Fox Lines Up Toy Deals for Avatar, Dragonball and More

Twentieth Century Fox Licensing and Merchandising (Fox L&M) has selected Mattel as master toy licensee for a full line of action figures and vehicles based on James Cameron's upcoming film Avatar, as well as Bandai America for Dragonball: Evolution.

Mattel's Avatar toy line of heroes, creatures and vehicles is expected to arrive at U.S. retailers in October, months before the film's release in December. The toys will also come with a 3-D Web tag, where fans can unlock other special online features tied to the product. Epic-adventure film Avatar stars Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana and Sigourney Weaver.

Bandai America's Dragonball action figures will hit stores in April to coincide with the release of Dragonball: Evolution. The line will include seven 4" action figures based on the main characters from the film and 6" ripcord-activated figures.

"The introduction of Dragonball: Evolutionis the next installment to an amazingly successful franchise that boasts more than $4 billion in related merchandise sales," says Elie Dekel, executive vice president of licensing and merchandising for Fox L&M. "We know that fans both old and new will be looking for ways to interact with the property and Bandai America has created a great program to satisfy their hunger."

Dragonball: Evolution premieres on April 8 and stars Justin Chatwin (War of the Worlds), Emmy Rossum (Phantom of the Opera), Eriko Tamura ("Heroes") and others. The Dragonball franchise began as a manga series by artist Akira Toriyama in 1984 and has since grown its merchandise into other graphic novels, comic books, video games and toys.

Meanwhile, Fox L&M has also announced other major toy deals, including: