Exclusive: Nike Vandals Will Not Be Back

Were you one of ‘The Terminator Fans’ who were waiting to buy your own pair of Nike Vandals to coincide with the release of Terminator Genisys?

There was a window to get the limited edition re-issues via Nike Lab but if you missed it,- the opportunity has long gone. We would have loved to take a closer look at a pair but it obviously wasn’t meant to be.

When Nike tweeted out about some new Nike Air Force 1’s; the same trainer model Nike initially wanted Skydance Productions to use for Jai Courtney’s Kyle Reese in Genisys; we decided to respond via tweet to ask… where are Nike Vandals?

The result was a tweet back from Nike representatives in Europe on behalf of Nike.com…

Thanks to Nike for the honesty but how on earth has this happened? We want to understand it more and the answers are pretty disheartening.

Nike Lab:

Making the Vandals available as an experimental Nike Lab release was the sign of a limited release or secretly also a test release to see how the Nike Vandal re-issue would work out in sales volume and crowd reception. They must have sold out because we can’t find any for genuine sale out there although we are sure they will pop up on auction sites for extortionate prices over time. Or is the simple fact that there just wasn’t that many in the first place?

Terminator Genisys:

Terminator Genisys was a failure no matter how much a minority tries to validate the misguided Terminator movie.

The appearance of the 2015 re-issue of the vandals was weak and only held a quick homage to the fans, Skydance Productions did nothing to make the trainers iconic for audience goers of today, Jai Courtney clumsily threw them on in a half-assed way,- especially when in comparison to the way Michael Biehn originally did it.

Nike Touting/Extortion:

There are individuals out there who like to buy Nike trainers to auction them off for double the price or more. They will make it harder for fans to buy a limited release unless they have quite a bit of money to throw around. A Nike Lab release (to us) seems like also a way to limit the threat of such dealings encouraging people to go to physical Nike Lab stores to make a purchase and also possibly limiting the amount of units a sole individual can buy in one go. This scenario is similar to people who buy tickets then stand outside of stadiums or events charging extortionate prices to people trying to get into an event, it is a growing problem for Nike and possibly pivotal in why we won’t be getting Nike Vandals on a proper worldwide release.

This is definitely the case with the new Back to the Future Nike Mags in which Nike has made the decision to auction them off in aid of Michael J Fox’s Foundation instead of an online release.

Revealed in a letter to Michael J. Fox from ‘Tinker’ Nike will make the money on sales and additionally provide an estimated 9.4 million donation to aid Michael J. Fox’s fight to rid the world and future generations of Parkinson’s disease. This will remove any goals of mass buyers looking for auctioning profit and also contribute to a good cause along the way. This could become a future trend for Nike for large/limited/special releases in future and has other business benefits to the global corporate company’s operation.

Not Fully Accurate to the 1984 ‘The Terminator’ editions:

Hardcore Terminator fans are especially hard to please and if you release something that is not 100% fully accurate to the original (and widely considered best Terminator movie) ‘The Terminator’ then expect some problems on the way. Why they are not fully accurate; possible legal complications forcing a design change or designers taking liberties in flawless designs to put their own stamp on things is sometimes common.

For Nike to buy a Terminator license and release official ‘The Terminator’ Nike Vandals isn’t financially high risk but they just don’t seem to care to do it. We should have had them for the 30th Anniversary and fans who didn’t get the re-issues are still waiting for 100% accurate editions.

Sorry Nike but some of us don’t want to buy smelly used 30 year old Nike Vandals or to be extorted online…

The 80s has been back in fashion a while now and some people just want Vandals because they are still cool and still way cooler looking than some of Nike’s modern day counterparts.

With each installment the Terminator franchise is losing value as the franchise continues to worsen at the hands of Hollywood but if Nike put their stock in 1984’s The Terminator and the original loyal and true fan-base then we think they would be pleasantly surprised.

Maybe if Skydance had been more confident they would have made sure Terminator Genisys Nike reissues were available to all Terminator Fans as a collectible to coincide with the movie. Regardless of the movie we think fans would have bought them but the real money to be made is obviously with ‘The Terminator’ property.

Nike: “@TerminatorFans At present there are no plans to re-release that style. Please don’t terminate us.”

TheTerminatorFans.com: “We’ll be back”.

Update:

Nike have now responded with something that gives up some hope for fans who still want Vandals!

So Nike responded to this article with “We never say never” and we couldn’t be happier with that response. Like this article and share it with fellow Terminator Fans to continue showing your love for the Nike/Terminator relationship and hope this continues long into the future of theatrical productions and merchandising.

In another quick tweet to Nike we threw the idea that perhaps Arnold Schwarzenegger can reprise his role as ‘The Terminator’ to hunt down Shia LaBeouf (Shia wearing Nike Shoes) in a series of fast high octane advertisements under the slogan of #JustDoIt. Can Nike’s make you run fast enough to outrun the wrath of the original leather clad and relentless ‘The Terminator!’?

We need better marketing and ‘films’ for the Terminator series.