Toys / Comics to Toys / Marvel Legends

Marvel Legends

   Marvel Toys, formerly known as Toy Biz is the action figure division of Marvel Entertainment. Marvel Toys, released the popular Marvel Legends action figure series in 2002, which created highly articulated Marvel Comics-based action figures. Marvel Toys is also involved in wrestling action figures and licensed several other properties   

There is no more ToyBiz. ToyBiz has ceased to exist since 2006 when owner Marvel Entertainment sold a license to Hasbro to continue the popular Marvel Legends action figure toyline which is reviewed here. To this day, there is a lot of inside information that’s missing allowing the public and toy pundits to figure why exactly Marvel would give up a very successful toyline – probably the most popular action figure toyline of the first half of the 2000s in favour of Hasbro which continues the line as Legends but just cannot capture the popularity of the original line produced by ToyBiz.

First, some history. ToyBiz was partly the product of producer Avi Arad and Isaac Perlmutter. Early on, ToyBiz created toys that were of poor quality. Some of their early super hero toys included a pastiche of the Super Power series by Kenner but with new sculpts, worse action features and bad plastics. These DC Comics’ based action figures had none of the grace or sturdiness of the Super Powers which were an extension of the Super Friends’ cartoon series in 1984. In the mid-1990s. ToyBiz also produced several toys related to comic book properties, such as their long running X-Men series and various Avengers, Spider-man and related characters such as Alpha Flight. Again, these toys were cheap, badly articulated and a shame for the collector of comic book-based action figures.

However, sometimes during that time, ToyBiz bought nearly bankrupted Marvel Entertainment and Arad became interested in becoming a movie producer in Hollywood. Several movie rights were sold for next to nothing and in some cases in perpetuity to Sony Pictures – but that’s another story. Marvel was struggling in the late 1990s. Although it was ToyBiz that had bought Marvel, it seemed like it was Marvel that ran the show. Just before selling its license for Marvel Comics-based action figures to Hasbro, there was some disagreement with Arad and Marvel’s leadership and Arad was now just a movie producer for Marvel Entertainment and not as involved in their project. It’s hard to say if all of these disagreements were entangled with Stan Lee.

Much of this information is hard to piece out and not many have bothered asking as many questions over the years as The Comic Book Bin. Although we covered the sale of the Marvel Legends licensing to Hasbro way back in 2005-2006, we only had official documents to base our investigations. At the same time a new round of financing for Marvel-related movies on its comic book characters through animation in partnership with Lionsgate was announced. Was Hasbro’s license used to finance and cushion the risk Marvel had taken by borrowing money to finance a series of super hero-based movie blockbusters a movie completion financing had invested, outsiders will never know.

However, there is no doubt that with Hasbro now taking the brunt of the risks for producing Marvel Legends action figures, that ToyBiz was no longer a source of potential trouble for Marvel were things to go badly with the production of toys. ToyBiz in early 2000s also made toys from other franchises it did not own, such as Lord of the Ring, which may have been a risky endeavour for the company as the toys quickly lost collectors’ interests after the trilogy ended. Although other licenses had been pursued by ToyBiz, its most popular product was the Marvel Legends and related action figure line of six-inch-based action figures. Related series had also been produced for Spider-man – Spider-man Classics and the X-Men. ToyBiz’s secret sauce was to create rarity of action figures through a complex web of distribution that some retailers, such as Wal-Mart have access to exclusive variants and whole series. The distribution was so sketchy, that collectors would go into frenzy and hunt the toys all over. It gave rise to a popular after market and frequent stories of creepy adult men buying up action figures and literally stealing them from children’s hands in department stores.

The ToyBiz came up with the build a larger action figure ploy which induced even more frenzy. Success in action figure marketing is how much the market will support variants and exclusive distribution methods. In that regard, no other toy company of the 2000s was as successful as ToyBiz. But as ToyBiz lost its main product line, Marvel Legends, the company renamed itself Marvel Toy and continued with a few licensed projects until the complete demise of the division within Marvel Entertainment just before the acquisition by Disney. All the talented sculptors and toy makers must have been absorbed by other companies. To this day, some fans argue that Marvel Toys belongs to Hasbro. It does not.