The whole place was a ghost town. While I wouldn?t be able to provide numeric statistics to back the claim, walking through the Javitz Center in the Chelsea District of New York City it was obvious. In the five years I?ve photographed Toy Fair for Rebelscum and Cool Toy Review, this year?s industry-only event was the only one to go with a whimper. Gone were the catered parties and over-the-top press packages. For that matter, gone were a lot of the companies you expect to see.

While photographing a newer company I had the pleasure of running into an old associate I wasn?t expecting to see this year, and what he told me was surprising. Do understand that his statements, while informed, may not be the whole truth, but it was an eye opener nonetheless. He told me that many of the absent spots seen at Javitz were the result of late cancellations. When a company withdraws as late as many of them did, they lose the full booth cost, which is said to be around $10, 000. What would make a company give up that much money when it would only cost them a few thousand more to ship their wares and house their sales staff? It?s the same six hundred pound gorilla that?s been on your mind: The economy. The dreaded recession.

The surprising thing is the message it sends to the potential customers. By spending the additional money these absent companies may very well have been able to sell enough product to at very least make their money back, but instead they are left with empty pockets, empty order forms, and a dark future. Who were these companies? A quick look through the Toy Fair program would have answered that question, but since they weren?t the companies we were there to see it didn?t cross my mind to check.

And speaking of the companies we were there to see (since that?s a more positive topic) things are looking very good for 2009. By going through the showrooms and talking to the representatives, it seems like we are moving forward with a modest, yet desirable year of toy goodness. What does that mean to the collecting community? Simply that there will be less product available for us to choose from, but we?ll want most, if not all of it.

For the big ticket lines from Hasbro, we?re seeing a split-focus for Star Wars collectors with just enough new Clone Wars figures to keep it fresh and more than enough wish list characters to keep the core line relevant in our forth post Saga year. The Clone Wars line has proven to be a massive success over this last year (proving that 20 negative voices in any given forum don?t know what Star Wars fans want as well as Hasbro does) and as it moves into its second year it will do the one thing no one expected: It will make you want to buy a Jar Jar Binks figure. The new packaging design for all their Star Wars figures is a welcome hybrid between the underrated 30th Anniversary card art the Lucasfilm-imposed 2008 white packaging design. This new card art looked even better with the first newly sculpted Phantom Menace Obi-Wan Kenobi to be released since The Power Of The Jedi line.

Star Wars seems to be the only action figure line Hasbro is producing this year not to have a movie to support it. Their G.I. Joe line takes a break from the brilliant and successful A Real American Hero collection to focus on the Rise Of Cobra feature film. The figures and playsets have the same feel as ARAH, so odds are good that the figures will out perform the movie itself. The same can be said about the Transformers line.

The true shining star in their showroom was the Marvel line. Hasbro?s bold move to 3 ? inches may very well put the last nail in the Marvel Legends coffin, and more power to them for it. While many collectors are loathe to admit it, the Marvel Legends line had played its best hands years before Hasbro had it, and even offering better sculpts, silhouette-conscious articulation, and infinitely better plastic, nothing could please the adult collectors. From an outsider looking in that seems a lot like denial. With this new scale Hasbro will be able to offer collectors something new, and ultimately better.

Mattel really brought it this year, and all of their core action figure lines look like pure gold. With the addition of the Ghostbusters line, they have pretty much sewed it up. Look through our photo coverage and you?ll see that no comments can better describe how incredible the new stuff looks. If they were to come out with a Wish List Check List based on what they had to show, it had better have an all of ?em box for checking off. In addition to the products displayed, the way they handled the press was a huge improvement over last year. It could still use a bit more work, but it wasn?t the cattle call that 2008 was. If they can iron out all their distribution and pack out issues they could become the manufacturer of the year. Time will tell if they can manage to give up the silly notion that people actually want to go to eBay and spend thirty or more dollars buying the chase figures they can?t find on the store shelves due to misguided shipping decisions.

Other big winners this year were Diamonod Select Toys, who had a show room full of amazing products, NECA who never fails to amaze, and Mezco Toyz who, while not having any Heroes presence at all, had some incredible new Horror related figures. In truth all the companies we cover on both sites had exceptional products on display.

In a perfect world Gentle Giant and Sideshow Collectibles would still attend Toy Fair, but since their products are sold in an entirely different manner, it makes sense that they wouldn?t attend, even if it means I have to wait another six months to photograph their stuff at the San Diego Comic Con. That won?t be so bad since I?ll also get to shoot Hasbro, Mattel, NECA, Mezco, Diamond, and everyone else again.

Or at least, that is, so long as everyone continues to buy all these great toys?