Years ago in my marketing class I learned about the DuPont marketing system. DuPont is responsible for a lot on inovative materials. In short the marketing scheme is this. Come out with something new and better. Price it high, very high, and make your sales to the people who simply 'must' have the best. Then slowly lower the price and catch as much of the 'got to have' extra $ along the way.

The more expensive helmets are 'better' meaning that they have some feature that is an improvement for at least some riders, as explained in the posts above. But it is very doubtful that it is $115 better for most riders. The price will come down as all the 'got to have' sales get made. Perhaps not down to $35. If there are real production cost differences the final price will be different.