Star Wars: The Force Awakens, much like Avengers: Age Of Ultron and Guardians Of The Galaxy, is one of those films that's inspires a metric ton of merchandise. Yet in a world where you can buy oranges with BB-8 on the sack's label, you apparently can't buy a Monopoly themed off of the film with Daisy Ridley's Rey available for play.
Reports have been sweeping the internet, most recently through a post on Entertainment Weekly's site, showcasing just who your token options are for the new variant of the popular board game. Obviously marketed towards eager crowds who are ready to obsess over Star Wars: The Force Awakens, the game contains the following tokens for play: Finn, Darth Vader, Luke Skywalker, and Kylo Ren. If you want to play as any other characters from the canon, you're out of luck, as those four tokens are all that's included in the game.
Now the largest fundamental flaw of this version of Star Wars Monopoly is, quite frankly, that there are too few tokens. Normally, you'd see a Monopoly game contain around 8 or 9 tokens in its compliment of game pieces. Not only does this allow for more characters to make it into the line-up, it also manages to allow more people to play a game of Monopoly. This is the pattern two previous versions of Star Wars Monopoly have adhered to, and neither the Classic Trilogy nor the Episode I variants excluded Princess Leia or Queen Amidala from their roster of players. So what's the big deal with the latest version?
This is one of many questions fans have been asking using the hashtag "#WheresRey," similar to the campaigns that asked why Black Widow and Gamora were in their respective Marvel toy line-ups. There are no answers handy at the moment from any official Hasbro sources, but if we were to venture a guess the Rey situation was all based on the pre-release marketing campaign that the folks at Disney had cooked up for Star Wars: The Force Awakens. For a while, the trailers had us wondering if John Boyega's Finn was going to be the main character, and undersold Daisy Ridley's Rey to a certain extent. So naturally, the toy line for the film seems to have taken a similar line, at least in its opening phases.
That said, Rey has proven to be more than a popular character in the new Star Wars film, she's also possibly the most important character of the new batch of figures to enter the Galactic Civil War. Surely, Disney and its toy manufacturers will take up the cause, and start to produce / promote more Rey products – rather than let a strong portion of their newly growing fan base wander off to more progressive parts. Right? If we can't convince them to even the playing field when it comes to the products linked to Star Wars: The Force Awakens, then perhaps one of their young fans could be more effective in the cause. Below is a letter from an 8 year old girl, asking about Rey's absence in Star Wars Monopoly, and it's quite possibly the most effective argument that can be made for why her inclusion is so important to all aspects of Star Wars lore:
Ultimately, the folks at Hasbro and Disney have dropped the ball with omitting Rey in their latest line of Star Wars merchandise. But it doesn't have to be that way forever. With Star Wars: The Force Awakens continuing to be a box office juggernaut, there's still time for the powers that be to correct their error and provide fresh product for the burgeoning fan base. We'll see what happens next, but in the meantime, you shouldn't let a marketing snafu hinder your enjoyment of Star Wars: The Force Awakens - which is currently in theaters, and contains tons of Rey-centric action!
