On Twitter, @GotFuturama asked the question “What one piece of Futurama merchandise doesn’t exist that you really wish did?” and it got me thinking.

I quickly realized that instead of trying to cram my answer into the usual ‘140-minus-original-tweet’ characters, that I would need to elaborate on the topic of ‘dream Futurama merchandise’ in a new post, here!

Futurama is easily one of my favorite animated shows. I began thinking about the different TYPES of merch that I know exist, or that I would potentially wish existed. I’m sure there are all kinds of Futurama shirts out there, even though I’ve never really looked (Not sure why I haven’t! I have MANY ATHF shirts!) Really, though, any design of shirt could be easily designed and printed off.

So naturally, next, my mind went to toys.

Most people know that I collect a few toys here and there that interest me. Futurama has SO MANY great characters for potential toys, just like its sister show, The Simpsons, and a good number have definitely been produced – at least all the more main characters.

I own a few of these Futurama toys — the KidRobot ones, the tall-ish Leela figure with moon base — I even had a tin Nibbler (that I sold! Argh!)

Other Futurama toys that were produced (but I don’t [yet] own) include the 2002-2003 Horrible Gelatinous Blob and brain slug toys made by Dark Horse and the excellent Toynami figures made from 2007-2009. Toynami produced a great selection of character figures, even including such one-off characters as Nudar and Nixon’s head in a jar. I also saw a picture of The Don from the Robot Mafia, although it may have been a comic-con exclusive or a prototype.

So, some toys exist.

But Simpsons toys feature pretty much EVERY character you can think of, (for good reason – it’s a more popular show and has been on the air forever) and recently even had a LEGO set produced. Hell, even Family Guy toys are expansive now with their selection of characters! Again, another TV show that is still actively producing new episodes.

Futurama has been canceled twice, from two different networks, but it has a SOLIDLY cool, weird science fiction foundation. That’s why I feel like the Futurama toys that have been produced are missing all kinds of cool possibilities and elements that would be really great to see in a piece. I was surprised at how many toy ideas I was able to generate by simply skimming through the list of Futurama episodes. After that, I of course researched to try and find (what I feel are ‘missing’) toy ideas that are already in existence somewhere. But I couldn’t find evidence that the below character figures or playsets had been produced or even prototyped as of now, ANYWHERE!

Here are MULTIPLE ideas for Futurama toys I’d love to see:

– Scruffy!!!! (Sal has a KidRobot figure! Why is there no Scruffy?!?!)

– Slurms McKenzie figure w/ Slurm Factory playset (+ huge Wormulon mom-slug?!?)

– A full set/pack of robot figures (I saw one, but it only had 4 figures, and was missing a potential Robot Santa, Robot Mafia bots [Clamps!], Calculon, Flexo, or Hedonism Bot.. plus many more… Tinny Tim? Others from All My Circuits?)

– Bender as a were-car (how cool would this be?!?!)

– Nibbler in his spaceship.

– The giant space-whale from “Mobius Dick”.

– Any figures of any of the sewer mutants.

– More heads in jars!! The possibilities for these are nearly limitless.

– Amazon women jungle/temple playset, with Fem-puter.

– Anything with all the characters as fish from “Naturama”.

– Mr. Peppy the bone vampire.

– Fry on the Scooty-Puff Jr. surrounded by giant brains in space!

So, there are the Futurama toys I wish existed. My thoughts on “one” piece of Futurama merch that I wished existed turned into an entire collection, but I stand behind all these decisions. I also happen to know that there are some extremely talented toy customizers out there who could probably produce these (for example, my friend made a large scale Mr. Peppy!) Hell, I have a lot of ideas for MY fledgling toy company after thinking about this!

🙂

REFERENCE MATERIAL:

http://thetoybox1138.blogspot.com/2012/07/futurama-toynami.html

http://www.tmnttoys.com/reviews/misc/futurama8/review.html