What If - We Got Todd McFarlane Art Inspired Marvel Legends Figures?

[JayC]

When it comes to Marvel, Todd McFarlane is probably best known for his work on the Spider-Man comics. In the 90's he played a large role in revitalizing the character and even launched a new title for the character that he did both the writing and art for.
 

Spider-Man however wasn't the only Marvel title he worked on or the only Marvel character he drew. Incredible Hulk was actually the first title for Marvel he began doing a regular stint on from 1987 to 1988, working with writer legendary writer Peter David.
 

Over the years McFarlane showed us his version of many Marvel based characters including the X-Men, Captain America, Fantastic Four and of course Venom that he helped create.
 

Since those early days, McFarlane has gone on to do a lot in the industry including being a founding member of Image Comics as well as launching his own Toy Company called McFarlane Toys. In the past year McFarlane even secured the rights from Warner Bros. to produce DC Comic based action figures, another comic book company he did art for back in the 80's and 90's.
 

Just today McFarlane posted on his Instagram this image featuring art he did of Wolverine. With the art he posted the following:
 

Quote

Would make a cool action-figure. McFarlane Toys does McFarlane. We can wish.

 

Now Todd can wish all he wants. but I don't think there is much chance McFarlane Toys could take the Marvel toy license from Hasbro. However, WHAT IF Hasbro did a sub-line of Artist Inspired Marvel Legends figures specifically based on McFarlane's art? Perhaps they could even bring Todd himself, independent from his company as a consultant for the sub-line?
 

Let us know what you think in the COMMENTS SECTION. Would you like Hasbro do comic book artist inspired Marvel Legends figures, and besides McFarlane, which artists and their work would you like to see turned into action figures?

[WonkoTheSane]

This is something I never even knew I wanted until now. Nonetheless, I do. 

I very much do.

[Satam]

The Eddie Brock Venom figures are quite close to Todd's Venom, although the build isn't really right and, obviously, we have yet to get a version with blue shading. I'd happily get a figure that's closer to Todd's art.  Same goes for Spider-Man (the SDCC "McFarlane" Spider-Man is no where near close enough, imo), Wolverine, and Gray-Hulk.
This could open up, maybe, some artist-specific waves, kinda like they did with the obvious Alex Ross influence in the 80th Iron Man, Cap, and Thor.  I'd also love to get a Tim Bradstreet Punisher and Blade, Terry Dodson Rogue and Lady Deathstrike, and Jack Kirby's Ultron, Red Skull, and Thor.

[Psychosomatic]

I have always wondered why there haven't been other artists beside Jim Lee represented in toy form. Jim Lee is great and all, but I would kill for Marvel Legends based on the work of Madureira, Bachalo, and Ramos!

 

[MonsterChris]

1 hour ago, Psychosomatic said:

I have always wondered why there haven't been other artists beside Jim Lee represented in toy form. Jim Lee is great and all, but I would kill for Marvel Legends based on the work of Madureira, Bachalo, and Ramos!

 

There have been smatterings here and there.  Toybiz did a Ramos-style Spider-Man and a Green Goblin in the old Spider-Man Classics line that were both pretty great to look at, if not pose.  Hasbro's Marvel Girl figure from the Brood Queen wave was very much a Bachalo drawing.

I could do with a McFarlane Spider-Man and maybe a Hulk.  I'd be set after that.  The specific artist figures can sure be cool, but sometimes they don't look right posed next to the other, more house-styled figures on your shelf.  I like more of a subtle influence, like those new Jim Lee-esque Punisher heads, or that mane of hair on the new AOA Weapon X that references the Adam Kubert approach.

Also, I've seen the McFarlane DC figures in stores.  They didn't grab me.  In my opinion, DCUC is the high water mark for the DC universe in 6-inch scale.  I think McFarlane is, so far, falling short of that mark.  The DCAU-style stuff in particular looks kind of bad.

[enzosaurusrex]

No to McFarlane for me but I'm all in for a Madureira X-men wave.

[Emnems80]

I think it would be cool to have an artist inspired series. But I doubt it would get the support it would need in order to last.

[Ironspider428]

I’m not a big enough fan of X-Men or Avengers to want any specific artist representations of those lines, but I’d love them for Spidey and his villains, particularly McFarlane and Ramos. They’d mostly have to be new molds, probably, but I’d get them, even at premium prices.

[Atlantis]

Considering the sloppy work done on his Batman and Superman DC figures, no, I 'm not interested in a McFarlane type Marvel figure. Now if its based on his art style, but neither he nor anyone affiliated with his company have a hand in the production, that's  a different story. Besides I think he's too wound up with his kickstarter. That work looks great by the way.

Figures inspired by Cockrum, Buscema, Perez, Bryne, Lee, Adams? Id sure be interested in those.

[SUPREME007]

I think his artwork looks nice, but using his style consulting him would not be cool, like his DC line he is not doing it justice, hopefully, that can change. I wish Hasbro can take the DC line, wouldn't that be something.

[JediJester]

Figures inspired by artists? Sure.

Consult artists on the figures? HELL NO!

I'd be worried that, like McFarlane, the other artists would sacrifice articulation for appearance. Even his Spawn Kickstarter has a weird sculpted twist in the torso that will prevent a straight-forward pose from looking natural. Action figures finally, after many awkward years, have moved away from that sort of limiting design and I'll quit buying altogether if they backslide.

[monron999]

 Never been a big fan of specific artist inspired figures. People will point to the Jim Lee style X-Men, but those were actually 100 percent ML figures with costumes and colors based on original Lee designs. There really wasn't anything done with the sculpting to mimic Lee's art.

That aside, the first reason I don't like artist specific figures is there is usually some awkward paint applications and articulation decisions they try to use to make the figure look like the art. Anyone who's seen those weird DC Direct figures based on Jim Lee, Jae Lee and Terry Dodson art know how badly that stuff missed the mark. Not to say someone couldn't do it right, but its gonna be something that gets perfected over time, then much like ML, the figures that were made in the early stages would be bad in comparison to the new figures and there would be so much demand to redo those figures. Secondly is the character selection which will inevitably include characters not even done in the main line. Then there would be all the outrage from the main liners that we don't have that character in their collection and etc....... Something I could see happening would be a McFarlane style Joe Fixit and then never seeing one in the main line. Still, some would be perfectly happy to have that one as their only Fixit, but you know the outcry would begin for a "regular" version.

Ultimately I think the best resolution would be to keep the body sculpting the same, but maybe include alternate artist inspired head sculpts and/or hand sculpts. I think a McFarlane Spider-Man head sculpt and hands would go a long way to make a standard Pizza Spidey look McFarlane-ish or a spikey hair with sunglasses head sculpt and "Pew Pew shooting hands" would make a fairly convincing Silvestri version Dazzler.

[GrtWhiteCustoms]

1 hour ago, Atlantis said:

Considering the sloppy work done on his Batman and Superman DC figures, no, I 'm not interested in a McFarlane type Marvel figure. Now if its based on his art style, but neither he nor anyone affiliated with his company have a hand in the production, that's  a different story. Besides I think he's too wound up with his kickstarter. That work looks great by the way.

Figures inspired by Cockrum, Buscema, Perez, Bryne, Lee, Adams? Id sure be interested in those.

Yes yes yes....PLEASE! I'm a huge Byrne/Cockrum/Perez fan!!

[williebill73]

Wouldn't mind seeing Dale Keown style of Hulk or Lee Weeks. McFarlane's Spidey definitely but only in a consultation position.

[Bluecomet]

Maybe an option for the future but not now...the costumes are almost the same as existing marvel legends...maybe a new head sculpt can actually get you the Todd McFarlane version of the character

What we really need for X-men is for the Dawn of X costumes (artists Pepe Larraz, R.B. Silva and Marte Gracia)...that should be a must for both Diamond Select and Hasbro..they started with Nimrod already, why not proceed further like what they did with age of apocalypse?

[Heisenberg]

I think this a great idea as an exclusive. They should find a company they don't usually make exclusives for ( I vote Books A MIllion) but it could be another store and give us a Mcfarlane exclusive every few months. 

[ADour]

I personally prefer Marvel Legends to have a universal kind of approach. For instance, I thought it was nice that the Tony Stark headsculpt that came with the Invincible Iron Man was very clearly inspired by David Marquez's Tony Stark, but I would have preferred something that didn't depict such specific version of the character.

However, I think making some kind of sub-line for artist-inspired figures would be neat. I stress that they should be in a sub-line of their own and not pass off as regular Marvel Legends. Another problem I see is that these hypothetical artist-inspired figures would require brand new molds. To properly capture an artist style's, Hasbro can't just rely on reusing the same molds that go for normal figures, with maybe a different headsculpt; they would need to be designed almost from the ground up. The problem here is that Hasbro aren't really the ones to design figures from the ground up, since they reuse parts as much as they can.

[Benn]

The McFarlane Spidey is the definitive Spidey for me, but I honestly don't care for his X-Men or many of his other renditions. His Wolverine cowl always looked awkward to me, like it bends out where it should bend in or something, and nothing about his other X-Men really jumped out at me. Meh.

[silverback]

5 hours ago, Atlantis said:

Considering the sloppy work done on his Batman and Superman DC figures, no, I 'm not interested in a McFarlane type Marvel figure. Now if its based on his art style, but neither he nor anyone affiliated with his company have a hand in the production, that's  a different story. Besides I think he's too wound up with his kickstarter. That work looks great by the way.

Figures inspired by Cockrum, Buscema, Perez, Bryne, Lee, Adams? Id sure be interested in those.

Nothing personally against McFarlane but I fully agree with Atlantis on this one, I got the Superman and Wonder Woman figures in his DC line but their not what I would call top of the line IMO.

[Air-Walker]

I love Todd McFarlane, he's a huge, huge inspiration to me. I have an enormous amount of respect for him; he practically pioneered the whole adult toy collecting phenomenon as we know it in the Western Hemisphere! That being said, and ironically, I wouldn't be interested in a toy line based on his particular style, though I definitely get the appeal.

Now...a line based on Jack Kirby's style....that would interest me! Granted, most of Marvel Legends can already technically be considered a Kirby line since he visually created nearly all the classic characters. Still...I think his aesthetic is probably the most 'toyetic' out of any comic artist who's ever lived. Who wouldn't want this guy cuddling their ML Captain America, lol:

 

 

 

 

[leokearon]

No way. The idea of artist inspired figures would just open the floodgates to the same characters being released over and over again but with different interpretations. I would prefer my figures to have a universal look which is what they ate doing quite well at the moment. 

[RAMCAT]

Well I could go for that Human Torch. Or just a badass classic lookin Torch for that matter.

[worldwarhulk]

1 hour ago, leokearon said:

No way. The idea of artist inspired figures would just open the floodgates to the same characters being released over and over again but with different interpretations. I would prefer my figures to have a universal look which is what they ate doing quite well at the moment. 

How many different variations do you think there currently are for characters like: Wolverine, Captain America, Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, Spider-Man, etc.

There's already a ton of all of them, in a of variety in costumes, styles, size. You name it, it's already happening. They're just not calling em by the specific artist's name. But they should.

[leokearon]

6 minutes ago, worldwarhulk said:

How many different variations do you think there currently are for characters like: Wolverine, Captain America, Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, Spider-Man, etc.

There's already a ton of all of them, in a of variety in costumes, styles, size. You name it, it's already happening. They're just not calling em by the specific artist's name. But they should.

At least for a lot of them they are different costumes. What's going to happen is we are going to get an army of Red and Blue Spideys but one will be McFarlane, another will be Ditko, another will be Romita Snr, another will be Romita Jr, another will be Byrne (shutter), etc.

[Reno]

I personally wouldn't have any interest in these. If they did them, it would be nice if they were included in their own wave with no other figures that I would actually want.