The Best Toys of the Week Will Absolutely Not Be Under Your Christmas Tree This Year

Toys and CollectiblesAction figures, statues, exclusives, and other merchandise. Beware: if you look here, you're probably going to spend some money afterwards.

Welcome back to Toy Aisle, io9's regular round up of all the coolest toys and merchandise we've seen on the internet lately. This week, it's nearly Christmas and every toy manufacturer is waiting for it to be 2020! These toys might not be coming down your chimney with Santa this festive season, but we've got Star Wars (duh), Batman, and more. Check it out!

Hot Toys Star Wars The Mandalorian Remnant Stormtrooper Sixth-Scale Figure

Hot Toys' complete and total desire to make as many figures of masked Star Wars characters continues with this...well, we don't know what to tell you here, folks. This is a dirty Stormtrooper.

Okay, specifically, it's a dirty Stormtrooper from The Mandalorian, a roughshod member of Werner Herzog's Imperial Remnant that is, essentially, a Return of the Jedi-style Stormtrooper who's been through enough shit that his armor's covered in chips and sandy weathering (we've learned from the best—that stuff is coarse, and it gets everywhere). But that means that, essentially, he's a Hot Toys Stormtrooper with a new paint job. He's got the hands to hold his otherwise relatively threadbare accessories—a SE-14C holdout blaster and an E-11 Blaster rifle—and a nice stand, and that's about it. Really, you're buying this if you're a Stormtrooper madman and must have them all, regardless of how minor the differences, or because you really, really like The Mandalorian.

The Remnant Stormtrooper will hit shelves in late 2020. Just let us know when they get around to the Hot Toys Baby Yoda. [Hot Toys]

Beast Kingdom Miniature Pullback Batmobile Collection

Cars don't come much cooler than the Batmobile, and the Dark Knight's collection of wheels from his 80 years spent fighting crime is adorably immortalized in this highly collectible line of spring-powered pull back toys from Beast Kingdom. Each one measures two and a half inches long and while detailing is minimum, their squashed, pudgy design somehow makes up for that fact. Discerning Batmobile collectors will want to move on, but the rest of us will gladly snap these up at six bucks a piece from the Big Bad Toy Store.

Hot Wheels ID Swift Playground Experience

By sticking an NFC chip inside a new collection of die-cast vehicles, Mattel came up with a genuinely compelling play experience that let physical toys interact with mobile devices. A special Bluetooth equipped track kept tabs on how fast a Hot Wheels car raced around a course and how far it had driven, while that data was displayed and stored on a mobile app, and used to unlock virtual content and digital games. This week Hot Wheels ID was upgraded with a new STEM experience through a partnership with Apple that brings the upgraded Hot Wheels cars into Swift Playground, challenging kids to rescue their stolen car while learning the Swift programming language in the process. It's another attempt to Trojan horse education into playtime, but learning to code while playing with Hot Wheels doesn't sound like a bad trade off.

Chronicle Collectibles The Dark Crystal SkekUng the Garthim Master Statue

Usually, we don't include statuettes in Toy Aisle, but we'll make an exception for one of the best things to come out of Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance being absolutely excellent (well, apart from the fact that it was absolutely excellent, of course): more Dark Crystal merchandise. Chronicle has just announced a new line of statues based on the beloved Jim Henson movie, kicking off with none other than the Garthim Master himself, SkekUng. SkekUng is around 10 inches tall, and is cast in polyresin, posed as he holds his blade high in pride having used it in the Trial By Stone that opens the film. He'll be available in late 2020, for a whopping $250, so start draining your Gelflings now.

For cash, not their essence. Who would've suggested otherwise? [Toy News International]

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