Let’s be clear: The COVID-19 coronavirus is a serious topic, one that’s already had a major impact on the health, long-term plans, and economic futures of a staggering array of people. The virus, and the fear surrounding it, has altered the trajectories of major films, shuttered massive festivals, and changed the fates of whole warehouses full of hand sanitizer and toilet paper, as well as the all-important “touching your face, stop thinking about touching your face right now” industry. It’s still borderline impossible to predict what the end result of the current concern about the disease might be for any industry, really—except, of course, for the Baby Yoda industry, which may now be demonstrably screwed.
This is per The Hollywood Reporter, which reported this week on what might be the most low-impact, still-kind-of-frustrating knock-on effect of the current viral fear: Possible delays in production of the long-anticipated line of toys featuring everybody’s favorite baby green space thing. This is per a recent SEC filing from Hasbro, which admitted that issues around COVID-19 have had a “negative impact to our ability to design, develop, manufacture and ship product,” including, presumably, its long-running line of Star Wars toys. (Hasbro refused to specifically comment on the status of Baby Yoda toys, we assume because they didn’t want Werner Herzog to be mad at them.)
Again: Demonstrably less important than almost anything else that’s happened in the wake of the coronavirus’ rise. And yet, also still kind of disappointing, especially since Disney—worried about plot spoilers for The Baby Yoda Show (or The Mandalorian, whatever you want to call it)—intentionally refused to have any plushies or other toys of the character available when the show launched (or even for months afterward), forcing fans to resort to bootlegs, off-brand offerings, and, in a few cases, playing pretend with their old, broke-ass Yoda toys, saying stuff like, “Oh, Baby Yoda, you look so tired!” or “Baby Yoda, did you put on old-age makeup to be in some kind of play?”
Anyway: If and when the toys do arrive in stores, we’d caution you not to touch Baby Yoda’s face, either, but we all know you’re not going to listen. He’s just too dang cute!