Fans got a jolt of unexpected excitement when Playmates Toys announced their return to the Star Trek universe two years ago, as the company promised a wide range of action figures and tie-in products from past, present, and future iterations of the franchise.
In June 2021, Playmates proclaimed that fans would be able to look forward to “a new lineup of action figures and accessories from Star Trek: Discovery, Star Trek: Lower Decks, Star Trek: Picard, other Star Trek series throughout the universe coming soon, and future selections from the expansive Star Trek Universe of series and motion pictures… including Star Trek: Prodigy.”
Since that announcement, the actual product output from Playmates Toys has been less than stellar — just two releases from Discovery (with Burnham and Saru in outdated early-season designs), and revamped versions of 1990s-era Wrath of Khan and Next Generation figures.
The company also released five characters from Star Trek: Prodigy — Dal, Murf, Gwyn, Zero, and Jankom Pog — but the promised second wave, set to feature fan-favorites Hologram Janeway and Rok-Tahk never materialized.
Now, TrekCore can confirm that Playmates Toys has ended their plans for future Star Trek action figure releases entirely. Citing poor sales figures, the company is choosing to only release starship and roleplay toy items moving forward — items like their Enterprise and Enteprise-D electronic ships and classic Trek landing party gear.
A representative from Playmates Toys provided this statement regarding the matter:
"Given lower than expected figure sales, Playmates Toys is focusing on producing new ships and roleplay items for the foreseeable future. As longtime Trek fans, we’re disappointed. "
On top of that, we’ve heard rumblings that Super7 is likely moving away from the Star Trek brand too, as the company included none of their existing Trek products in their massive New York Comic Con display in October — and they’ve told us there’s nothing from the franchise in their upcoming release schedule.
These are two more entries in a long line of recent Star Trek licensing plans to fizzle out before gaining any real traction with the fanbase, and is especially disappointing to Prodigy fans who will be left without two major characters from the animated series.
Will any licensee find success in the world of small-scale Trek action figures? Perhaps someone will try again, like newcomer Hiya Toys is doing with their Kelvin Timeline preorders, but it certainly seems like the future is bleak.
