X-Entertainment.com X-Entertainment.com A Proud UGO Affiliate
My dying wish is for an owl/camel hybrid, which I call camowl.
« [Main Index] »

Mildly Interesting ’80s Print Ads!

Grab your drink, grab your junk, grab a chair and relax -- this is a nice, long one for ya. A bunch of the greatest print ads of the `80s, pulled from children's mags ranging in topic from He-Man to Andre the Giant. Over a dozen trips back in time, with ads covering WWF Ice Cream Bars, Photon, Battle Beasts and more. Some really fun stuff chucked in there; if it's received well, I may do a second chapter next week. Look, you're going to see Jimmy Hart's life-sized face if you read this. Do it.

Posted by Matt on 07/10/2005. E-mail me!



Discussion Thread: 182 comments

It seems the topic tonight is about inequalities and Pac-man. I memorize a similar analogy with a gator (or croc) eating the bigger number, but I soon had to loath this analogy when I got to high school. It seems that my algebra teacher didn’t like that analogy or the fact that we started getting to the negative numbers.

Chestnuts roasted by Beta-Theta @ 07/13/2005 9:48 PM

I have an original Fortress Maximus. I had dreams of offering it to Matt years ago, with lofty ambitions of letting him have it for below original retail if he’d throw in a peanut.

It was a nice dream.

Chestnuts roasted by Knegative @ 07/13/2005 10:44 PM

I don’t think visionaries was ever on tv in Australia and I can’t remember the toys so I looked into it and found this rather comprehensive website dediceted to them.
http://www.hannagram.com/visionaries/

Chestnuts roasted by evan @ 07/13/2005 11:39 PM

I hated Pogo-Bal… At recess, that’s all we ever had to play with, and they were always lumpy and deflated. Bleh.

Shark Bites! I remember the "Great White" ones…there was also a kind of fruit snack shaped like fighter jets…and my personal favorite, Soda-licious.

On the Jell-o Gelatin Pops…judging from the fruit offerings from the packaging, I am going to guess that the lavender flavor is raspberry. I hate raspberry- it tastes like Burlington Coat Factory.

Chestnuts roasted by kickle cubicle @ 07/14/2005 1:12 AM

^^^I work at Burlington Coat Factory, it gives even the Raspberry Jell-O pop a good flavor. Pity Me…

Chestnuts roasted by superwarrior @ 07/14/2005 4:40 AM

You said Battle Beasts are expensive now? I went around and bought all my friends battle beasts for like 6 dollars after they thought they weren’t cool anymore. So my box of like 500 assorted battle beasts is worth something? Awesome.

P.S. Some of them are missing arms. The true curse of the battle beast design.

Chestnuts roasted by Simon @ 07/14/2005 6:56 PM

I have some things to clear up about the Transformers Pretenders toys. First of all, they were not a pathetic attempt by Hasbro to keep the TF line alive. Hasbro never really even made the toys. Takara over in Japan did (and they’re so undercredited for the fact that they essentially created the TFs and continue to design them for Hasbro. All Hasbro has rteally ever done is manufacture and market them here in North america). The pretenders were far more popular there in Japan. Hell, they even had their own series about them called Transformers: Masterforce It was all about the pretenders, who were left to patrol Earth against Deceptacons who could turn into alien-looking creatures. Shows how much Matt knows. Ha!

Chestnuts roasted by Nate @ 07/15/2005 12:34 PM

Oh. Somebody already mentioned it. Sorry, Bert Raccoon. You cantake all the credit. But I’m still right about the fact that the Japanese folks who brought us the TFs (it was even the Japanese company, Toei, who handled all the animation for the old TF series even though the character designs and story line were American). I’m a huge anime lover, and it always pains me to see a TF fan who hates anime. Those bloody hypocrits!! Yeah, I’m talkin to all yall!!!!!!!!!

OK, so I’m being a bastard here. Is that anything new?

Chestnuts roasted by Nate @ 07/15/2005 12:39 PM

Ooops. Incomplete sentence. insert "are so undercredited." at the end of that sentence about the Japanese and with all the comma-spiel about their TF contributions. Bye.

Chestnuts roasted by Nate @ 07/15/2005 12:42 PM

Wow that brought back good memories

Chestnuts roasted by Mercenary @ 07/15/2005 1:26 AM

hey gozer, if you are still here- jamaica is spanish for hibiscus! one man’s decorative landscaping flower is another man’s tasty sugar drink i guess…

Chestnuts roasted by Stormy @ 07/15/2005 10:29 PM

One of the big toys my parents bought my sister and I was the Photon set. We each had a helmet and the gun deal. She wasn’t much into it, so I’d usually play by myself. We also got the three VHS tapes of missions you could go on that were different from the TV show. You were flying around and there would be a cartoon ship going by you with a flashing white light on it’s bottom. I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to shoot it or dodge it – I’d get hit at weird, random times anyway. No one would be on screen and I’d take a hit.

Also, I remember one of the tapes dealt with the Seers Tower – it was this gigantic building that was in ruins and you would dog fight around it. Years later, I was in school and the teacher was talking about some of the tallest building in the world and it hit me like a bolt of lightning – the SEARS TOWER!!!

That was the day I became a genius.

Chestnuts roasted by dbruce @ 07/16/2005 4:12 AM

speaking of gpk i was in target yesterday and noticed that there is a new series 4 set of cards out, i was unaware that they were still in print. mind ya being 30 i have my set of the originals from ’85 and these hit the same concept. previous to yesterday the last time i picked some up was at a gas station in california in ’89. gonna hit amazon now that i know the dvd is out… :)

Chestnuts roasted by danoslayer @ 07/16/2005 12:25 PM

…and i wish that "RAD" would hit dvd…

Chestnuts roasted by danoslayer @ 07/16/2005 12:26 PM

"…and i wish that "RAD" would hit dvd…"

I agree 100%. That movie rocked.

Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 07/16/2005 1:21 PM

Yeah…I had the "Fridge" GI Joe figure. And, yes, I actually called the 900 number (not as cool as Santa’s Hip Hop Holiday line of course) so I could "save" 1 whole Fridge coupon. I remember the message was lame…with the Fridge asking some army schmo to tell the good listener his combat specialty. It was "Physical Training Instructor." The listener was instructed to write "P.T.I." on their coupons, and thus they could use only 4 Fridge points instead of 5. Ahh…marketing.

Chestnuts roasted by EmperorBinky @ 07/17/2005 10:16 AM

wsup yall matt is tha bomb ayt peace

Chestnuts roasted by RVD @ 07/17/2005 10:32 AM

Wow i have that rhino battle beast sitting over on my window ledge with the frog one on the left of the advert, and some wierd one could be a spider but he only has one arm.

Chestnuts roasted by Gorm @ 07/17/2005 12:12 PM

Nate: It is true that the majority of the toys from the first two years of G1 were just toys from Takara’s Microman and Diaclone toylines, or from other japanese toylines. In 1985, Takara introduced Transformers in Japan, sans most of the toys from other japanese companies (except Shockwave), since you can’t sell toys made by a rival manufacturer.

BUT, from 1985 onwards, Hasbro and Takara jointly developed Transformers toys for both markets. In 1987, when Hasbro cancelled the US transformers cartoon, Takara and Hasbro still developed TF toys together, but Takara began to develop TFs for their own market only.

Hasbro doesn’t merely just manufacture them and market them outside of Japan, they design them and provide Takara with concepts, ideas and requirements. It is then up to Takara to interepret these concepts into a working toy, engineer and sculpt them. It has been this way since 1985.

This relationship continues to this very day with Alternators and the new Transformers: Cybertron line.

Chestnuts roasted by Fit For Natalie @ 07/18/2005 9:30 AM

Oh man, your disgusting chewed up Chips Ahoy sandwich thing brought back some memories for me that I had totally forgotten about. Remember the slogan that was "Betcha Bite A Chip?" Well, being of the competitive nature that I was, and still am today, I used to say "Oh yeah?" every time I ate one. Then I’d see how many bites I could take without eating any chip. Usually it was between 3 and 5. And no cheap tiny bites either.

Chestnuts roasted by Kate @ 07/18/2005 2:59 PM

Fir for Natalie is right. That’s basically how we got the Transformers we know and love. Before, they were just nameless Diaclones and some other Japanese stuff.

Some of you guys should check out the Galaxy Force (Cybertron) line. It has one of the best incarnations of a Prime since Car Robots (Robots in Disguise) Prime.

The best part of Rad is when the guy does the faceplant off that jump. Maaaannn….I miss my GT Performer…..

Chestnuts roasted by XGalvatronX @ 07/19/2005 2:13 PM

P.S. Some of the pre-Transformer bots came with little drivers, that’s why figures like the insecticons have little seats in them. they came from the Japanese line called Microman I believe….

Chestnuts roasted by XGalvatronX @ 07/19/2005 2:15 PM

Damn, I forgot about the Freedom Stick. Now I need to go through my old tapes, I know I have one with a freedom stick commercial on it somewhere,

All kinds of old memories came back. I forgot about Kung Fu, great game,

Chestnuts roasted by Quid @ 07/19/2005 7:11 PM

*****BEASTIE BAL*****

Man, I didnt have a pogo bal, but I had something called a beastie ball. It was from the makers of pogo bal, but it had a purple monster face instead of a round ball. I will take a picture of it when I raid my parents basement this weekend.

If anyone knows where I can find those WWF ice cream bars(or you want to buy my beastie bal) email me at thomas.holdren@gmail.com

T.J. Holdren

Chestnuts roasted by BackToTheFuture @ 07/21/2005 11:08 AM

–>> ..Gee.. i wish we had frequented the market more in the 80s for toilet paper..n’ then maybe my mum wouldn’t have raided my collection of ‘Masters of the U.’ mags.. n’ i’d have Orko posters to this very day hanging on my wall instead of what’s left of my dignity and my heart.. 8*(

Chestnuts roasted by ~tOkKa @ 07/22/2005 2:26 AM

Add A New Comment!


This entry was posted on Sunday, July 10th, 2005 at 6:19 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.