Toy Ads

Toy Bender Savage is now my favorite person on the face of the Earth. He wrote some articles for me while my time and net access is severely restricted. Yeah, I apologize for sucking hardcore. Why is it that whenever I move my internet connection never works right away? I swear to Crom that there’s some sort of conspiracy involved to keep me from my toy writing and electronic pornography. Anyway, be sure to thank Mr. Savage by visiting his website: Old Man Musings.com. It’s a pretty kick ass blog full of nerdy stuff that all you little nerdlings should enjoy. And now on to his post! A flashback for some old ads, for what is always a popular toy for boys - guns! Back in the old days kids could pull out a toy gun on anyone, as shown in these classic ads, and just fire away. In those days you’d play all day outside, running through the park, shooting your friends. Then after all the horsing around everyone would go home no worse for the wear. But things changed over

Man it’s been a long time since I did a Toy Ads that Time Forgot with a comic book ad, unfortunately most of my good ads dried up. This was an old one that I found laying around that I realized that I must share with the world (click on it to make it much bigger): (more…)

There are certain toy advertisement jingles that get stuck in your head like some bizarre Amazon worm that will stick it’s breathing tubes out of your face and you think are just really weird bits of facial hair, but then one morning larva will painfully burrow their way out of your eyes… or something like that. The Slinky jingle has lasted for decades, but other jingles that were very catchy for their time have faded away. Here’s one that was pretty damn catchy for it’s day, but is now so much more hilarious that I’m a bit older. It’s for Mr. Bucket, a mechanized plastic bucket that moves around in random patterns and shoots balls out of it’s mouth. Ahhh Mr. Bucket. Your love of balls is unmatched. I must thank the Opie and Anthony Radio show for bringing this one back into the light of day. I had completely forgotten all about this (or maybe I had buried the memory of it’s existence). I was too old for this toy, but old enough t

Way back in the long, long ago, otherwise known as 1990, the once enormously successful Transformers line had become an empty shell of it’s former self. In fact it was dead. The line had lost all it’s momentum and the Transformers era known as Generation One was over. Not content to let a good, money making property stay dead, Hasbro let Transformers rest for a couple of years and reintroduced them in 1992. What’s the best way to bring back beloved toys? With commercials featuring terrible, terrible rap songs. But first, here’s a straight commercial featuring some two beloved Transformers characters: This commercial features the return of Optimus Prime and it had been a long time for those kids (like me) who had wanted the original but never could get their hands on it. Megatron came back too, but as you can see he was a tank. Somehow that never sat right with me. I realize a tank makes a little more sense than a pistol that can shrink to fit into the hands

After a brief hiatus, Toy Ads that Time Forgot is back… if anyone cares. Anyway, I ran across this commercial on YouTube and I couldn’t pass it up. It’s for Jem, the doll (and doll line) produced in the 80s by Hasbro to compete with Mattel’s Barbie. Unlike Barbie, Jem had more of an edge to her, because she was a female rock star who was truly, truly, truly outrageous. (more…)

Today’s ad comes to you mostly because I love the Star Wars figure featured in it, Admiral Ackbar. He’s been the subject of many a nerdy Photoshop, but I really hope that doesn’t take away from the sheer coolness that is the Ackbar. (more…)

Way back in the begins of Toy Ads That Time Forgot, in fact in the first installment of the feature, I dipped into the classic comic book advertisement pool and came up with one of the many toy soldier ads that were almost a mandatory staple in comics for decades. I’ve come across another one, this time featuring Revolutionary War Soldiers. (Click on the pic to see a larger version) I can say I’ve actually seen these plastic guys first hand, because there were a few of them laying around my house that remained from my Dad’s supply he had received as a kid. They are about as crappy as you could imagine they could be. The soldiers are are barely three dimensional, mono-colored, tiny pieces of plastic. My father was extremely disappointed when he got them, and they are directly responsible for both destroying his love of history that doesn’t involve Nazis and his hobo murdering spree in the early ’70s. toy, toy collecting, advertisement, comic book, h

This is a great commercial that has some interesting things of note. For one, the narrator is that voice is in everything. Okay, he’s not the official guy who is in everything, but it’s the one that you get when you can’t afford the real one. It also is a Palitoy commercial, meaning it’s the British company that handled the Star Wars toys on the other side of the pond. (That’s Europe for those of you from Mississippi) This commercial also features that fantastic toy landscape that NOBODY had growing up. Please let me know if you had a miniature forest in your backyard that was to scale with your Star Wars figures, because I will direct a powerful wave of Omega Envy at you in that case. This replica of Endor is just the kind of set-up every kid wished he had when he was playing in a cat turd filled sandbox. Finally, the commercial has copy that mentions the word attack about three dozen times. Listen to it again if you hadn’t noticed it. Terrib

I realize that doesn’t exactly fit into the action figure extravaganza that is Toy Bender, but this ad is too good to pass up. How many different things can they fit into this game? There are game pieces that are practically action figures, a puzzle, and a spaceship! A fricken spaceship! The only thing missing is blatant product placement like a Speak and Spell and Reese’s Pieces. Regardless, E.T. and the early 80s rule. There’s no way kids today would be hanging out wearing collared shirts and playing board games. They’d either be playing Gears of War and screaming the foulest things you can think of or stabbing homeless people. toy, toy collecting, action figure, doll, commercial, advertisement, E.T. Board game

First let me get this joke out of the way, no these aren’t the droids you’re looking for. I don’t know how a toy name can get any worse than Morphodroids, especially considering for a moment I thought they were some sort of powerful, robotic hemroids. I’m not sure how hemroids could be robotic, but I assure you that the Japanese are working very hard at making it a reality. Regardless, Morphodroids now posses the Worst Toy Name Ever intercontinental belt. The Morphodroids fall into the category of Transformers rip-off quite nicely. Hell, they make the Go-Bots seem like high quality merchandise. The are similar in some ways to Chargertron, but without the catchy and suicide inducing theme song. Much like they Chargertron the Morphodroids barely transform. Can you consider the underbelly of a car that has arms that pop out as a transformation? No? Well, how about a car underbelly that sort of looks like a robot that has stick on guns!? Still no? Oh well. The m

Here’s a quick question: Did Remco make any toys worth a damn? No really, I’d like to know, because they haven’t had an impressive score so far in Toy Ads that Time forgot. This week we will focus on Remco’s completely forgotten He-Man rip-off, Crystar. Like the lines before him, namely The Power Lords and Sectaurs, Crystar lay slain on the field of battle for the hearts and minds of legions of children. He could only watch on while gathering dust in clearance aisles as the victorious He-Man was hoisted up on the tiny shoulders of children and carried away into toy Valhalla, otherwise known as, Collective 80s Nostalgia. (more…)

This old TV ad needs no introduction: These CHIPs cops come from the highly popular (at the time) Mego series of figures that spawned figures coming from Planet of the Apes to tons of DC and Marvel superheroes. Mego is no longer with us, but the figures live on in old commercials like this one and within the pages of ToyFare’s Twisted ToyFare Theatre. On another note, the voice behind this commercial is so baritone that it literally frightens me. toy, toy collecting, action figure, doll, commercial, advertisement, Chips, Mego

No man on Earth has ever had so much power. An incredible power that turns a normal, uninteresting man into a hideous freak! These are the Power Lords and if you never heard of them, I don’t blame you because they didn’t stick around for too long. Back during the reign of He-Man in the ’80s, Revell, who is more known as a car model company, decided to jump on the bandwagon and create their very own He-Man inspired knock off like dozens of other toy companies at the time. The Power Lords had more of a sci-fi spin than the fantasy/sci-fi themed He-Man as evidenced by the epic sci-fi story and lack of swords and skeleton men (Attention bands: Swords and Skelton Men is a great name). According to the one source I could find on the Power Lords that was helpful, not only were the toys ugly, but they were prone to breakage. Both the plastic was shoddy and the mechanism for their transformation could easily break, creating a one two combo punch of utter suckitude. One in

I decided to share this video for a few reasons: 1. It features Storm Shadow version two and he rocks harder than ninja Elvis. 2. I’m running out of good ads for the moment, so if anyone wants to mail me magazines or comic books with awesome toy ads that would be fantastic. 3. There’s enough flashing lights and sounds in this G.I. Joe commercial to give a blind, deaf kid a seizure. Yo Joe! toy, toy collecting, G.I. Joe, commercial, advertisement, Hasbro

If you were a comic fan in the 80s, it was impossible to escape Marvel’s biggest crossover event up until that point. It was called, “Secret Wars”. Secret Wars featured some of the biggest heroes in the Marvel Universe slugging it out in another dimension against the biggest Marvel villains in a storyline that was light on characterization and drama, but heavy in the smashing department. Take for instance the normally morally upright Captain America’s plan of attack: Now that’s brutal! Secret Wars was so over the top, that at one point a damn mountain was dropped on the superheroes. A mountain. With a rather simple plot line, it’s no wonder than the comic mega-event was created as a big commercial for the Secret Wars line of toys. I plan on going into the whole Secret Wars toy line in more detail in the future, but it basically was a fairly decent line that offered kids a chance to get their hands on a few Marvel superheroes that weren’t a

Ugh, GoBots. Just when you think you’re done having to ever think about them again, they pop up back into your life just like that rash you got from the chubby drunk girl at the party. You know, the one with Hamm’s on her breath and loneliness in her eyes? This time the GoBots return to Toy Bender via an ad found in a comic book. Instead of the regular crappy toys, these GoBots were models that you built yourself. It seems like every once in awhile the model car companies try something new to get people interested in building models again, and this was a pretty novel way to do it. Their choice of the Go-Bots for this is a little less than steller, though. I suppose that they had to keep it simple to make it work and you can’t get any more simple than the way that Go-Bots transformed. Roughly half of the transforming process of a GoBot is accomplished by turning it over. It’s got to be one of the laziest, yet most successful product lines in the history of toys.

The main reason I’m placing Burnin’ Key Cars in the TATTF vault is that this toy line was one of those toys I had as a kid that was just kind of there, and I never knew the actual name of until I found this ad. Bless you internet, one of life’s mysteries now solved. This commercial features the usual mop topped kids with the token black child thrown in for good measure. It’s a pretty standard “kids going nuts with their most favorite toy in the whole world” milieu. The cars were pretty neat, but they suffered one gigantic flaw. If you lost the key, the wheels would lock up and you were left with a toy car that was useless. Friggen fantastic. I held on to mine for years hoping that stupid key would show up. Nope, it went the way of half my G.I. Joe vehicle parts and Transformer guns, into the vortex of lost toy parts. toy, toy collecting, cars, burnin’ key car, advertisement, ad, commercial

With the release of the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle film that everyone assures me is the cat’s pajamas, I thought it would be time to take a look back at an ad from the Turtles’ past. This commercial is mainly for the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ van, which in itself is a very cartoony concept. If they were trying to keep a low profile there’s nothing that says, “Hey, look at me!” quite like a giant customized green van with your team name on the front. As a toy this thing is fantastic. It is everything that a kid could want in bringing the cartoon into their Ninja Turtle toy adventures. It’s not too small, and it’s not too big. It’s got some nifty action features. Most importantly, it looks just like the van in the cartoon. The Turtle Cycle on the other hand? Well, it works for a budget minded Ninja Turtle fan I suppose. It’s one of those toys that you’d get because your parent’s couldn’t afford the

First of all, I must apologize to all you toy ad fans as the G.I. Joe article I wrote took the place of last week’s installment of Toy Ads That Time Forgot. A million pardons, I beg of you. This week I decided to go back to the comic book well to make up for it and find an ad for something mega-crappy, and I did! You might be familiar with the Transformers or their shoddy imitator the Go-Bots, but I’m sure you’ve never heard of the mighty Trans-bots before this ad: What we have here is a half page ad for some bootleg Transformers. I apologize for the quality of the thing as the ink hasn’t been kind enough to keep it nice and clear. I’ll do my best to translate this mess, however. Please note the picture of Starscream at left, Megatron at bottom, and a pile of various parts flying in space on the right. The real beauty of this ad is the horribly mistranslated text and renamed robots. You can get all your favorite transforming heroes like Thunderstar (Stars

I’d like to take a moment to focus on a classic toy of the early late seventies and early eighties that might not be as remembered as well as other lines from that era. That toy is ROM and even though it didn’t last very long on store shelves, it has a rather interesting history. ROM was invented by a guy named Bing McCoy (not kidding), who then sold the idea to Parker Brothers who at that time was interested in entering the toy market outside of their board game business. Before fading into obscurity, ROM had made the cover of Time in 1979 and spawned a fairly successful comic book tie in (more on that later). Here’s a full color comic book ad for the toy: And here’s the television ad courtesy of YouTube: As you can see, this TV ad does a great job of introducing ROM and almost feels like an ad for a movie. ROM was an electronic toy that could make nifty breathing sounds, light up, and came with some nifty gadgets to boot. What kid wouldn’t want a toy

Way back last November I brought you an ad for a set of less than super Superman die cast cars. I’m proud to say that I found another ad for Corgi superhero cars, and this one is a lot better: Now that’s a collection of supermobiles anyone would be happy to own. Sure there are more than a few duds in this set, like the boring Superman van and Daily Planet truck, but they are overshadowed by that sweet ass Batmobile, Batcycle, and Batcopter. Even Wonder Woman gets a classy ride, and Captain Marvel’s got a great car too. Wait… how does that work when he’s really a little kid? I guess the rules are different if you can punch a crook’s lungs out with a single blow. Toy, toy collecting, car, Corgi, Captain Marvel, Wonder Woman, Superman, Batmobile

As a toy collector who is a boy, it’s easy to forget that there are female toy collectors out there. More times than not, the female collector is forgotten. Well, if there’s one thing I like doing it’s pleasing the ladies. Come on guys, get your minds out of the gutter. Today I have two lovely girl themed videos provided by the magic of YouTube for all you lovely ladies out there. The first is for a toy called Dazzle: I have no idea who Dazzle is, but check out her huge porno hair. Wowza! The second video is for a toy based on someone that long ago reached the peak of their success: That’s one hot Brooke Shields doll. It’s so lifelike that it’s nearly Satanic. And that look in the girl’s eyes at the fifteen second mark? F’ing creepy. That’s the kind of look you’ll see in a kid’s eye that will talk to their doll for the next thirty years. Toy, toy collecting, doll, Brooke Shields, , advertisement, commercial,

As a toy collector who is a boy, it’s easy to forget that there are female toy collectors out there. More times than not, the female collector is forgotten. Well, if there’s one thing I like doing it’s pleasing the ladies. Come on guys, get your minds out of the gutter. Today I have two lovely girl themed videos provided by the magic of YouTube for all you lovely ladies out there. The first is for a toy called Dazzle: I have no idea who Dazzle is, but check out her huge porno hair. Wowza! The second video is for a toy based on someone that long ago reached the peak of their success: That’s one hot Brooke Shields doll. It’s so lifelike that it’s nearly Satanic. And that look in the girl’s eyes at the fifteen second mark? F’ing creepy. That’s the kind of look you’ll see in a kid’s eyes when they will talk to their doll for the next thirty years. Toy, toy collecting, doll, Brooke Shields, , advertisement, comme

There are a lot of toy ads I find in comics that make me wistful for the toys of my youth. There are still others, many more I’m afraid, that beg the question, “Just what in the hell is that?” The Zorcom Spaceship is just such a toy. What a fabulous cardboard box… I mean spaceship! You know, it looks like someone took the old joke, “I just bought the kid an expensive toy and they only wanted to play with the box… ha ha ha I’m so funny and intellegent” to a whole other level. That or they thought that they’d cash in on that awesome market that refrigerator boxes have the corner on. Yes, I know I’m going to get an email from someone crying about how this was their favorite toy ever and that I’m completely wrong, but this thing has all the markings of cheap crap. Example: How fantastic, the box only has printing on one side so they turned the boring part into a super fantastic fantasy zone of boundless imagination just l

There are a lot of toy ads I find in comics that make me wistful for the toys of my youth. There are still others, many more I’m afraid, that beg the question, “Just what in the hell is that?” The Zorcom Spaceship is just such a toy. What a fabulous cardboard box… I mean spaceship! You know, it looks like someone took the old joke, “I just bought the kid an expensive toy and they only wanted to play with the box… ha ha ha I’m so funny and intellegent” to a whole other level. That or they thought that they’d cash in on that awesome market that refrigerator boxes have the corner on. Yes, I know I’m going to get an email from someone crying about how this was their favorite toy ever and that I’m completely wrong, but this thing has all the markings of cheap crap. Example: How fantastic, the box only has printing on one side so they turned the boring part into a super fantastic fantasy zone of boundless imagination just

This week’s high calorie, no fat serving of toy Ads That Time Forgot visits a small section of the 80s toy universe: Starting with the basic scientific concept that dinosaurs rule, toy maker Tyco decided to build upon that foundation the only way that they knew how, by taking wicked cool dinosaurs and outfitting them with missiles and laser bazookas. This then created the wet dream of many a twelve year old boy in the form of Dino-Riders. Even before Dino-riders came out, I was up-armoring my plastic molded dinosaur toys with spring loaded missile launchers (otherwise known as pens). I’m guessing that this is some sort of stepping stone in nerd evolution. If I was in the board room the day this concept was brought up, my head would have exploded. The only words the design team would have to say would be, “Dinosaurs with lasers” and I’d have had a heart attack and died a happy man. My friends would say, “He died doing what he loved, thinking abou

Let’s bust out an old Star Wars ad from a cartoon that I fondly remember: That’s right this is for Droids, one of the two Star Wars Saturday morning cartoons. Both Droids and it’s sister cartoon Ewoks first aired at the very end of Star Wars original popularity, so naturally toys made from these licenses are some of the rarest ones in the crazy world Star Wars collecting. In fact, in Brian’s Toys latest buy list they were offering two grand for a loose Vlix. Good luck searching for one at yard sales to get rich quick, Vlix was more common in Brazil and was basically nonexistent in the states. Who knew that those kids in the ad are playing with a small fortune worth of toys, or that those very toys went on clearance racks in the 80s? Toys, toy collecting, Star Wars, action figure, Kenner, Droids, cartoon, advertisement, Brian’s Toys, Vlix