At the Imperial Archives, one of our favorite categories is unproduced toys. This includes toys that were designed and never released, as well as toys that changed substantially during the design process. Let’s take a look at two Kenner Star Wars action figures that fall into the latter category. Each figure is represented in our collection in the form of both a preproduction drawing and an unpainted hardcopy prototype.
First up is an early “uncloaked” version of The Emperor from the vintage Return of the Jedi action figure line:
Star Wars fans who had the original Emperor action figure that was sold in stores will likely recall that the cloak was molded onto the body as part of the figure, but that wasn’t the initial plan. The hardcopy here has no cloak, and the drawing shows that it was going to be a separate molded plastic piece, similar to the cowl on the Chief Chirpa figure released in the previous wave of figures. (Contrary to what some think, this version of The Emperor was not going to have a “soft goods” cloak—the Deco Design Drawing specifies the color as “Dr. Gray” (dark grey), the same as the figure’s body. If the intent had been to offer a cloth cloak, the callout for it would instead read “Dr. Gray Fabric.” The cloak also would be drawn on the figure, not separately. See today’s second item for how soft goods are treated on these drawings.)
We don’t know for sure why the separate cloak was dropped, but it’s easy to speculate that it might have been a cost-saving move, especially given that The Emperor was initially offered free with five proofs-of-purchase from other Kenner Star Wars figures.
Today’s second figure is even more interesting. This early version of Luke Skywalker (Jedi Knight) from Return of the Jedi first became known to collectors more than 25 years ago when it surfaced in hardcopy prototype form. The pieces that turned up were either painted in grey primer or were completely unpainted, so nobody knew what color the figure was supposed to be. Further complicating things, a Kenner source at the time misremembered that this figure was made in the Power of the Force era at the end of the vintage toy line, leading to speculation that “Luke in Robes” wasn’t related to Jedi at all, but might have instead depicted Luke in his medical robes from the end of The Empire Strikes Back, or perhaps was even a non-movie concept.
A couple of years later, though, the Deco Design Drawing showed up; it clearly lists the figure as “Jedi Luke ROJ,” and is dated June 21,1982, the very same month that Deco Design Drawings were being made for the first wave of Return of the Jedi figures. (Note the drawing above for The Emperor, in the second wave, is dated November 16, 1982.) The real surprise here, though, is in the list of colors specified for the figure: instead of the black outfit Luke wears in the film, this figure is dressed in rust-colored robes with a rust-colored fabric cloak. Below, I’ve digitally colored the photo of the hardcopy with the colors specified in the drawing; fans of vintage action figures will note a strong resemblance to Kenner’s Ben (Obi-Wan) Kenobi figure from the original Star Wars.
However, not everyone was convinced that the drawing and the hardcopy were necessarily connected. But a little while later, collector Chris Fawcett noticed that a photograph in a 1983 catalog from Meccano—the company who sold Kenner’s action figure line in France—included several prototype Return of the Jedi figures, including a Luke in rust-colored robes that matches the hardcopy!
So this solved one mystery—the mysterious “Luke in Robes” hardcopy is definitely the same rust-colored version of Luke that was briefly in the works for the launch of the Return of the Jedi action figure line. But there’s still one mystery to answer: Why, in June 1982—a full month after principal photography had wrapped on Return of the Jedi—did Kenner appear to believe that Luke’s new Jedi outfit looked like Obi-Wan’s robes from A New Hope?