While Star Wars has generated billions of dollars in theaters, its merchandising branch is even more impressive. Since Kenner’s pioneering toy line launched in 1977, the franchise has accumulated an estimated $29 billion in merchandise sales alone, a figure that has turned the galaxy far, far away into the most profitable licensing enterprise in cinematic history. The most coveted items of that collection have become serious financial assets, such as the 1979 Kenner Boba Fett Rocket-Firing Prototype, the figure that shattered the Guinness World Record for the most expensive action figure ever sold when it fetched $1,342,000 at Goldin Auctions in August 2024. Now, another specimen from that same legendary lineage is heading to the auction block at Goldin. Just as that auction opens, fans will get a rare on-screen look at what makes this collectible so extraordinary.
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MeTV’s original series Collector’s Call is spotlighting Star Wars collector Paul Chu in its upcoming episode, and ComicBook has an exclusive clip from the episode. As a kid, Chu owned Star Wars toys, sold them to fund tuition and dental school, then spent his adult years methodically reclaiming them. His collection includes Star Wars artwork salvaged from a dumpster, rare international pieces like the Uzay Headman from Turkey, and his crown jewel, a one-of-one Boba Fett bounty hunter figure from the same line as the one that broke the Guinness World Record, with a third soon to be auctioned at Goldin.
Goldin has officially listed a 1979 Kenner Star Wars Boba Fett Rocket Firing / J-Slot Prototype Action Figure/HK — graded AFA NM+ 85+ and accompanied by a Collectible Investment Brokerage Certificate of Authenticity — with a starting bid of $100,000. This particular specimen carries the distinction of being a Pop 1, meaning it is the sole example graded at that designation, and the auction is set to open on Saturday evening. Given that a comparable figure from this exact prototype run became the most expensive toy in recorded history, serious collectors will arrive at this sale with the full weight of that precedent behind them.
Why Do Collectors So Covet This Boba Fett Action Figure?
In 1979, Kenner was developing a Boba Fett figure with a spring-loaded rocket-firing backpack as a mail-away promotion for fans who purchased four or more Star Wars action figures. Before a single unit reached a child, Kenner’s executives were confronted with a crisis unfolding at rival Mattel, whose Battlestar Galactica toy line featured a nearly identical rocket-launching mechanism. That toy had been linked to at least one child’s death by choking, triggering a large-scale recall and an industry-wide safety reckoning. Kenner immediately shut down the rocket-firing program, destroyed the overwhelming majority of prototypes already produced, and released a redesigned version of the figure with its missiles welded in place. The prototypes that survived did so because a handful of Kenner engineers and employees quietly took them home before the destruction order was carried out.
The specific J-Slot designation on the current Goldin listing refers to the shape of the firing mechanism channel on the figure’s back, a second-generation prototype design that was produced in even smaller quantities than the earlier L-slot variant. According to auction house records and collector documentation, only about 100 of the Rocket-Firing Boba Fett prototypes in total are believed to still exist in any condition, and fully painted, high-grade J-slot examples represent the rarest subset within that already limited pool. A Pop 1 AFA grade compounds that scarcity because it attests the singular highest-graded example of its specific variant. No equivalent specimen exists to compete with it on condition.
All that already set the new action to shatter records, but it’s also important to remember Star Wars is a cultural institution. Collectors and alternative asset investors have historically been cautious about franchises that could disappear overnight, taking their associated memorabilia valuations with them. Star Wars, however, is as popular as ever, with Disney currently developing multiple movies and TV shows.
The Goldin auction for the 1979 Kenner Star Wars Boba Fett Rocket Firing / J-Slot Prototype Action Figure/HK — AFA NM+ 85+, CIB COA — opens Saturday evening, May 2, with bidding starting at $100,000. After that, MeTV’s Collector’s Call episode featuring the Boba Fett action figure airs Sunday, May 3, at 6:30 ET.
Do you think this Boba Fett prototype will break the existing Guinness World Record? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!
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