The Direct spoke with Heroes & Villains Creative Director Doug Johnson at San Diego Comic-Con (SDCC), where he helped break down how his merchandise company approached designing and selecting what they bring to consumers.
Johnson revealed that one of the key things he wanted to do with Heroes & Villains, a company that sells clothes and other premium items for everyone's favorite fandoms, was to help out fans of Inferno Squadron (who were first introduced in Battlefront 2), noting that "there's no Inferno [Squad] product in the market"—something that the company has now fixed. They also wanted to revisit the rebel commando designs, which "did really well" in the past, but in a new era.
As for The Fantastic Four: First Steps, Johnson noted that his initial thought on Fantastic Four was "to lean harder into the classic and just pay homage to the whole story of the Fantastic Four." He also confirmed that Dr. Doom merchandise, which he previously revealed he wanted to bring to the world last year at SDCC, is for sure on its way—though it could be delayed further due to Avengers: Doomsday's release date shift.
The entire discussion can be read in full below, which also sees Johnson open up about how they dealt with the incredibly volatile tariffs and the necessarily pivots they needed to make to keep everything going.
Heroes & Villains' Mission Statement In Approaching SDCC Merchandise
"There's No Inferno [Squad] Product in the Market..."
- The Direct: "When designing this Star Wars stuff for San Diego Comic-Con 2025, what was the mission statement when you started? What did you want to achieve with what you were doing with this line?"
Doug Johnson: We wanted to really just capitalize on that special ops portion, like we did. So for this one, we've done the rebel commando in the past. It did really well, but that was really pinpointed on the Endor commando with the Cambo texturing and like the predominantly green olive, but we wanted to revisit that piece in a different timeline. So that was kind of the goal here.
And then as far as the Inferno Squadron, there's no Inferno [Squad] product in the market, and I see it all the time. I see cosplayers come by as the full Inferno Trooper a lot of time. So I thought it was relevant.
Doug Johnson Explains the Difficulties That the Tariffs Present Heroes & Villains
"The Last Year Has Been Wild as Shit."
- The Direct: "We spoke a year ago, and within that year, how has both your line and the company evolvedand also just the demands and interest from consumers?"
Doug Johnson: The last year has been wild as shit. So this particular year was unprecedented, bizarre shit, right? So the tariff war situation, like all these things compounding, compounding business inflation. Prices going up on the general consumer. So these are all struggles that the whole world's dealing with, obviously.
But for us, I mean, there were certain pivots that we've made along the way, just simply because we knew, like a lot of our higher end product that was in production wasn't going to be here in time and like, how do we fill that void of things that—That's why we don't have the backpacks in stock. It's because of the tariff situation, because everything stopped. And we were on time for everything, but then that happened, and now we don't have it.
But we have kind of pivoted in some aspects. Like, we really leaned into T-shirts, because we do the majority of our T-shirt development and manufacturing in-house. So we've launched new T-shirt bodies, new T-shirt styling. These tees that we're doing here are a new blank. This is a heavier weight, like, a more boxy fit than what our typical classic tees are, which is what I'm wearing. This is like one of our classic styles.
So, this is more like form-fitting. This is more like boxy; this is called the Forge line. So within our T-shop online, we'll have the forge, we have a Z-line, and we have our classics. So that's kind of the way we've tried to manage it with, like, still having fresh, new things with the situation that it is facing you.
- The Direct: "What is the thought process there in when you guys figure out, okay, this is our presence at SDCC. What is the process to make sure that you know exactly what you want to do and how you're going to put yourself out there to audiences?"
Doug Johnson: I mean, over the years of doing cons, we've kind of realized that having too many options can be a problem sometimes. Over the years, we've kind of whittled down our assortment to just, these are the specific items we're taking... You know, if I offer you 5 t-shirts to pick from, you're going to struggle to pick from five, and you might just walk away. But if I said this is the t-shirt, they're gonna be like, I'll take it.
So, there's a lot of that type of calculating going into it. As far as the space goes, we always have to be cognizant of storage space. Like, how are we going to manage all our stock? How are we going to store it? And that, based on the size of the booth, it's obviously going to limit you to how much stuff you can bring. Yeah, you got to plan accordingly.
Designing Fantastic Four Merchandise for Heroes & Villains
"Marvel Invited Me to London to Go to the Set Ahead of Time..."
- The Direct: "With that Fantastic Four stuff, can you talk a little bit about designing that line and how you were able to—because, that movie brings this whole interesting world, and really there are so many tools creatively, like we can just do so much that's new and fresh. So what was it like tackling that?"
Doug Johnson: That was a cool experience for me. Marvel invited me to London to go to the set ahead of time, which was amazing and truly incredible. So I derived a lot of inspiration from that trip, my initial thought on Fantastic Four was to lean harder into, like classic and just pay homage to the whole story of the Fantastic Four.
And so we do have some product based on that vision launching later, like, actually sooner than later, but relatively soon. Exclusive information, but that piece should launch soon? Because basically, the one we did is very movie-specific. It's like the bomber jacket that's in that collection is based on the suits that you'll see in the film, mimicking what they have on their spacesuit.
- The Direct: "Last year we talked, you mentioned you really wanted to do something for Dr. Doom, yes. Has any progress been made on that front?"
Doug Johnson: It has, for sure. But with the film ('Avengers: Doomsday') being pushed back now, the product launch may be pushed back as well.
