History Main / ToylineExclusiveCharacter

* The toyline for ''Film/SpiderMan3'' had figures of Kraven, Scorpion, Lizard, Black Cat, Mysterio, Rhino and Shocker. They never appeared in the movie, though they did appear in the games.

** A notable oddity in the Evil Space Monsters lineup were three monsters, Steamy Meanie, Calcifire, and Silent Knight, who did not appear in ''Power Rangers''. What makes them notable is that these villain ''did'' appear in ''Series/NinjaSentaiKakuranger'', (where they were Enraenra, Ittanmomen, and Hakumenrou respectively) but were otherwise [[AdaptedOut not adapted]]. %% The Pink Shogunzord does not count, as it's in the show as the White Shogunzord. Same "character", different color.

* ''Franchise/{{Naruto}}'' Back in the late 2000's, many people all over the world found 2 action figures of Akatsuki members that never appeared in the manga and the anime. One being a guy with purple skin, a green tongue, an Otogakure headband, the Akatsuki cloak and a large Wolverine-esque claw gauntlet, the other being a guy with a Iwagakure headband, the Akatsuki cloak and blue skin.

This trope refers to a character who only appears in toys and merchandise but not the actual work. When a series is made into toys (or vice-versa), writers must conceive a role for a character to play in the story, and toymakers must have a reasonable amount of merchandise to sell as part of an assortment, thus resulting in several characters never appearing in fiction and only appearing as toys. Alternatively, it may be easier for toymakers to PaletteSwap an existing toy into a new character to keep the line going. [[Wiki/TFWikiDotNet Perhaps someday some writer will love them all.]]

* The action figure line for ''WesternAnimation/IronMan'' featured Argent and Aureus, two robotic duplicates of Fin Fang Foom that Comicbook/{{MODOK}} created.

* ''Film/{{Moonraker}}'': There's a Toys/FunkoPop of Creator/RogerMoore's Film/JamesBond wearing a space suit. He never dons one in the film itself, the figure is based off the famous promo shots Moore did wearing it.

* ''Franchise/{{Godzilla}}'': The Trendmasters ''King of the Monsters'' / ''Godzilla Force'' toyline has Godzilla Force, and its members David Easton, Peter Richards, Margaret O'Brien, and Michael Van Horn, a group of human commandos wearing ''Franchise/PowerRangers''-style helmets, based on G-Force from ''Film/GodzillaVsMechagodzillaII''. Both groups fly a Garuda ship.

* ''WebAnimation/{{RWBY}}'': [[AvertedTrope Averted]]. The villain Lil' Miss Malachite originally appeared exclusively as a mini-boss in the ''RWBY: Combat Ready'' board game. Later, the character was adapted into the show proper as a minor antagonist.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheNewBatmanAdventures'': 20 years after the show finished airing, [[Creator/DCComics DC Collectibles]] began a new series of figures titled ''Batman: The Adventure Continues'', releasing figures of other ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'' characters who never appeared in the Franchise/DCAnimatedUniverse such as ComicBook/{{Azrael}}, ComicBook/{{Deathstroke}}, or [[ComicBook/RedHood Jason Todd]]. This would be eventually averted with the release of the ''Batman: The Adventures Continue'' digital-first comic, which features appearances from many of the characters from the toyline.

** ''Series/PowerRangersJungleFury'' subverts this - the Bat, Elephant, and Shark Rangers were created for the toyline and then showed up in the TV series. However, one item tied to the three that had nothing to do with the show was the Beast Master Megazord; on TV their Zords were {{Mecha Expansion Pack}}s and incapable of forming a Megazord on their own, while the Beast Master combined completely different versions of those Zords (that could not be used as Expansion Packs) with Leopard and Puma Zords (which also didn't appear in the show). The show-accurate Expansion Pack versions of the Zords were released later.

* ''Franchise/{{Transformers}}'': Incredibly common; every single toyline ever has characters whose only appearance in fiction is the little bio on their ActionFigureFileCard, and some don't even have those. This is often eventually [[SubvertedTrope subverted]], as later writers love using obscure toyline-exclusive Transformers in media or by retconning them to be existing characters. Of course, the toys are rarely still on shelves, meaning these subversions make the original toys much more expensive on the secondary market.

** Ironfist the Lightformer Jeep went seventeen years without a single appearance in fiction until this trope was coincidentally subverted by two completely separate comic series that independently chose to use him as a major character at the same time, both believing that he wasn't going to be used by anyone else.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheNewBatmanAdventures'': 20 years after the show finished airing, [[Creator/DCComics DC Collectibles]] began a new series of figures titled ''Batman: The Adventure Continues'', releasing figures of other ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'' characters who never appeared in the Franchise/DCAnimatedUniverse such as ComicBook/{{Azrael}}, ComicBook/{{Deathstroke}}, or [[ComicBook/RedHood Jason Todd]]. [[SubvertedTrope Subverted]] with the release of the ''Batman: The Adventures Continue'' digital-first comic, which features appearances from many of the characters from the toyline.

* ''Film/FantasticFour2005'': The most sought after figure from the movie line is the Doombot, a character who didn't even appear in the film (and whose design is totally different in the comics).

* ''WesternAnimation/SheRaPrincessOfPower'': Double Trouble was never featured in the show proper, instead included as a doll in the merchandise though she made an appearance in one comic. In [[WesternAnimation/SheRaAndThePrincessesOfPower the reboot]], [[ToylessToylineCharacter it's the other way around]]; [[GenderFlip they]] get a prominent role in season four but aren't part of the toy line.

** ''WesternAnimation/BeastWars'' had this by the dozens. Out of the many, ''many'' various animals, Fuzors, Transmetals and non-canon variants, only a handful were showcased in the show itself. Many of them received new life in the comic lines (both Western and Japanese), as well as a Japanese exclusive ''Anime/BeastWarsII'' and ''Anime/BeastWarsNeo'', but in the initial show itself? Not so much as a cameo. This would be repeated later on in ''WesternAnimation/BeastMachines''.

** ''WesternAnimation/BeastWars'' had this by the dozens. Out of the many, ''many'' various animals, Fuzors, Transmetals and non-canon variants, only a handful were showcased in the show itself. Many of them received new life in the comic lines (both Western and Japanese), as well as a Japanese exclusive ''Beast Wars II'', but in the initial show itself? Not so much as a cameo. This would be repeated later on in ''WesternAnimation/BeastMachines''.

* The ''Series/PowerRangersNinjaSteel'' toyline featured the Stegosawrus, Tigercannon and Gorilla Blast Zords, three original Zords never seen in the show.

* The toyline for ''Film/TheDarkKnight'' featured two comics villains: Deathstroke and Firefly both of whom never appeared in the movie or any tie-in media.

* ''Film/{{Hulk}}'': Around the time of the first movie, [=ToyBiz=] launched a series called "Hulk Classics" (a companion to their Marvel Legends, Spider-Man Classics, X-Men Classics and Fantastic Four Classics lines), which featured various characters from across the history of the comic. The major exception was Mecha-Hulk, a [[MiniMecha robotic Hulk piloted by the Gremlin]]. Despite the suit never having appeared in the comics (even though the Gremlin did) Mecha-Hulk proved to be a huge hit with collectors and frequently goes for extremely high prices on the aftermarket.

* Creator/{{Kenner}}'s ''Super Powers Collection'' contains a few characters not seen in either Franchise/TheDCU or the ''WesternAnimation/SuperFriends'' TV series. Among the new characters are heroes named [[http://www.actionfigureinsider.com/archives/sp/goldenpharoah.html Golden Pharaoh]] and [[http://www.actionfigureinsider.com/archives/sp/cyclotron.html Cyclotron]], as well as an [[Comicbook/NewGods Apokoliptian]] assassin named [[https://superfriends.fandom.com/wiki/Silicon_(Super_Powers_figure) Silicon]]. South American company Gulliver Juguetes introduced The Abominable Snowman and Captain Ray in their South American release of ''Super Heroes''/''Super Powers''.

** Bench-Press from the ''Film/GIJoeRiseOfCobra'' line wasn't featured in any fiction whatsoever, nor does he have a direct G1 counterpart. He does share a real name with the G1 character Rock 'n Roll but their similarities end there.

* From 2014 to 2016, Fisher-Price released a line of [[WesternAnimation/ThomasTheTankEngine Thomas]] Wooden Railway specialty sets that had characters exclusive to those sets. These characters were not pre-existing characters from the ''Literature/TheRailwaySeries'' books or the ''Thomas the Tank Engine'' TV series and were made specifically for these sets. These characters included Logan, a small, squat steam shunter that distributes coal in the yards, Sam, a massive American locomotive sent to help with the construction of a new museum, and Dustin, a snowplow locomotive that comes to help during a blizzard. In addition to models of the characters themselves, each set came with a book about the adventures these characters went on; Logan had ''Logan and the Big Blue Engines'', Sam had ''Sam and the Great Bell'', and Dustin had ''Dustin Comes in First'' and ''Dustin and the Sodor Steam Team''. While Logan and Dustin have not appeared outside these books, Sam eventually made a brief cameo in the ''WesternAnimation/BigWorldBigAdventures'' movie.

** NECA's "Sewer Mutation Warrior Alien" is a fun example, as no such alien exists in the ''Franchise/{{Alien}}'' franchise... it is, however, inspired by a LawyerFriendlyCameo from ''WesternAnimation/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles'' that had the turtles meet an ersatz xenomorph in the sewer (hence the name). It also shows up in ''VideoGame/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtlesTurtlesInTime'' but is a complete foreigner to the franchise that the toy is from.

* There were quite a few ''[=GoBots=]'' toys that didn't appear in the ''WesternAnimation/ChallengeOfTheGobots'' cartoon, some of the more notable ones including the [=RoGuns=] (Rifle, Pistol and Squirt) and the Renegade Combiner Monsterous (Fright Face, Heart Attack, South Claw, Weird Wing, Gore Jaw and Fangs), though the ''Renegade Rhetoric'' Facebook page (which was largely a CharacterBlog for Cy-Kill where the Renegades' leader used his posts to describe the events of a non-existent second season to ''Challenge of the [=GoBots=]'') would retroactively add many of them to the cartoon's canon.

* There were quite a few ''[=GoBots=]'' toys that didn't appear in the ''WesternAnimation/ChallengeOfTheGobots'' cartoon, some of the more notable ones including the [=RoGuns=] (Rifle, Pistol and Squirt) and the Renegade Combiner Monsterous (Fright Face, Heart Attack, South Claw, Weird Wing, Gore Jaw and Fangs), though the ''Renegade Rhetoric'' Facebook page (which was largely a CharacterBlog for Cy-Kill where the Renegade leader used his posts to describe the events of a non-existent second season to ''Challenge of the [=GoBots=]'') would retroactively add many of them to the cartoon's canon.