Imagine, not only selling 300 million toys using a beloved IP that cost $100,000, 5% in royalties and a $10,000 annual fee in perpetuity….and then forgetting to pay it. That’s what happened after Tonka bought Kenner in 1987, only to then be bought by Hasbro in 1991. With that steal of a deal lapsed, Hasbro were then required to prove themselves all over again, and writing over at Rancho Obi-Wan, Vic Wertz takes a look at a fascinating – and largely unknown – moment in time, as Hasbro sought to prove they were the best company to bring Star Wars toys back to life.
in 1991, Hasbro purchased Tonka, and—whether by intent or accident—didn’t make the required payment, so their contract with Lucasfilm expired. And in 1992, George Lucas started letting people know that he was working on Star Wars movies again. Of course, Hasbro was interested in making the toys, but now they had to compete against other toy companies for a new license, and that meant they had to show Lucasfilm what they could do.
These kit-bashed toys, currently residing in the Imperial Archives, were made as part of Hasbro’s 1993 license pitch to Lucasfilm. They didn’t represent items that they necessarily planned to release; rather, the point was to show the types of toys they could possibly make.
This Endor display is housed in a styrene plastic frame, with two background images mounted on foam core: a Ralph McQuarrie painting behind the Ewok treehouse, and a Return of the Jedi movie still behind the Imperial bunker.
The treehouse is a heavily modified and repainted 1983 Kenner Ewok Village toy taken from Kenner’s own in-house toy museum; it was cut apart and augmented with handmade styrene elements as well as sticks, plastic plants, and bits of twine. Hasbro kept the elevator and capture net features of the vintage toy and added a new log thrower and a levitation effect for C-3PO’s chair. One of the vintage Ewok figures has been given a spring-loaded crossbow.
