Yeah, exactly. It's never like 'okay, this matches up with what I had so it's pretty good.' It's JUST RIGHT. It's "I couldn't ask for a better version of this character." That's how I meant it, at least. Someone at Hasbro (again, I think it's Lenny) is almost obsessed with nailing these characters so well that no other versions could ever measure up.
I loved working at Toys R Us when the Hot Wheels people would come in, rifle through everything as it's getting stocked, not find what they wanted, and then tell me:
When I was in middle school, there was one kid in my grade who bullied the hell out of me. Mostly making fun of me and calling me fat a lot. Fast forward to a couple of years ago and I run in to him face to face at Target, and he's a Hot Wheels guy. That gave me a laugh thinking he's the one who was below me now. We'd say hi and talk some when we would see each other. We talked about what we collected. He collected to actually collect, not to make a profit on. A few months after, he sees me in the parking lot and calls me to his car and hands me a Micro Galaxy Chase Kenner version Luke Skywalker X-Wing. I asked him how much he wanted, and he said "nah, just take it."
That's my thought when I see some of the local collectors as well. There was one guy who had an Ebay page that I would always see rifling through the Hot Wheels, and snagging that new Marvel Legends drops before me and they'd be on his page that afternoon. I started showing up earlier and getting what I wanted...his page closed.
I like the visual of you going home, putting on some make-up, and crossing his name off the List.