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Even if you're not into college basketball, you can still get in on March Madness! Sideshow Collectibles is hosting their own tournament and pitting heroes and villains of all genres against one another to see who's the last one standing.

Who would win in a fight between Indiana Jones and Wolverine? How about Yoda and The Hulk? Or Boba Fett and the Red Skull? You get to decide!

The competition is currently into round two, and you can head over to the offcial site and cast your votes now. You can also sign up to win figures from Sideshow--this round features Star Wars Infantry Battle Droids.

So go make your choices known, or you'll have to live with the fact that someone else decided Batman was more powerful than Obi-Wan Kenobi.
 
 
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From our friends John and Keith:

The Swass-Cast is back with a spectacular year end Christmas Special or should we say "Kiss-Mas" Special? This time we are again joined by the greatest comic book podcast on the inter webs, our friend Matman Herring from the world famous “Secret Identity - Podcast” and also John's daughter Bryn Cimino. 

In this stellar episode we pick out and discuss our top 3 Best Christmas Presents from our childhood. Some of the choices are drop dead hilarious and others just plain controversial but one thing is for sure, you’ll have a great time with this episode. Plus just because it means so much to Matman and his Christmas memories, The Reckless Sidekick crew dresses up in the Kiss make-up, Rally Ho! or Should I say Let's Rock and Roll all Night and Party Everyday!! 

Merry Christmas everybody!!! 

The Swass-Cast Crew and Secret Identity
 
 
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Press Release

For the first time at New York Comic Con, Hasbro will attend the convention at the Javits Convention Center in New York City from October 13-16 to present many of its iconic brands and meet with fans.  Hasbro will have a significant booth presence featuring current and upcoming products from its TRANSFORMERS, G.I. JOE, JEM AND THE HOLOGRAMS and KRE-O brands and BEYBLADE, MARVEL and STAR WARS lines.  Additionally, Hasbro will host panels for several of its properties and action figure lines as well as offer for sale several HasbroToyShop.com special edition products made for New York Comic Con convention goers.  

In addition to its booth exhibition during the main convention, Hasbro will be the title sponsor of New York Comic Con’s “NYCC Kids!” taking place on Sunday, October 16.  Within NYCC Kids!, Hasbro will host the National BEYBLADE Championship where semi-finalists from around the country will battle in head-to-head competition to be crowned the BEYBLADE U.S. Champion.  The BEYBLADE National Championship winner will be awarded travel to the BEYBLADE World Championship, in Toronto, Canada in March 2012.  A worldwide phenomenon, BEYBLADE is a battling tops game with a focus on strategy and high-performance competition.  Kids collect, customize and compete head-to-head to be the last BEYBLADE top spinning. Fans can visit www.BeybladeBattles.com for additional information, official rules and kids 8-13 can register for regional qualifier events.

“Hasbro is looking forward to an exciting and substantial presence for its first ever participation in New York Comic Con,” said Jeff Jackson, vice president of U.S. marketing for Hasbro. “As this show continues to grow we’re thrilled to be attending this year to offer our fans the opportunity to engage with Hasbro’s brands in unique ways at both the convention and NYCC Kids! events.”

Hasbro’s NYCC Kids! presence will also offer families the opportunity to experience its new KRE-O TRANSFORMERS line of construction toys and new NERF VORTEX line of disc blasters. More details about Hasbro’s booth, panels, special edition New York Comic-Con figures and other special events at the convention will be released in the coming weeks.  Hasbro will be located at booth #302.  For more information about New York Comic Con and NYCC Kids!, fans and families can visit www.NewYorkComicCon.com. 
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by Brian LeTendre

I think I may have started down a slippery slope, my friends. After having been out of toy collecting for more than 20 years, I may be back at it. All because of Soundwave.

As I’ve talked about on the podcast before, GI Joe and Transformers were the toys of my youth. And when it came to Transformers, I was a Decepticon guy all the way. Sure, Optimus Prime was cool, but I preferred jets to cars and trucks. Thundercracker, Starscream and Skywarp were all awesome.

And then there was Soundwave. Easily my favorite Transformer of all-time, what made Soundwave even cooler was the fact that in addition to being a boombox, he had a series of minions that transformed into cassettes and could be stored within him. Lazerbeak, Rumble and Ravage were the ones I had, although there were nine in all. Of all the toys of my youth, my Soundwave figure is probably the one I missed the most.

So it’s perhaps appropriate that the first Transformer I have bought in years was the new Cybertronian Soundwave figure. On the diappointing side, this fuigure is not the iconic boombox one, but a vehicle-based one from Soundwave’s days on Cybertron (pre-boombox, if you will). The positive is that when in robot form, he looks much more like the Soundwave I grew up with than the new design from the Transformers movies.

The quality of the figure is decent, but far from the ones I grew up with, which were partly metal. Transforming Soundwave from robot to vehicle mode and back was not as intuitive as I would have liked, and I actually had to refer to the directions a couple of times. After the first transformation, it was easy enough to remember, but I could imagine a child having a pretty difficult time with it.

All in all, I definitely feel like the figure was a worthwhile purchase, and I’ll probably just keep him in his robot mode as he stands on my bookshelf. I had enough fun with this one that I went out and bought two more, and I think I’ve started down a slippery slope back to toy collecting now. Just don’t let me near any GI Joe figures, or I may need an intervention.

Below is a gallery of the figure in the packaging, and in various states of Transformation.
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