NYCC ’24: Bandai Namco’s Justin Cavender reflects on the show floor

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Anyone who’s been to New York Comic Con or seen people talk about it over the last few years has heard about the giant Goku balloon balloons or Piccolo statues as they enter the convention show floor. That’s usually just one piece of the grander expanse of Bandai Namco, the entertainment company from Japan that is not only one of the largest video games companies in the world (Tekken series, Elden Ring), but also one of the biggest toy and collectible makers with more licenses than I could list.

At NYCC ’24, I spoke with senior marketing manager Justin Cavender about this year’s NYCC, surrounding events, the Tamashii Nations store in Times Square, and much more.

Julian Lytle for The Beat: How’s it going, Justin?

Justin Cavender: Ready to rock and roll. It’s going great. We have a tremendous footprint here. We got a little bit of everything for everyone around here.

Lytle: You guys take over a big section of the show floor.

Cavender: It’s pretty neat but at the same time, everything is its own little brand. It’s not like Bandai Namco all over the place. There’s a main booth here, but [the spread] is more celebrating Gundam, celebrating Blue Lock, celebrating Dragon Ball, celebrating Godzilla and Pokémon.

Lytle: What are some of the exclusives that you have for New York Comic Con this year?

Cavender: For Dragon Ball, we have the Super Saiyan God Super Saiyan Vegito (Super Saiyan Blue) which is great, and comes with that cool aura effect and the energy ball. Then there is the gold Godzilla -01 figure, which is really cool. There is an OG Tamagotchi and Hello Kitty Sanrio collab Tamagotchi over there. All the Gundam Base model kits are available. Those count as exclusives.

There are regular retail model kits in there, but a sizable portion of what is available are kits you would only get in Japan or Singapore, any place with a Gundam Base. But it’s cool to bring that stuff to New York so you don’t have to fly all the way to Japan just to get the hottest stuff.

Lytle: How is the Ultraman stuff doing?

Cavender: Ultraman is doing really well. So, Ultraman Rising, which came out over the summer, was a big hit on Netflix. It’s a great entry point. It’s been around for 60 years, but a lot of people don’t really know what Ultraman is. Being on Netflix and getting exposed to a general audience is a really good thing.

We’ve been sort of doubling down on Ultraman at Anime Expo. We had that same sort of exhibit with Ultraman and Emmy from Ultraman Rising showing up and doing meet-and-greets and photo ops.

We have an activation happening on Saturday at American Dream. We’re going to have live-suit actors wrestle and combat each other in front of the Bandai Namco store. It’s gonna be awesome. It’ll be Ultraman and Baltan and then Ultraman Zero and Ultraman Belial going against each other. Two matches.

Then there’s a meet-and-greet hosted by Christopher Shawn, who was the voice of Ultraman Rising. So it’ll be a blast. And then Ultraman has a panel here at the con on Sunday.

Lytle: Are there any future products coming out?

Cavender: Yeah, so we have a Vegeta and a Piccolo and then there’s all plans that I can’t talk about. But, you know, we’re definitely invested heavily in Dragon Ball Daima. We have a North American tour happening. It’s going to the Mall of America in Minnesota. It’s coming to America Dream and it’s coming to the Edmonton Mall in Canada. It’s very exciting.

Julian Lytle: Do you have an eventful 2025?

Justin Cavender: We do. We always have new stuff coming out. Right now we’re taking preorders for items that come out in like February and March. We’re always six months ahead of products coming out, which is definitely tricky because you gotta get people excited about it now. And then we have to remind everybody that it’s coming out six months from now, like when it finally hits the stores and everyone gets excited about it.

There are some, some very exciting things happening with some IPs that I can’t talk about, but I am very much looking forward to it. We are already knee-deep in the planning stages for 2025. A lot of fun surprises coming your way.

Lytle: Hopefully there’ll be more Tekken figures, but will Bandai Namco do some of the other famous brands, like Soul Caliber or even variants of the Dragon Ball figures from Dragon Ball FighterZ or Sparking Zero?

Cavender: I like where your head is at. As of right now, no other figures have been announced for Tekken. As a Dark Souls fan, I would love to have some Dark Souls action figures. Elden Ring was a huge hit in the last two years and there was the Festering Fingerprint fight figure. And then Malenia debuted at the Tamashii Nations event last year in Tokyo. So hopefully that comes out.

I would love some Soul Caliber figures, man. I would rock like a Volvo, Siegfried, or a Nightmare. Forget about it. Those would be on my shelf today! Absolutely. But the S.H. MonsterArts line is one I really love. It usually is a lot of Godzilla figures, but they did do Monster Hunter. So I do think that that opens up the door for the possibilities for other video games. So, I would love the bosses in Elden Ring or the bosses in Dark Souls to be in S.H. MonsterArts. That’s like pie in the sky.

Lytle: Times Square has one of the only Tamashii Nations Stores. Will there be any more exclusives announced this year?

Cavender: Tamashii Nations has been really good about having new store exclusives. It was shared that there’s going to be Robert Pattinson The Batman with the cloth cape. So that’ll be a new one and the first-time display is [at NYCC] over by the register. They’ve been really good about cycling in new store exclusives. And it comes in that beautiful black box. It’s very eye-catching. It’s a nice box.

Lytle: How can we get some more Kamen Rider stuff and maybe Super Sentai?

Justin Cavender: The Tamashii Nation store does carry Kamen Rider S.H.Figuarts, which is great. But it’s really tricky to market toys for a show that isn’t available to watch legally here in the United States. And it’s kind of a sticky wicket. It’s like the world’s worst secret where like, all these Kamen Rider fans are obviously watching this show, but how are they doing that? It’s hard to be able to meet a demand that might not even exist because it’s all cloak and dagger due to piracy and stuff like that. So until you can have a great partnership with the folks in Japan and have it streaming for an American audience, I think it’s always going to be an uphill battle.

Something like Ultraman‘s been around for 60 years. There is now an English dub version on the [Tsuabara Productions] YouTube channel. So, I mean, if maybe Kamen Rider went sort of that avenue… Obviously, Shout Factory has been putting out the collections, but at the end of the day, here in the United States, it’s very niche.

Even Gundam, something that we are 1 thousand percent invested in—my mom knows who Optimus Prime is, but she has no idea what a Gundam is. It’s all about that education piece. It’s hard to educate people on a show that’s not available. That’s my take on it. I’m sure that’s a much higher-level conversation to be had, but objectively, it’s hard to market toys for a show that isn’t available to watch.

Lytle: Is there anything you’d like to tell people about?

Cavender: Obviously, we can’t go to every single convention, but it has been exciting. The Gundam Base mobile tour has opened up a lot of opportunities. Going forward, it might not be uncommon to see more things like that, you know? Stay tuned on [Bandai Namco’s] social channels @BandaiCollect for announcements. Maybe we’re taking other things on the road, you know?

California gets a lot of love, and New York gets a lot of love, but middle America gets lost in the void. Anything we can do to bring the convention space to you is our goal. Be on the lookout for exciting things. And I think that the Dragon Ball Daima North America tour is another perfect example of that. Taking the convention experience out across the country, I think, is a great thing.

[This interview has been edited for length and clarity.]