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Tribute to Stay Puft, and Roy Rogers’ Happy Meals.

I had a dream that I ate a giant marshmallow, and when I woke up, my pillow had transformed into an all-too-long tribute to The Stay Puft Marshmallow Man. One love, Stay Puft. We tight.

Fast food chains are more successful in some areas than other areas, and in NYC, the once-great Roy Rogers' scope has dwindled down to just a few remaining restaurants. I don't know when Roy stopped being fashionable, but I'd like to kill the person who started that movement because God damn, his chicken was serious business. The breast pieces always came with this little knob of fried fat attached to the edge, and popping those busters is certainly what led to every fried chicken place on the planet coming up with their version of "chicken poppers." If you live in a city that still pays Roy his due respect, consider yourself lucky and eat some crunchy skin for me.

Roy's inability to connect with children may have played a part in his slow decline. McDonald's had Happy Meals and Burger King had constant Happy Meal rip-offs, and Wendy's had a pretty little red-haired girl on the marquee, but what did Roy Rogers have? Nothing. Roy Rogers had chicken. Roy Rogers has roast beef. But Roy Rogers had no Happy Meal.

Eh, that's not entirely true. Once in a blue moon, Roy would put aside his convictions about chicken restaurants needing to serve chicken and not pander to the lowbrow crowd who wanted toys with their chicken. I assume this to be the work of his advisors, always in Roy's ear with more lies about the necessity of a Happy Meal element. I kind of want to spend the next paragraph writing "buckaw" over and over again, but I won't. One of Roy's Rare Rappy Reals was called "Power Pullers," including small action figures that...pulled power.

Essentially superhero-shaped Wacky Wall Walkers, the figures came in four different colors, stuffed in text-ridden picture boxes that went to great lengths to make the toys seem more interesting than McDonald's Fast Macs. Click here to download the commercial, and note how the song number doesn't really gel with save-the-world superhero toys. Buckaw buckaw buckaw buckaw buckaw buckaw buckaw buckaw buckaw buckaw buckaw buckaw.

Posted by Matt on 04/30/2006. E-mail me!



Discussion Thread: 134 comments

Holy crap Penne Arrabiata got arrested too!
I am saddened by your Pillsbury revelation, Manimal. Kids today indeed, tsk tsk tsk.

Chestnuts roasted by squee4242 @ 05/02/2006 9:01 PM

What can I say about Ghostbuster that hasnt already been said, both 1 and 2 are pretty high up on my favorite movies of all time.

Once for an exam my teacher asked the question, who sang the song for The Ghostbusters movie? I remember many people were upset because they didnt get it right so they had to live with a question wrong on an exam. boo fuckin’ hoo.

Chestnuts roasted by IHAQ @ 05/02/2006 9:01 PM

Matt…don’t know if you’re still looking for one on E-Bay, but a quick search provided this result. Looks like he’s still in the holding plastic, although the box is probably long gone. It’s super cheap and no bids currently. Good luck!! Click here!

And no, this isn’t my auction!!

Chestnuts roasted by Frito @ 05/02/2006 9:56 PM

I totally had that figure…but mine came from a garage sale, so it’s more beat up than I’d like. :(

Chestnuts roasted by The ORIGINAL Paul @ 05/02/2006 10:04 PM

LOVE Ghostbusters…used to have the proton pack, the ‘trap’, Ecto 1, Ecto Coolers, a lunchbox, action figures, you get the idea. Still love the movie to death. Due to that movie, Bill Murray was and remains my favorite actor of all time.

There weren’t many things that had IT ALL: Movie, toys, AND kick ass tv show. Often one aspect would suck. Not Ghostbusters- all 3 were awesome…same for TMNT and Beetlejuice- they also had a movie, toys and a kick ass tv show. He-Man too, of course.

Still, Ghostbusters was a huge part of my childhood and I can’t ramble on about it enough.

Manimal: This Saturday is our prom. My hands are full of paint stains, my back hurts and I am dog tired. Those damn kids better appreciate this. I bet they’ll be there an hour and a half before going to get drunk. Bastards!

Chestnuts roasted by Muppet Baby @ 05/02/2006 10:05 PM

The Yeti yeah that sound familiar there are lots of movies I didn’t see unedited for years. Like Robocop I had no Idea it was quite as violent as it was until seeing it a few years back. So I definatly have fallen under that one before.

Chestnuts roasted by Mrjayberry @ 05/02/2006 10:13 PM

Rebecca, yeah I posted before I read up to your original post, sorry bout that.

in all this drug propaganda I love that the main idea is that you will be ostracized (sp?) from your friends if you don’t do drugs, and that apparently teenagers all over the country are forcing drugs upon one another.
That’s pretty much the exact opposite of all my experiences with it. Seriously what drug addicts do you know are gonna give up free shit just to maybe hook their friend?
I spent about 4 years, not including high school rolling around in that game pretty deep and with the exception of heroin every piece of drug propoganda I had any knowledge of was proved completely backwards and wrong.

In more X-E related-ness Do you think this blog has the petition like power, Matt pull some network strings if you have any, to try and force the third Ghostbusters into the works?

Winston is my real father.

Chestnuts roasted by WonKa @ 05/02/2006 10:39 PM

On topic, one Ghostbusters toy I never had but serrrrriously want is the Ghost Trap. That’s it, and my life will be complete.

That, and a G1 Soundwave.

Chestnuts roasted by Invader Norbert @ 05/02/2006 11:06 PM

Darth Galv – Limewire seems pretty darn good to me for a file-sharing app. I don’t know how "stocked" it is on movies and such, but there’s a good chunk of music on there and I haven’t encountered any "fakes" like you’d run into on Kazaa and WinMX yet.

And whoever was mentioning that they’d only seen the TV version of Robocop for years and were surprised at how violent the uncut version was – you should see the unrated version. If you thought it was violent the first time around… Unfortunately, last I knew the unrated cut is only on the out-of-print and far-too-expensive Criterion Collection DVD…but if you ever run into it at a video store something, grab that sucker and copy it, there’s gotta be at least an additional two or three minutes added back into the running time, all of it gore.

And on the subject of edited-for-TV movies, I think it only aired once but did anyone ever catch the ABC-TV airing of Kevin Smith’s Mallrats? Hee-freakin’-larious. It’s practically like watching an entirely different movie, and to make it even better, whoever they hired to loop in the new "clean" dialogue sounds absolutely nothing like the original cast, particularly whoever was dubbing Jason Mewes.

Chestnuts roasted by lugnut @ 05/03/2006 9:16 AM

Just Glorious

Long live the ghostbusters

Chestnuts roasted by Mavs @ 05/03/2006 10:27 AM

About the Filmation version of Ghostbusters…I actually bought a tape with three of the live action episodes from the local video store back in March (Only because I couldn’t believe they actually had it.)

If you do wanna seek out one of these episodes, PROCEED WITH CAUTION.

Chestnuts roasted by TheUnknownWatcher @ 05/03/2006 10:37 AM

Rebecca: Ecto-1 is still at Universal. Although it’s used in conjunction with a new set of Ghostbusters…There’s a whole "show" based on it, and for an added treat Beetlejuice shows up.

Chestnuts roasted by Maxim @ 05/03/2006 10:46 AM

I had that Ghostbusters game when I was a kid.
It was fun and frustrating at the same time.
I could always get a couple of ghosts and it was fun to drive around the city, but I could never figure out what it was that I was supposed to be doing in order to advance in the game.
It would have been nice to get to buy one of the more expensive cars.

The only game I ever had that was as frustrating as Ghostbusters at the time was the Thing and Human Torch game on the C64.

Chestnuts roasted by Kurt @ 05/03/2006 1:34 PM

Thanks a lot Matt, after reading your Stay-Puft tribute I had no choice but to order both Ghostbusters movies. Goodbye money!

God I’m psycked, I haven’t seen those in ages…

Chestnuts roasted by CCP @ 05/03/2006 5:07 PM

Actually the Ghostbusters C64 wasn’t that hard. After a while when on the map the ghost start flying really fast you have to use ghost bait when 4 ghosts are headed towards a certain spot on the map. If you don’t Marshmallow man will form and destroy a building which YOU have to pay for. (makes no sense, ey?)

After a while the bottiom screen bar reads "go to zuul". When you go there you will find the dancing MM as seen in the review. If you are able to get 2 GBs in the building you win and get to see a very disappointing cutscene.

Chestnuts roasted by Jordy @ 05/04/2006 11:13 AM

But hey, the title screen had a karaoke option for the theme song.

Chestnuts roasted by Jordy @ 05/04/2006 11:16 AM

Stay Puft!

Chestnuts roasted by Me @ 05/04/2006 4:57 PM

Stay Puft article was superb as always Matt.

I have vague recollections of playing a Ghostbusters game, though not on the C64. And yes, the back-pack toy was way cool. Mine got stepped on a few too many times though.

Now, off to find some marshmallows…

Chestnuts roasted by CWH @ 05/05/2006 4:22 AM

I was fortunate to get Stay-puft for my birthday, I remember all me and my friends being in complete awe of him … like someone said before about the slimer action figure .. he smelt amazing and I seem to recall pumping his stomach and sniffing at the air hole in his foot. Unfotunately Ive got no idea what happened to him, but I do recall that his pristine white body soon became smudged with general grime.

Chestnuts roasted by Ricey @ 05/05/2006 7:55 AM

I never thought Gozer actually was the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man. I always thought Gozer was just the chick and Mr. Stay Puft was just someone Gozer summoned to kill the Ghostbusters. Although, I can’t say I know the RGB episodes too well with the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man in them so they may or may not reveal more info on him?

Chestnuts roasted by Toxicity- @ 05/05/2006 9:02 AM

This site is terrific. I discovered it recently and your writing style really cracks me up.

Stay Puft Man, Krang…you know the stylish bad guys when you see them. Well done.

Chestnuts roasted by Mr. Sinister @ 05/06/2006 11:30 AM

There’s a Roy Rogers at most of the travel plazas along the Pennsylvania Turnpike (I-76), and as far as I know, the ones in the rest areas on the New York State Thruway (I-87) are still there. I’ve been to the one on the PA Turnpike near Carlisle a bunch of times (why do the buses always stop there?), and it’s kind of overpriced (even by rest area standards), and their bacon cheeseburgers are bun shaped balls of grease wrapped in foil. The fries aren’t that good either.

Arby’s is far superior.

Chestnuts roasted by X-E Fan @ 05/08/2006 3:20 AM

I’m such an impressionable asshole. I went and bought a rubber Stay Puft on ebay. Fuck!

Chestnuts roasted by Homosexual Werewolf @ 05/12/2006 10:43 AM

Argh! I’m away five minutes and there’s an article and 90 feet of blog on one of the greatest screen stars ever. Ghostbusters may well be my all-round favourite film of all time.

"You’re right. No human being would stack books this way."

That catalogue of ‘busters toys took me back – I really wanted the yellow ectoplasm-garglimg ghost – think his name was ‘Sludgebucket’. Ah well, at least I managed to get hold of Stay-Puft.

Chestnuts roasted by Candle Snuff Fungus @ 05/12/2006 1:51 PM

Ghostbusters rule! I’ve loved that movie since the first commercial I saw for it. Even when all the movie posters didn’t have a name, just the tagline "Coming to save the world this summer." Looking back now, the second one was a disappointment even though I loved it then. I used to hope that they would make more sequels but I know now that it was probably for the better. The cartoon was awesome and much better than that ripoff GB. Thanks for another great article to reminisce by. BTW, I have that "rare" Stay-Puft toy you were referring to. A friend of mine was cleaning out his parents’ house and gave it to me because he knew what a huge fan I was.

Chestnuts roasted by Kaploc @ 05/17/2006 12:22 PM

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