Toys"R"Us was embroiled in controversy Tuesday after a Florida woman complained about the kids' store selling dolls of fictional drug dealer Walter White and other characters from hit TV show "Breaking Bad."
Plastic figurines made by Mezco Toyz LLC include Walter White holding a handgun and White's accomplice, Jesse Pinkman, wearing a protective suit used in the manufacture of crystallised methamphetamine. It comes complete with a gas mask and a tray of blue crystals.
Action figure of fictional drug dealer Walter White in hit TV show 'Breaking Bad' being advertised on the Toys'R'Us website. (Screenshot: Toys'R'Us)
The Toys"R"Us decision to sell the doll, "complete with a detachable sack of cash and a bag of meth, alongside children's toys, is a dangerous deviation from their family-friendly values," Susan Schrivjer of Fort Myers, Florida wrote in an online petition for the products to be pulled.
"Knowing that those are the items that one needs to make meth, I just think that it's wrong," Schrivjer told Fox affiliate WFTX.
"Get those taken off the shelves and put them in an appropriate store. Put them in an adult store."
"Breaking Bad" follows the story of White, a high school chemistry teacher who morphs into a drugs kingpin.
Action figure of fictional drug dealer Jesse Pinkman in hit TV show 'Breaking Bad' being advertised on the Toys'R'Us website. (Screenshot: Toys'R'Us)
Toys"R"Us did not immediately respond to a call for comment from AFP. In a statement to NBC News, the toy store said "the product packaging clearly notes that the items are intended for ages 15 and up" and "are located in the adult action figure area of our stores."
Schrivjer's petition, posted on the Obama administration's Change.org website, had garnered more than 7,000 signatures by Tuesday.
One petition supporter, posting under the name Jaime Keasler from Georgia, wrote: "It's sick that a company would design kids toys that glorify the making of meth.
"As my 11-year-old daughter just said, 'I thought we were suppose(d) to teach kids not to do drugs.' Exactly."
Toys"R"Us describes itself as "the world's leading dedicated toy and baby products retailer" and has stores throughout the United States and in 35 countries and jurisdictions.
Toys"R"Us told The Associated Press late on Tuesday that the dolls are being removed immediately from its website and shelves.
"Let's just say, the action figures have taken an indefinite sabbatical," said Toys"R"Us in a statement.
The retailer had maintained that the figures are sold in limited quantities in the adult action figure area of its stores.
