Any self-respecting Terminator fan will know what Nike Vandals are. They were an awesome pair of sneakers/trainers from the 80s; worn by Kyle Reese (Michael Biehn) in the first Terminator movie.
Jai Courtney will be wearing the famous trainers in Terminator Genisys…
Still, to this day, the sneakers have held up and have not gone out of fashion but Nike Vandals stopped production a very long time ago and if you have wanted a pair you will have had to search eBay or other shopping sites to find a secondhand pair. Not only do people charge ridiculous prices but they will even try to sell you dirty, worn, and by the look of them- stinky, secondhand pairs. If you have found a pair of mint condition unused Nike Vandals then you are one lucky Terminator fan.
TheTerminatorFans.com tried to seek out Vandals with no luck, so we decided to do the next best thing and track down a shoe as close as we could get… the result was the Nike Blazer.
However thanks to Terminator Genisys the Nike Vandals will go into production again this year and you should finally be able to buy your very own authentic pair of Kyle Reese footwear!
Legal issues have previously prevented even a Kyle Reese figure by NECA from being able to have the Nike ‘tick’ on the trainers…
Nike doesn’t seem to understand its importance in the Terminator fan community; obviously when it comes to figures and disallowing the brand (most likely down to costly licensing fees) they should be embracing Terminator and collectibles. Instead some fans have been forced to paint the complete tick onto the shoes of their Kyle Reese figures. This, to us, is unacceptable, drop the licensing fee, wave it in exchange for a free Nike promo or do a legal clause which states that product packaging must contain the official Nike tick. Ensure Terminator fans get authentically detailed products of the Kyle Reese character!
With Terminator Genisys Nike was again reluctant to re-issue or make a pair of Vandals for the movie requesting that the costume designer build a new pair of trainers based on the Air Force One model of trainers…
Even the Nike Blazer was closer than these… this is the low-cut version; the model Nike wanted them to use was this…
Luckily we had someone fighting our corner… costume designer for Terminator Genisys; Susan Matheson. She took it upon herself to hassle Nike for months until they caved in and made a pair of Nike Vandals for the movie. She must have had backing from Skydance as she suggested they would halt the production of the movie if the demand was not meant for this classic pair of trainers.
io9.com had the chance to speak to Susan on a set visit while the movie was filming:
“Nike wanted me to design an ID, like something, using the Air Force One base. But I’m a sneaker person and I know every single base of every sneaker. The Air Force One base is not the same as a Nike Vandal.”
“So I said, ‘No. I’m not going to do that. I need you to make me the real sneaker… Everybody watching this movie is going to know if it’s the real sneaker or the non-real sneaker.’ Anyone who is a fan of Terminator knows that sequence and knows the photo booth, and knows him grabbing the jacket, and knows that he’s taken the pants off the bum in the alley. We all know this, because I’ve watched this movie in slow motion frame by frame over and over and over. This is the entire reason I went into moviemaking, was a combination between Terminator and Mad Max. Those two movies made me decide that I wanted to do costumes. So for me, if I can’t give you the real sneaker, then I might as well not do the movie, right?”
It would be an excellent opportunity to officially license and sell the shoe again; to a market of needy Terminator fans…
Selling the sneakers in both Terminator Genisys and The Terminator Edition Boxes with appropriate artwork would be a great selling point, maybe buying both editions of the shoe would hold additional reward for fans with unlock codes for online rewards and offers geared around Terminator Genisys’ theatrical release/collectibles and the original ‘The Terminator’ Home release.
The trainers could have movie logos embossed in silver on the inside heel of the shoe with an edition number.
Crossing the brands and relating back to The Terminator with Nike could be a very successful opportunity for Skydance and Paramount; connecting back to those hardcore fans with a product they will love and appreciate.