What I Loved in the 80’s-Toys and Games (repost)

This article is a very special one for me. It’s the very first article I ever posted on Manic Expression. I am sure if I had not done that, and stayed on TGWTG, I would have stopped doing this a loooonnnngg time ago. Certainly when they switched web sites and all their old stuff was deleted! But instead Les worked with me on my concerns, and here I still am. 7 YEARS LATER!! So to celebrate I decided to repost this by changing a few things. Mostly, making it more of a focus on authentic 80’s toys. I mean, they still have action figures today so that isn’t really decade specific. Plus I’ve talked about the various franchises elsewhere. I fixed the pictures which are long gone, and I also took away an insult toward video games of today that I had made which was really unfair. Video games today are AMAZING and I just came off as an old person saying “In my day we didn’t have these things…” I guess wisdom does come with age.

As you know by now, I was a kid of the 80’s. I loved the toys and games we had then! Course who doesn’t fondly remember the toys of their youth. Here is a look at some of the 80’s things I had as a kid, and as usual this list is in no particular order.












Rubik’s Cube

Does anything say 80’s more? It’s such a simple idea, it’s a 3-D puzzle and all you have to do is line up the colors on each side. Easy, right? Frustrating is more like it. I spent hours playing with this thing, it was lots of fun. Everyone had their little ways of cheating, mine was to peel the stickers off and replace them. No wonder I bought them so much. If you think that’s bad, you should have seen what I did to my slinky!

A Look at Batmania-Merchandise and Memorabilia

I can hardly think of a character that has more fan love than Batman. Oh sure the Marvel movies are getting there but that’s been in the last ten years or so.  And Mickey Mouse has been around longer but I think it’s more the kids who get excited about that. Superman is more iconic but not as loved. Batman is loved by everyone, whether your a kid playing toys or an adult who just loves to cosplay. Let’s discuss:

 

I just had to cover the merchandise he has spawned, even if I have to approach this article a little differently than before. That’s because unlike Star Trek, Mickey Mouse and Garfield; Batman has changed a lot over the years. And of course every iteration has new products. In fact Batmania has been around for over fifty years. Now, why just fifty when Batman is approaching his 80th anniversary? Well…let me tell you a story about a little TV show….



















William Dozier was brought on board for a proposed Batman series and, after reading the comics at the time, decided camp and silly was the way to go. They cast Adam Ward and Bert Ward, and the rest is history. AND PEOPLE WENT NUTS. While Star Trek, which premiered at the same time, took some time to really find its audience Batman was an instant smash. It was broadcast twice a week, with a cliffhanger separating the two, and kids ate it up. This show was one of the biggest things in the 60’s and was such a hit that celebrities lined up to make appearances. Some as villains, others as “window cameos”. Adam West was the perfect straight man and as I’ve talked about before, the villains were so fantastic that they’re still remembered. I discovered this show in re-runs, obviously, and couldn’t help but love the fun of it. This show was a bonanza and saved Batman, because in the comics the character was kind of starting to fade. I also give the show credit for rejuvenating the popularity of his villains especially The Joker.

A Look at Mickey Mouse Merchandise and Commercials

So this weekend is Mickey’s 90th birthday. Well technically ABC is celebrating it this weekend.  And I can’t believe it! I remember when he turned sixty. He has been around a long time and I love him.  I was trying to come with a tribute, but had trouble. In the years of doing this I’ve obviously talked about Mickey. In fact five years ago I did a run down of his changing appearances in TV and movies in one of my personal favorite articles. But then I remembered an area I covered back in June for Garfield (and even earlier for Star Trek) which Mickey sure as hell has more impact. Merchandise!

 

And as I said, Mickey is all over this! I mean all you have to do is go to Disney World. Or Disneyland. Or The Disney Store in dozens of malls. Or mail order. Or Disney.com. Or really any store anywhere. He is a merchandise machine and there are people out there who have dozens of collectibles and memorabilia. So for his 90th birthday let’s take a look back at the character through some of the things his face has been put on. No, not all, you want to be here all day? Just a sample.


Let’s start with the obvious…


Yes there are stuffed animals. In my day I owned more than one Mickey Mouse. They come in all sorts of shapes and sizes, in fact they fit pretty much every theme you can think of. I shared this pic because it comes to looking the Mickey I had as a small child.






By the way, has Mickey been a Macy’s balloon? Are you kidding?????

In fact Mickey was around when the parade was just getting started (with a hideous balloon which matched the hideous costumes used back then).

Five Lamest Toys I Grew Up With

In the 80’s I loved action figures. Especially, like most kids in that time, the He-Man and the Masters of the Universe lines. Of course there were others too from Super Powers (DC heroes) to Secret Wars (Marvel) to Transformers, G.I.Joe, Thundercats and plenty more. But while these toys were awesome, they weren’t all great. For instance I guess we did have Air Raiders, but I hardly remember them. When I look at the pictures and videos I see why, the vehicles are awesome but the action figures are just pathetic. Unless it’s something really special, like the die-cast Star Wars X-Wing or the unique M.A.S.K. toys, than it’s not gonna work if your action figures are boring because they’re smaller than G.I.Joe’s and have no character at all.

 

I did a whole article awhile back about the lamer Master of the Universe toys that were out there. But there were plenty of others. Here are five toys which were stupid, at least in my opinion. And of course I am going off toys I had as a kid there have been more lines and variations since but I am not a collector and am not familiar with them.





Wonder Woman (Super Powers line)

It’s really hard to sell a female character in a line that is geared more for boys. Now of course you had to have Wonder Woman, she was one of the premiere heroes DC made and was even in Superfriends. But man this figure sucked. Not only was it kinda small, and even fragile, but it didn’t offer much in the way of action. If you pushed Superman’s legs together his fist would punch for instance. What did Wonder Woman do? Oh her arms raised to sow off her deflecting bracelets. Huzzah. The figure was redesigned years later with a lot more articulation. What we had in the 80’s was just bad.

A Look at Garfield Merchandise and Commercials

Continuing my look at Garfield’s 40th birthday and there is only one more thing to really discuss. And that is all the merchandise and commercials the cat has been in. Garfield was a merchandising machine. In fact there’s a while company devoted to it called Paws. In 40 years Garfield has become a major part of pop culture.


He has appeared in everything from Happy Meal’s

to amusement parks (where he has roller coasters named after him)


and yes even being a balloon at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade (several times).                       .
 






In fact Garfield is such a pop culture phenomenon that one of the biggest phenomenons o the 1980’s was this :

Yep, no joke.  This plush Garfield “stuck on you” was accidentally made for car’s and people adored them. So much that the company couldn’t keep up with the demand!! These were all over place and the image has been homaged to death.

Though to be honest, I am not sure how safe it is to have a something blocking a portion of your back window. Still, it’s GARFIELD!!!!  These were so popular in fact that there were reports of people vandalizing cars just to get their hands on the plush toy. Check this ad out:

We’ll get back to these ads in a bit.
Garfield has permeated pop culture so much there are references to him all over other media. Here are some quick examples : 

THE SIMPSONS

Top 5 Favorite Kenner Toy Lines

           

When you’re a kid you don’t care who is making the cool toys, you just play with them and love them. As I am older now I can’t believe how much I loved Kenner. They sold the best stuff! They were a small Cincinnati company that made Play Doh and Easy Bake Ovens. They came into popularity when they claimed the license to make toys based on a little sci fi movie in 1977 that no one else wanted. But we’ll get back to that. I had tons of there stuff. For instance one of my favorite toys ever (that I wish I still had) was a talking Knight Rider car. Guess who made that?

But that’s not all, here are the five best toy lines from Kenner that I loved as a kid.






#5.M.A.S.K.

Last year I mentioned the TV show and how it was pretty cool, even if it’s been forgotten these days. Usually its the show that get us into the toys but here it was the opposite. The vehicles were the best, being combination vehicles, two in one. For instance my favorite was Condor, a motorcycle which could also be a helicopter. Or Thunderhawk which was a red Chevrolet Camaro, which can transform into a gull-winged fighter jet. And while I never really understood what the Mask’s were supposed to do, they made the otherwise boring action figures look pretty darn cool.

A Look at Star Trek Merchandise & Memorabilia

So for the last several months I have tried to cover as much Star Trek as I could, including expanded media. Seemed only right to take a look at the things that go beyond books and comics. The toys, games, video games and other assorted memorabilia based on this amazing franchise.


I had my fair share of toys and other stuff growing up but never went that crazy. And no I never owned a uniform. But I will go over the stuff I had that I can remember, along with a look at some other things that I sadly never owned. Of course if I covered every toy or game based on this franchise we’d be here forever. So here is just a glimpse at the world of Trek merchandise and memorabilia


Let’s start with video games…
.

Star Trek The Promethean Prophecy

This was a rather lackluster video game made for those of who lived in the stone age and had to rely on disk drives since it was weak ass graphics and mostly text only. In fact the game was so frustrating I usually just gave up and destroyed the Enterprise.






Star Trek TNG-A Final Unity

This was a really cool game because not only were the graphics pretty damn impressive, but it had the voices of the entire cast. You also go to pick which choice you wanted. However I don’t remember staying with it long before the game bored me. Course there are dozens of Trek games (VCR, PC, internet, and role playing) from Voyager:Elite Force to the Borg game which actually starred John DeLancie as Q. I sadly don’t have much experience with these fine games.

A Look at Star Trek Novels & Books

We’ve talked a lot about Star Trek in TV, movies, and animated form. But the truth is Star Trek has deep roots in other media as well. There are dozens of Star Trek comic books out there, even though I only really read the DC run other companies from Marvel to Gold Key have carried the license at various times. And then there are video games, toys, and all kinds of other stuff. But the big one after the TV shows and movies has to be the Star Trek Novels and books. While not nearly as big as it was used to be, there was a time when Pocketbooks, Bantam and Ballantine Star Trek books were HUGE. They ranged from novels written by respected authors to fanzines literally written by fans of the show.  Yeah of course none of them were canon but that doesn’t mean we couldn’t enjoy them.


The list of them all could go on and on (it’s on Wikipedia if you don’t believe me). Today I want to go over some of the one’s I read…for good or bad. Because while some were damn good others were…silly. Now the problem I had with the novels in many cases was that the story just didn’t feel like it could be an episode. And that’s a big deal for me! Anyone can write a story and throw the names Kirk and Spock on the characters. If it doesn’t feel like the characters than it just isn’t going to work.



Here are some books I did read, and this is going to be a drop in the bucket of the amount of books out there but I only read so many. To be honest as I went through the list I found I remembered less than I realized. There are dozens of books covering not only the five series but new frontiers that were created just for the novels.



Yesterday’s Son

 If you’re a fan of the animated episode “Yesteryear” and the classic episode “All Our Yesterday’s” then this the book for you. Written by A.C.Crispen and I don’t have much to say about it.

Top 10 80’s Masters of the Universe Toys I Just Hated!

When a new product comes along and is a new hit, it’s only natural for the creators to want to expand that line to make more money. This has always been especially true when it comes to kid properties. From Teenage Mutant Turtles to Batman to Pokemon to whatever else you can think of. The problem is that after awhile, you start to run out of ideas, and your audience starts to fade because of competition from other properties. So in the attempt to compete and to keep your audience,  you begin coming up with things that either make no sense..or are just plain dumb!

      

In the 80’s the Masters of Universe toys were all the rage. I had more than a bunch of them and wish I still did. And the vehicles and the Castle Gresyskull and Snake Mountain playsets. Of course there was a little TV show at the time called He-Man and the Masters of the Universe which helped the action figures sell even bigger! Problem was as the series went new ideas were harder to come up with. Here are ten of the worst. And for the record,  I am judging based only on the original 80’s toy line and am not including how the character appeared in any animated or comic versions.

Ok now for my the stupidest…


#10.Prince Adam

The Prince Adam toy was lame because, well, what the hell were you supposed to do with him exactly??? Yes I had one, for some reason.

#9.Faker

A lot of people hated Faker but he never bothered me. He was supposed to be an evil version of He-Man created by Skeletor. Though you do have to wonder, why was he blue? And why did he wear an orange version of Skeletor’s armor?