10 Shocking Cover Ups Marvel Comics Wants You To Forget

The X-Men have historically had a rough time of it. Although they have the mutant gene in their DNA, for decades they have been trying to prove that they are still human beings and deserve to be treated with the same rights as everyone else. They have served as a metaphorical stand-in for countless minority groups who have suffered the same discrimination. At the very least, their creators would never denounce their humanity, especially not to simply make a quick buck. Right?

Wrong! Very, very wrong.

When Marvel went into business with ToyBiz in the early nineties, they collaborated on a line of X-Men action figures. However, because dolls were taxed higher than other toys, Marvel decided to try and exploit a legal loophole. The definition of a 'doll' was a toy modeled on a human person, so Marvel simply declared that the X-Men were not human people. Therefore, any model of an X-Man was not technically a doll, and they saved themselves a nice lump of cash in tax.

Marvel went further, denouncing the humanity of their non-mutant heroes too. Eventually, the Fantastic Four, Spider-Man, and all of his villains were considered legally non-human.

When word of this got out, both fans and comics creators themselves felt betrayed that Marvel would so easily dismiss the humanity of the characters they loved. Marvel attempted to calm this by claiming they believed their heroes to be MORE than human, not less than, and ended up sounding like a business-savvy Magneto.