DC Multiverse Outsells Marvel Legends In 2021?!?

Oh hey, look at that, Todd McFarlane fudging numbers to claim he's selling more than Marvel. Gee, where have I heard THAT story before. *cough-cough-SPAWN-cough*

The more things change.? #90sAllOverAgain

Given the state of Star Wars though I would have an easier time seeing DCM beating them head to head. Black Series seems to have totally stalled with an over abundance of repaints and an over focus of new media figures that come out 6 months after the new media has been released and lost momentum. Im enjoying Vintage Collection more than Black Series but clearly that line is still struggling with distribution (at least at Targets). So I could easily imagine DCM beating Star Wars.

And given the above explanation I think that also explains how DCM could beat Mattels WWE line since likewise WWE figures would have their numbers split since Elite counts separate from Legends, which counts separate from Top Picks, which counts separate as Basics, which count separate as the Summerslam wave, etc. If you actually added all those numbers together I would guess WWE and ML would have to be the top two sellers in the category.

I think the explanation provided by the Hasbro ML team makes perfect sense. At retail each ML wave counts as a new/different toyline. So when looking at retail sales data they count Spider-Man Marvel Legends waves as a different line than X-Men Marvel Legends wave, which they count as different than Disney+ Legends waves, which they count as different than Eternals wave etc.

So in other words if at retail in 2021 Marvel Legends sell:

250K Spider wave figures

200K X-Men wave figures

100K Disney+ wave figures

50K Eternals wave figures

50K Shang Chi wave figures

50K FF retro wave figures

Then even though the total for ML across all lines equals 700K in this example NPD group would keep those numbers separate so the highest number would be 250K for the Spidey waves. Meanwhile Multiverse all counts as one toyline. Thus if all the DCM waves for the year sell 300K figures they would be the winner despite selling less than half of what ML sells just as a result of how NPD Group does the counting.

Thats what the Marvel Legends team is claiming and I think thats an explanation that makes sense.

Even if he's right, he's not comparing apples to apples. Marvel Legends started in 2007. The main characters have all been done multiple times. The only new characters are pretty much from the third tier at this point. Also, McFarlane seems like he's pumping out a lot more figures, like he's trying to cash in before his license is up. No shade to his line. Some of them look really good and I would buying them if they were in 6 inch scale. I'm actually kind of glad they aren't so that I don't feel compelled to indulge.

I am sure it has outsold Marvel Legends. I had to buy the Year 2 Batman figure three times, because each time, the arms crumbled into dust, and it took forever for Target to process the return. I eventually gave up on trying to own it. It was the last straw of many such QA issues with DC Multiverse.

For as much as I have enjoyed some of the Mcfarlane figures, they really are a bit of fool's gold in some ways.

Sure, the costs are "down", but you are also getting extremely brittle figures half of the time, especially at the wrist and ankle joints. The articulation is also incredibly awkward and useless on some figures, not to mention baffling decisions like Side Eye paint apps and being gouged by the endless head swap variants.

A lot of the "new sculpts" are really just rubber overlays slapped onto the figure, which in some cases, ends up looking like a diaper, and in others, gets stressed against the articulation. These figures actively hate having any articulation, and a lot of them look incredibly ugly as a result. It feels like every other company is doing pinless, well proportioned sculpts, while Todd is catching up to the ToyBiz era.The line has definitely seen incremental improvements since it launched, and I have enjoyed some of the figures, but there's a reason a lot of it peg warms, and why a lot of people end up buying these figures on clearance. Hasbro has its own issues, of course, but Todd should actually take a look at what he is putting out onto the shelf before he tries to big dog any one company.

I'm limited as to what I can store as a collector but find myself buying more Hasbro since I'm a GI Joe fan but with Marvel Legends and DC multiverse I limit myself to MCU only figures no interest in comic waves and DC Movie waves and I have to say McFarland is the easiest to get. Finding Hasbro GI Joe and Marvel figures have late has been difficult. McFarland didn't run into the same shipping issues so of course alot of his stuff was going the past year because getting anything else was next to impossible

A lot of my thoughts have been echoed already by other commenters, so pardon the repetition.

I buy Marvel and Dc both (as well as GI Joe, NECA, other Todd offerings, Valaverse, Super7, etc.,) I cannot stress how much I appreciate McFarlane's ability/willingness to keep the price points down. I have my minor gripes with his toys, such as face sculpts on occasion, releasing batman figures from every comic ever ,extra hands, scale issues, etc...but its not even close enough to make me consider 'dropping' the line. I enjoy the figures. I do factor in that many of Todd's figures can be found on clearance if you are patient enough and have an eye for what may be a more popular offering (I didn't wait on Bane, thank god)

Hasbro's repeated price jumps have made me more picky and I now do the same calculation to wait on clearance/price drops for certain figures. What used to be my habit of picking up entire waves at a time have turned into cherry picking what figures I guess may be more difficult to find later or are just favorites and waiting on the rest. Thor: Love and Thunder is my latest example...picked up 2 figures and stalking the rest. I LOVE Marvel Legends, but I despise Hasbro and their greed. These excuses to raise prices are just that...excuses. I'm sure their are marvel/hasbro diehard defenders out there who will try to point out covid, inflation, etc...and they are correct to an extent, but they could easily absorb those costs for quit a bit....but that means less profit *gasp* Gotta make sure their shareholders keep getting that unsustainable profit increase year after year....grrr....gonna stop before I go further off topic. I'm not knocking on Marvel Legends fans. I'm one too...its the corporate greed I can't stand.

Todd may have outsold Hasbro that year...his stuff is on the shelves all the time for better or worse. He does seem to target kids/parents more with his offerings and prices. I hope he keeps it up and Hasbro feels the pressure a bit and drops their prices some (haha...they won't)

McFarlane: Here is the batcave, batmobile, batcycle from the 66 batman wave all under 30.

Hasbro: Here's a Fortnite boat....77

Hasbro has completely crapped on their reputation thanks to corporate greed. Not that they weren't greedy before - they at least stayed reasonable - but in the current climate they ramped up the shizhousery up to 11. Massively inconsistent prices, over priced with nothing added and will have the gal to moan when people don't buy their stuff. I wait til sales on figures now. I'd happily miss out on a fig I want rather than get ripped off.

I'm not a fan of McFarlane's DC line. They're overall gorgeous looking but the face sculpts are terrible and the articulation is frustrating in how it's sculpted. But mucho respeto on his prices, especially vehicles.

Disclaimer: I'm a Marvel Legends guy through and through. I've been collecting Legends for 20+ years before they were called Legends. They are the primary line that I collect and everything else is secondary. They are the only line that I open anything from. All other lines I buy stay in the package. I also bought at least one version of every DC character that either Mattel or DC Collectibles / DC Direct ever made from the very beginning just like I've done with Legends.

I've bought tons of both Marvel and DC over the last couple of years. The big difference? Every single thing that I've bought by McFarlane has been bought at at least 40% discounted off the original retail price because everything he makes goes on clearance, and relatively quickly. I've never paid more than $13 for a standard DC Multiverse figure and have at least 1 version of every character that he has made since taking over the line. Even the deluxe figures have been easy to find 50% off within 60 days of release.

I still prefer Mattel's DC product to McFarlane's because I'm big into the 1/12 scale (6") and hate that Todd's figures don't conform to that established norm. I have hundreds, if not thousands of figures in that scale so I was super pissed that Todd had to be different. DC Direct / DC Collectibles varied their scales. They did a lot of 7" also, especially in the early days but did more 6" towards the end. For me, my preference for DC figures is Mattel over McFarlance, but McFarlane over DC Direct. DC Direct figures were more like statues in that they were looked nice but were brittle - but I've still got figures from DC Direct that I never would have otherwise like Vandal Savage, The Shade, Tom Strong, Promethea, Professor Pyg, Firefly, Talia al Ghul, Oracle, etc.

For what it's worth, I've also never received a Hasbro figure broken in the package whereas I've had several of McFarlane's arrive broken in the package. Usually it's arms or hands that have broken. DC Direct was even worse, that stuff was always breaking. For Marvel, I had some Toy Biz figures break over the years but I can't specifically remember anything from Hasbro doing so and that's saying something since I have hundreds of those figures.

So for me, I probably buy something like 2:1 Hasbro (Legends, Joes) to McFarlane (DC, Spawn), but only buy McFarlane at clearance prices and because basically everything they make hits clearance somewhere (Amazon, Gamestop, BestBuy, Walmart, Target, etc.).

Luckily, there are different vendors to meet different people's desires. We don't all have to like the same thing. I don't think it's necessary to put down what other people like. For instance, I thought that The Batman movie with Twilight Boy was really bad (which is why they're already trying to replace him with Keanu) - but people like Bagman must have liked it. To each their own!