Licensed Merchandise

Items that were sold rather than distributed for free

HarperCollins:

1. 12 Dismal Cards & Envelopes

Set of twelve greeting cards and envelopes in a tin box, produced around 2001-2002 and sold in bookstores as official merchandise. Cards feature humorously dour sayings ("Dreary sentiments by Lemony Snicket") and illustrations from the books ("Despondent depictions by Brett Helquist"). Tin is decorated with the cover illustration from The Bad Beginning. Each card is approximately 3.75 by 5 inches. There are six different card designs, with two of each design included.

    • Image of Sunny in birdcage: "Having a terrible time ... wish I weren't here."

    • Image of spiral staircase: "It's all downhill from here."

    • Image of trapdoor: "Help."

    • Image of Klaus holding toast: "I'm sorry things are crummy."

    • Image of a Zombie in the Snow: "Hope winter isn't too ghastly."

    • Image of a telephone: "Why haven't you called?"

2. An Unfortunate T-Shirt

White t-shirt: front reads “Things are looking worse” with illustration of the Baudelaires in Count Olaf’s trunk. Sold in bookstores around 2002-2003.

3. Notebook the First

Binder with a Lemony Snicket flash chart. 2003 Barnes & Noble exclusive, sold to promote SparkNotes' FlashCharts. Binder is decorated with the cover illustration from The Bad Beginning. Flash chart contains lists and graphs summarizing A Series of Unfortunate Events.

4. Calendar of Unfortunate Events

Wall calendar with illustrations from the books. Each day is annotated with a historical or V.F.D.-related unfortunate event.

    • 2004 calendar. Sold in bookstores in 2003. Cover illustration depicts the Baudelaires reading a newspaper (artwork originally produced for the 2003 ALA poster).

    • 2005 calendar. Sold in bookstores in 2004. Cover illustration depicts the Baudelaires in a library.

    • 2005 movie tie-in calendar. Sold in bookstores in 2004. Illustrated with stills from the movie.

5. Mattel merchandise

Mattel had the license for producing toys and games for A Series of Unfortunate Events.

    • Magic 8 Ball: cue ball filled with bubble solution and floating answer cards. Unlike traditional magic eight balls, the Unfortunate Events eight ball only provided negative answers.

    • Jigsaw puzzles: three 100-200 piece puzzles each depicting a scene from The Bad Beginning, The Reptile Room, or The Wide Window. Part of the scene was hidden on the box cover and could only be revealed by completing the puzzle.

    • The Perilous Parlor Game (Game the First): tie-in board game in which Count Olaf and the Baudelaires compete to harm or save a Guardian

    • The Catastrophic Card Game (Game the Second): tie-in card game similar to rummy

6. Commonplace books

Hardcover journals with lined, blank pages featuring quotes and illustrations from the series.

  • The Blank Book (March 16, 2004). The cover depicts Olaf holding a pen and surrounded by flames; at the rear is a sheet of stickers with illustrations and phrases from the series (same as the sheet included in The Horrendous Heap). Later reissued in paperback and sold bundled with copies of the movie DVD.

  • The Notorious Notations (February 21, 2006). The cover depicts Olaf in silhouette (artwork originally produced for The Ominous Omnibus).

7. Illuminated Eye Pen

Pen with a light-up eye on the top. October 2006 Barnes & Noble exclusive.

8. The Tragic Treasury

A collection of the songs written and performed for the audiobooks by The Gothic Archies (a.k.a. Stephin Merritt), plus two bonus tracks. Released as an album in October 2006 in conjunction with the publication of The End.

Track listing:

    1. Scream and Run Away

    2. In the Reptile Room

    3. The World Is a Very Scary Place

    4. Dreary, Dreary

    5. When You Play the Violin

    6. This Abyss

    7. Crows

    8. Smile! No One Cares How You Feel

    9. Freakshow (a replacement for "Walking My Gargoyle", the song that appeared on The Carnivorous Carnival audiobook)

    10. How Do You Slow This Thing Down?

    11. A Million Mushrooms

    12. Things Are Not What They Appear

    13. Shipwrecked

    14. Walking My Gargoyle (originally used on The Carnivorous Carnival audiobook; replaced by "Freakshow" for the album)

    15. We Are the Gothic Archies

Egmont:

1. Calendar of Unfortunate Events (2006)

Wall calendar with illustrations from the books. 2006 edition only produced by Egmont; uses text from the 2004 and 2005 HarperCollins calendars.

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2. Fridge Magnets

Produced by Mattel but only sold in the UK. Illustrations of the main characters in the block-color style Brett Helquist used for the Mattel merchandise.

3. Collector Cards

Trading cards included at the rear of some copies of Egmont's paperback editions of the series (published in 2010). W.H. Smith exclusive. Each card had a book cover illustration on the front; the illustrations on the back combined to form the Marvelous Marriage portrait (from The Bad Beginning Rare Edition).

4. The Blank Book (Egmont version)

Publication date: October 4, 2004. Hardcover journal with lined, blank pages featuring quotes and illustrations from the series.

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5. Ottakar's Exclusive T-Shirt

Black t-shirt with the cover illustration from The Bad Beginning on the front and an illustration of the Baudelaires from the back cover of the Egmont edition of The Miserable Mill on the back. Produced under license for and sold at Ottakar's, a former chain of bookshops in the UK.