I want to talk today about what I think of Open Window series. I hear a lot of collectors assume that Open Window means "outlet fodder" and/or "sub par series" and this is sometimes true. Just think of the Chinese New Year, Occupations, Sea Creatures, I Love Mickey, etc. They flooded the trade boxes (and can still be found there) and sat on outlet shelves for months.
Giant Octopus from Sea Creatures - why would I want that?
But alongside these undesirable open window series, there have been other open window series that are much more desirable: D-TOUR, Star Wars, TRON, Walt Disney World 40th Anniversary, Nerds Rock (some character of which were recently re-released), I would even say that the original Bakery series was on the more popular side. I also think the 2013 Poster Art series was pretty epic.
Animal Kingdom from the Walt Disney World 40th Anniversary series
Yes some not-so-great open window series have been released, but there have been some pretty amazing open window releases too. We can't paint all open window series with the same negative brush. It's not just open window series either, the same goes for blind box series. Just think of all the blind box flops we've seen: Nursery Rhymes, High School, Extreme Wrestlers, Zooper Heroes, Medieval, some of which didn't last a month before they became Buy One Get Ones.
The most disturbing Vinylmation I've ever seen - Nerd form the High School series
I definitely think that these bad open window series need to stop being produced, but it's not because they're open window, I feel the same about awful blind box series. It saddens me that some collectors now assume "if it's gonna be open window, it's gonna be a bad series". I know exactly why people have come to this conclusion, but I think each series needs to be assessed individually. I'll admit that the thought of Mickey's Wild West sounded like an undesirable series to me, before I had any detailed information. But when I saw the promotion posters and concept art, I did a full 180 - I wanted these! And that was a blind box series.
To clarify here, I don't want to cause offense, especially with the artists. Some of these series and figures are great pieces of art, very well done from an artistic perspective. But a lot of people collect Vinylmation as little pieces of Disney, so as scary as the Medieval dragon was and as cute as twinkle twinkle little star is, a lot of Disney collectors just don't want to own that. Myself included.
One of my favorite open window figures that I'm pleased I didn't have to blox
More care needs to be taken when choosing future series to be produced. I think it can be predicted that some ideas just won't be appealing to collectors who want Disney products and it looks like Disney are getting better at what they produce. But I also hope that collectors will be open minded too and judge a series on the merits of its theme and art, instead of the type of box it's sold in. As much as I love the excitement of blind boxing, sometimes it's nice to take a break and be able to pick up the exact figure you want from a blind box. Especially when there's only 1 or 2 figures that you want in a series.
It can also be great for enticing new collectors into the hobby. When I bought my first vinyl, I was too afraid to pick up a blind box and be disappointed with the figure I pulled. Luckily, I was able to pick up my favorite character from TRON in Vinylmation form from the TRON: Legacy open window series. Once I had a few of my favorites in hand, I was brave enough to try my hand at blind boxing, knowing I already had some figures that I really wanted.
So to summarize: open window boxes can produce wonderful figures, give collectors a break from spending a lot of money chasing down figures they want, and bring new collectors in to the hobby. While they can also hold some undesirable vinyls, I think open window boxes should continue.
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