Friday, August 25, 2017

Looking to the Future: 2018 Vintage Club

Last year I wrote a blog post about upcoming Vintage Club releases. When I investigated further, to see if I'd gotten to that time of the year yet, I was surprised to see that post went up on August 7 of last year.  (Also, I've been blogging for a year already? Unreal...) Since it's already August 25 and this has been a pretty slow news week, I figured I'd write a post to speculate about next year's Vintage Club offerings (especially since I managed to predict two of this year's releases last year!).

So, I'll start by posting this old photo again:



To borrow a bit from last year's post...
So far, club members have seen:

Amigo, the charcoal Adios;
Halo, the Appaloosa-Performance-Horse-colorway on the Stretch Morgan;
Commander, the smoke Five Gaiter;
Denim (Diamonds?), the Copenhagen pinto Shetland Pony;
and Kiowa, the Indian Pony pinto on the Jumping Horse mold.

Molds that appear in the photo, but were used in the VC in other colors, include the Running Stallion, Man o' War, Quarter Horse Gelding, the Belgian, Semi-Rearing Mustang, Fighting Stallion, Running Foal (with Mare) and the Western Prancing Horse.

Now, we already know (more or less) what one of next year's releases will be, if we remember this poll Breyer held earlier this year:

 

So that's another mold that's being reused, as the Semi-Rearing Mustang previously appeared in the club as the red roan Diablo in 2014. I will point out that the palomino one appears in the test photo above, but the other two don't.

Also earlier this year, we got a statement from Sommer Prosser on Blab that this year's Vintage Club was a departure from previous years on purpose (using Sham and the CQH Family, and putting them in non-vintage colors), to try to keep the club from falling into a rut. Since it seems like there's been at least some controversy about that decision, it remains to be seen whether we'll see more of that next year.

Anyway, let's get to our list of vintage molds that haven't been used yet. Here we go! Last year I lined out all of the molds that were released in the '80s, because we weren't sure where Breyer was putting the "vintage" line, but since Sham was used this year, I think anything from the '80s is fair game.

Vintage molds: Appaloosa Performance Horse, Black Beauty, the Black Stallion, Bolya/Halla, Brighty, Buckshot, the Donkey, El Pastor, the FAM and FAF, the Foundation Stallion, the Fury Prancer, Galiceno, the Grazing Mare and Foal, Haflinger, the Hanoverian, Justin Morgan, Legionario, the Lying Down Foal, Midnight Sun, Morganglanz, the Pacer, Phantom Wings, Phar Lap, the POA, possibly the PAF, Quarter Horse Yearling, the Race Horse, Saddlebred Weanling, San Domingo, the Scratching Foal, Sea Star, the Shire Mare, Smoky, the Stock Horse Stallion, Mare and Foal, Stud Spider, the Trakehner, the Western Horse and the Western Pony.

I still don't think Midnight Sun, the Donkey, Sea Star or Phantom Wings will be used, for the same reasons I laid out in my previous post. That still leaves a long list of possible molds, though. I still think the Western Horse is a definite possibility, along with Brighty and the Pacer. Since the CQH Family was used this year, it begs the question of whether Breyer will use another Classics family next year. If so, I think the most likely candidates for that would be the Classic Mustang Family. I would also add the Justin Morgan, and of course the Thoroughbred Mare and Nursing Foal in glossy alabaster - hope springs eternal on those.

As for the contemporary mold with vintage paint job, I'll take a stab at that and say Forever Saige - but I have no idea what color they'd use. It'd be interesting to see her painted up as the Appaloosa Performance Horse, though, so I'll go with that. As for the free Stablemate, it seems like most of the time they go with a modern mold for those - but they seem to have free rein to use the G1 molds again, so it could just as easily be one of those. I'll pick the G1 Morgan Stallion just to be random.

What will it be next year, Breyer? Remember, I'm most hoping to see the Thoroughbred Mare and Nursing Foal in glossy alabaster! Throw me a bone here! Last year's models were revealed on October 4, so we don't have too terribly long to wait - I hope I'm not disappointed!

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