Why no Marvel cartoons between 83-92?

[Zorak Masaki]

I posted this thread on the temp forum, but it may get more traffic here. Why was it that between the final season of Spider-Man and his Amazing Friends (1983) until X-Men (1992) there were no cartoons based off of Marvel comics (save for the X-Men pilot in 1989). Marvel Comics were white-hot around that era, but there were no cartoons out there to promote it. Granted, Marvel Productions was busy making shows based around other properties (some of which ended up having tie-in comics from Marvel themselves), but it still seems odd. Maybe Marvel thought that with how darker some of their stories were getting around this time (Born Again, Kraven's Last Hunt, The Black Costume Saga, Inferno, Acts of Vengeance, anything involving Punisher), they couldnt do justice to their characters in a more "sanitized" format (even though all the stories I pointed out were code-approved).

 

[Christopher Glennon]

80's cartoons were driven by toy sales. Marvel did have its Secret Wars toy line in the mid-80's, but maybe it just didn't do as well as something like Transformers or GI Joe so they couldn't justify a Marvel cartoon and toy line at the time.

 

[Erased Paper]

None of the networks were interested.

 

[Magmaster12]

It was a low point for the Genre at the time Superman 3 had just flopped at the box office and Batman 89 was still years away.