Although it could be argued that Mattel is portrayed with some less-than-flattering, tongue-in-cheek satire in the Barbie movie, who would have guessed at the toy maker’s porn connection?
It seems the company has a tie-in product deal with the new Wicked movie, selling their “Wicked Fashion Dolls” including Ariana Grande’s “Galinda” and Cynthia Erivo’s “Elphaba.” But it was revealed that there is a misprint on its doll packaging showing the website for an adult film movie site (one we all know pretty well) sporting the same name.
The “Wicked Fashion Dolls” are among a slew of movie tin-in collaborations, spanning dolls, to makeup, shoes, luggage, even food. With this big tent-pole movie opening for the pre-holiday rush, products as well as commercials for them have been in the public eye now a good few weeks…especially in the US, where the movie opens on Nov 22nd.
Mattel has apologized for the box misprint, describing the link as a “misprint.” They went on to further say:
Mattel was made aware of a misprint on the packaging of the Mattel Wicked collection dolls, primarily sold in the U.S., which intended to direct consumers to the official WickedMovie.com landing page. We deeply regret this unfortunate error and are taking immediate action to remedy this,” the toy company said in a statement.
The line of dolls was pulled from the shelves of retailers including Walmart, Macy’s, Kohl’s and others.
“Parents are advised that the misprinted, incorrect website is not appropriate for children. Consumers who already have the product are advised to discard the product packaging or obscure the link and may contact Mattel Customer Service for further information,” the company added.
What the further ramifications might be, if Mattel enjoys a rush of buyers hoping to grab these misprinted packages, or Wicked needs to be ever careful of who suddenly logs onto their site, and if the new Wicked movie is a hit, all of this has yet to be seen.
