When I was wee ladding, I had a Smurfs "bop bag" featuring none other than Gargamel himself. I guess the thinking was, since kids were going to be beating the holy fuck out of the bop bag, the company might as well have based it on a villain character. I loved that stupid thing so much. Me being the youngest and weakest of seven brothers and sisters, it was the only thing in the house outside of Sandy the unloved dog that I could successfully pin for the Intercontinental title. Gargamel always came back for more of my patented body blows, Bull Charges and Tiger Punches, because that's what any good bop bag does.
Bop bags came in all colors and sizes, and sometimes bop bags were full of surprises. In the very odd case shown above, the technology was bestowed upon the popular but not that popular Madballs franchise, run by those who were convinced that such classic characters as "Wolf Breath" were destined to become more than mere foam rubber balls, even if every attempt to move 'em into new territory blew up in their bankrupt faces. I don't know how many Madballs bop bags were produced, but I'll put the bank on the fact that less than five were sold. EVER. Not that it isn't an object of supreme excellence -- it is, but kids who were heavily into Madballs had probably grown older than "bop bag age." Three-year-olds weren't allowed to have balls with devil faces on them.
God, that was a bitch to blow up. I need to stop smoking and start nebulizing.
After blowing it up forever, the end results were pretty cool. "Aargh" and "Dust Brain" are the chosen representatives, conspiring to forge an "3-D" effect against a clear plastic background. There's nothing absurdly 3-D about it, but the box is convinced otherwise. For more information on Madballs, don't click here, click here.
Posted by Matt on 02/16/2005. E-mail me!
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Oh and as far as Bop Bags, I had a giant inflatable E.T. when I was younger but it was actually like a life sized thing (rather than his picture on a bag) that had a round bottom so he could wobble back and forth. and yeah you could punch him. 
I had one of those bop bags, but I think it had a clown on it. What I remember MUCH more fondly was something called "Rocky Boppers" They were like inflatable boxing gloves that you put on your hands to safely pound on your pals. I believe that I had the Mr. T ones, as I was obsessed with ANYTHING "T" at that time. So this was around Rocky III. Anyone else remember these things?
Also…I want to know the story of the room that pic was taken in. Matt, is that your store room?