Deluxe Insecticons; the group, not the price point
With Hasbro steadily working through the list of original 1980s toys and giving us some very nice modern versions of them, there's still one rather large omission - the Deluxe Insecticons. A rather glaring omission because of how early in the line they were, too (1985). In fact, just looking right now, they are almost the only toys from 1984 to 1986 not to have seen a modern re-make (Steeljaw shares that dubious distinction with them).
When will we get new ones? I'm not asking the question of if we will get them, because it seems clear to me that there are no special reasons for not making new Deluxe Insecticons. Sure, the original toys can't be re-issued, just like the other Takatoku toys (Jetfire, Roadbuster, Whirl) can't be re-issued, but there's no reason at all that Hasbro can't do exactly what they've done for those three and produce new versions of the characters (and in fact they have made new versions of Chop Shop in the last decade - poor ones, to be sure, but still new toys).
So, when? We've seen a lot of leaks for toys from the next couple of years, including all three of the standard Insecticons, but I don't think I've seen even a hint of these four. Which seems odd to me, because now would be a really good opportunity for them. As mentioned, Hasbro is steadily working through the list of toys from the 80s at the moment, and then there's all the Beast Wars stuff being produced now - more Insecticons would fit right into a toyline where people are accustomed to seeing animal alt-modes (even skeletal animal alt-modes...).
As for why Hasbro might not make them, there don't seem to be terribly many compelling arguments any more. Licencing can't be an issue (they own the characters, and see the Chop Shops mentioned above). Obscurity no longer seems relevant; much more obscure characters are getting toys these days - just look at Nightbird, who wasn't even a transformer to begin with, or Scrounge, a throw-away comic-only non-toy character, or even the mail-away Powerdashers, so obscure that most people never knew until the new toys that there were three variants. Even the need for entirely new designs doesn't really stick these days - look at all the new moulds for things like Slammer that would previously have been (and was until recently feared to be) a re-deco of something close enough.
Sooooo... When, Hasbro?
