biggest critic of them all when it comes to Minimates.  I always ran self-evaluations on things that worked and things that didn’t and tried to improve on the next wave, whether it be on a different licence or not.

A ‘perfect’ one is hard for me.  I have many favourites, but I see flaws that others would never see, so it’s probably harder for me to choose than most.  Some that come to mind of favourites, but maybe not absolutely perfect, are the Kraven’s Last Hunt Black Costume Spidey, Liara from Mass Effect, and oddly the World Of The Psychic Peter Venkman.  I always liked figures that acted as a two-in-one as well, my favourite being Chameleon / Mary Jane, because it’s something fairly unique to MMs.

F&F Spidey, along with the rest in the set, were a disappointment.  Making sure webbing couldn’t be seen through his eyes became something I’d be paranoid about with every new Spidey sample right up to the most recent iterations.

My biggest personal disappointment though was the comic Age Of Ultron Angela.  I feel that I really dropped the ball on her and wanted to get her properly made one day.  I loved her from her Spawn days, and went through a period of drawing her in the margins of my math homework, so to be able to suddenly have her available to us was amazing for me.  The news hit of her company changeover one morning and later that afternoon I had her completed.  In my excitement, I rushed the design.  When we had a moment to remake her I took the chance.  I know a lot of people were upset she got remade so quickly over a new character, but I find the first one such a blunder on my part.  It’s nothing that anyone else did, she was executed properly to my design, but I feel that design was just not good.  It would have upset me not to rectify that before the line ended.

My disappointment in her actually led to my own unspoken rule about working on a design — MM, statue, or anything work related.  I would never again submit a piece on the same day that it was completed.  I would let it sit over night and look at it the next day to see if I still liked it.  In doing that, pretty much every time, I would alter something, from subtly to drastically, before submitting it.  It’s not to say that I rushed designs before Angela, but my disappointment in my own work and work ethic in that moment was a personal lesson to be more mindful going forward.

 

10 hours ago, thereasonsy said:

We could have gotten an updated Firestar… I’m going to go eat my feelings now.

Maybe she would have been possible one day, but I wouldn’t be too upset as she was not on any active lists.

 

10 hours ago, cylonchaney said:

This thread makes me feel like we are George in "The Foundation" where he has to sit with the board of trustees going over Susan's estate and all of the stuff that would have been his but now ...

I didn’t even have to watch the clip, I immediately heard “…and now?”  “Not.”  Maybe that should have been this thread’s title!

 

Edited July 15 by Barry

[Navaan]

I really, REALLY appreciate you answering all these Barry.

You're clearly, as the kids say, a 'real one' for sticking with us.

Was there ever anything for other Cap characters, like Diamond Back, Agent 13, Machinesmith, Superia?

[thereasonsy]

1 hour ago, Barry said:

Maybe she would have been possible one day, but Iwouldn’t be too upset as she was not on any active lists.

 

 

Too late I already ate the ice cream. But seriously thank you. 

[BuffaloDelorean]

11 hours ago, Barry said:

When we had a moment to remake her I took the chance.  I know a lot of people were upset she got remade so quickly over a new character, but I find the first one such a blunder on my part.  It’s nothing that anyone else did, she was executed properly to my design, but I feel that design was just not good.  It would have upset me not to rectify that before the line ended.

I remember thinking that second Angela was an odd pick for her wave, but that definitely explains it.

Were there any other characters considered for that Guardians wave? I want to say it was the first specialty wave cut down from four to three different two-packs.

[elhonez]

Barry, I really appreciate you showing up to the forum and making yourself available for our questions. It's so cool to get more insight into the development of past waves, your design process, old production plans, etc.

It has gotten me thinking about one of my favorite topics, "Design Challenges." You alluded to this in the TMNT thread -- at a certain point, when is a MiniMate no longer a MiniMate? I love all of the examples of pushing that edge -- MODOK, Mojo, Amaterasu, Terror Dogs, some of the GB Ghosts, the Brood, Mothra... these are just some of the more interesting executions. Also: Man-Thing and Slithe were examples of big design swings that didn't use the classic MiniMate head.

Which have been the most fun to work on? The most challenging? Which ones worked the best in your opinion? Before the MVC line ended, I was super curious about how you would've approached Shuma Gorath -- what would you have done? Same question for Ego the Living Planet. Torso blocks with some sort of overlay or sleeve? And/or: were there any characters you just couldn't get to "work?"

Edited July 15 by elhonez

[Barry]

On 7/14/2025 at 11:51 PM, Navaan said:

Was there ever anything for other Cap characters, like Diamond Back, Agent 13, Machinesmith, Superia?

Agent 13 was the BAF for 80 for a long time, but Silver Sable ended up being used since she felt absent from the Maximum Carnage wave.

 

On 7/15/2025 at 11:04 AM, BuffaloDelorean said:

Were there any other characters considered for that Guardians wave? I want to say it was the first specialty wave cut down from four to three different two-packs.

None that I can remember, or have record of.  It was pretty cut and dry.  What became 80 was originally 79 as "International Avengers", and it was the last set concepted as four 2-packs.  Then we cut down to three 2-packs, and 79 became 80 with the shift to "Esponage".  "Cosmic Guardians" became 79.  So, the now-79 was always set to be three sets.  

 

21 hours ago, elhonez said:

Which have been the most fun to work on? The most challenging? Which ones worked the best in your opinion? Before the MVC line ended, I was super curious about how you would've approached Shuma Gorath -- what would you have done? Same question for Ego the Living Planet. Torso blocks with some sort of overlay or sleeve? And/or: were there any characters you just couldn't get to "work?"

Way back, everyone used to say that MODOK would be challenging, or impossible.  When he finally came up, he was honestly so easy to figure out it seemed like something was wrong.  Like I'd missed something, and it wasn't going to work in reality.  Storm's cape from Wave 29 took more work than MODOK, with 14 iterations to his 2.  After MODOK, I think there was some more clarity that anything was possible.

Most fun were probably all of the body variations in the Nightmare Before Christmas.  They weren't as drastic changes to the formula as some other figures or lines, but the combinations of smaller or shorter parts made for a really interesting and diverse line to look at as a group.  I feel that they are all very much MMs even though the base body changes from figure to figure, and they're still very much in character to the source material.  They all look like they belong together too, even ones that stray more from the base body like the Harlequin Demon.  That line would not have worked without altering the base body as much as we did.

Challenging was probably the Halo aliens.  Mark Wong did most of the black & white design work on those, which was brilliant.  I did the work of putting it together on the base bodies, which I felt terrible altering his work to make things fit.  At that point we were still figuring out how far we should go with altering things.  They don't seem very crazy compared to other figures we've done since, but at the time they were difficult to wrap our heads around.  I think if we did those now, they'd be easy, and probably be done a bit differently, but they really paved the way for thinking differently.

I think a lot more worked than I would have told you years back.  Mojo really worked well (although the packaging of him didn't...) and I feel he is 100% still a MM.  He's one of my favourites.

Shuma was fully designed and prototyped, but as a one-piece accessory since he was small in the game.  He's just straight up himself though, which I think I would do a bit differently now.  He'd be pretty similar, but his center ball would be simplified with all of his 'face' tampo (right now, it's just his iris and pupil.)  Beholder from D&D would be an example of how he'd be done.  Beholder really doesn't have any MM parts, but the fully tampo face in the MM style makes him feel like a MM.  Ego would probably be like Beholder as well.

I don't think there's any character that fully didn't work, but maybe ones I would do differently now.  Some early ones had more articulation which ended up making them more fragile.  As time went on I felt that less parts made them work better.  Years ago D&D's Night-Mare would have had a two-part body for some kind of waist articulation, like the Terror Dogs, but he's a more solid figure for the chest cap being one piece.  In hindsight, I don't think the Terror Dog's separate waist added anything to the figure.

[cylonchaney]

46 minutes ago, Barry said:

In hindsight, I don't think the Terror Dog's separate waist added anything to the figure.

I always thought it was cool how much of a regular Minimate was still in figures like that. It's a detail I've noticed a few times. You never know who you're going to please with what feature. And you can never please everyone.  

There are a couple of figures that I think could have used sculpted heads, but I have no complaints whatsoever with any of the body choices you guys made. The Alien Queen falls apart a little easily. LOL But even that one is awesome! If ever there was a figure that didn't need to be based off the standard Minimate body (at least at the time), that was the one. And I still think it's kind of cool that there's a regular Minimate body in there.

The other thing is that while it may not add anything to the Terror Dog, it makes the Terror Dog parts more interchangeable and useful to customizers or kids who mix and match as part of their play. So well done!

Edited July 16 by cylonchaney

[Navaan]

3 minutes ago, cylonchaney said:

I always thought it was cool how much of a regular Minimate was still in figures like that. It's a detail I've noticed a few times. You never know who you're going to please with what feature. And you can never please everyone.  

There are a couple of figures that I think could have used sculpted heads, but I have no complaints whatsoever with any of the body choices you guys made. The Alien Queen falls apart a little easily. LOL But even that one is awesome! If ever there was a figure that didn't need to be based off the standard Minimate body (at least at the time), that was the one. And I still think it's kind of cool that there's a regular Minimate body in there.

The other thing is that while it may not add anything to the Terror Dog, it makes the Terror Dog parts more interchangeable and useful to customizers or kids who mix and match as part of their play. So well done!

Oh man, I would have MUCH preferred Agent 13 but Sable was well made. Was there any design sheet for her?

[elhonez]

1 hour ago, cylonchaney said:

The other thing is that while it may not add anything to the Terror Dog, it makes the Terror Dog parts more interchangeable and useful to customizers or kids who mix and match as part of their play. So well done!

100% !!

1 hour ago, cylonchaney said:

...The Alien Queen... 

Oh yeah! How could I have forgotten about the deluxe Aliens figures? So fun. I remember thinking, "How are they going to get that Power Loader to work??" It was (and is still) amazing. 

Back briefly to MVC3 -- a huge thanks @Barry for sharing that Shuma Gorath design! I never would have guessed at this execution, but it works. After thinking about it I realized that a bigger design challenge might have been Tron Bonne. I could picture her as perhaps a torso block that could be seated inside a very large custom robot chest that sat on a standard pelvis? Whatever it might have been, I'm sure you would've nailed it.

This all hearkens back to a ToyFare article that didn't age very well, with maybe Chuck? In it they were evaluating the MiniMate potential of certain Marvel characters. The feedback for a classic Namor was "Who wants a dude in underwear?", and MODOK was categorically dismissed. And this is not a dis to Chuck or whomever was interviewed -- it's more a marker of the passage of time. I love how much the line evolved over the years!

Fast-forward to now, with the Selvig MiniMate laughing maniacally in his tighty-whities...

[Barry]

20 hours ago, cylonchaney said:

I always thought it was cool how much of a regular Minimate was still in figures like that.

We definitely wanted to use as much of the base body as possible, even if it's not very visible, it would at least act as an armature.  I often joked with Robert - at what point are we going to make a standard action figure, hollow out the chest, throw a blank MM body inside, and call the whole thing a Minimate?

 

19 hours ago, Navaan said:

Oh man, I would have MUCH preferred Agent 13 but Sable was well made. Was there any design sheet for her?

No, she didn't get very far before she was changed.  I began mocking her up but shelved the design.  Her face and chest tampo were the only thing completed, and they became Mockingbird's in the end.  So, you have an idea of what she'd look like.

 

18 hours ago, elhonez said:

After thinking about it I realized that a bigger design challenge might have been Tron Bonne. I could picture her as perhaps a torso block that could be seated inside a very large custom robot chest that sat on a standard pelvis? Whatever it might have been, I'm sure you would've nailed it.

That's exactly how she was designed.  One lower body was the robot's, the other was hers, so you could swap them out.  Then you could still have the robot standing around without her in it. 

[cylonchaney]

1 hour ago, Barry said:

We definitely wanted to use as much of the base body as possible, even if it's not very visible, it would at least act as an armature.  I often joked with Robert - at what point are we going to make a standard action figure, hollow out the chest, throw a blank MM body inside, and call the whole thing a Minimate?

S.T.R.I.P.E. and Krang (robot body) are both in my list of upsized customs I want to make (with a figure inside). I love characters within characters.

Like that stupid movie that was out where the robot kept dying. But it would turn out that he was actually a smaller robot in a giant robot suit. Then that one dies and turns out to be yet another exosuit for an even smaller version. LOL The movie wasn't good enough to even remember the title but I enjoyed that element of it.

Both Krang and STRIPE have been started in my chaotic ADD project list.

If you were allowed to scale up for certain characters, who would you most want an upscaled Minimate of?