Toynami displayed a wide variety of Robotech merchandise at the latest New York Toy Fair.

The major toy companies are still leery of anything but a gilt-edged property, so some pretty big movies were snapped up by some of the more aggressive players among the small and medium-size companies in the industry.

January is a transition month in the pop culture products business, with the first week or two typically showing strong post-Christmas sales, followed by slowing traffic as the winter doldrums set in. But there was a lot of activity in pop culture stores this January, with especially strong releases in the comic category.

N2 Toys is waiting to see if buyers at the recently concluded New York Toy Fair will order N2's second series of toys based on the cancelled Tick TV series.

The good news is that ToyBiz action figures are getting better and better thanks to new high tech imaging equipment and an increasing willingness to hire top sculptors, but the bad news is that the first wave of Spider-Man Movie Action Figures showed up in Wal-Mart (and reportedly, in Toys R Us) a month before other channels.

IF Labs is already branching out to include figures from the original Dragon Ball series as well as from FUNimation's next offering, Yu-Yu Hakusho .

Diamond Select showed off a growing collection of licensed products and cool Japanese imports at its showroom at the New York Toy Fair this year.

At Toy Fair, Sideshow displayed its new Cave Troll figure...

The one company to emerge as a new major player in the action figure field at the 2002 Toy Fair was Art Asylum, whose showroom was second only to McFarlane Toys in its devotion to state of the art action figures.

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