Does anyone remember the Fragle Rock happy meal toys?? The ones that had fragles in little toy cars??? I stil have a bunch of those kicking around and was wondering what year they were from? I would guess like 1991 or soemthing.

Chestnuts roasted by Galph @ 02/20/2007 9:49 AM

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Comment based on the fact that I haven’t read the article or most of the comments yet:

By gum, Shuanfu, I just discovered Heroes. I couldn’t believe that it has both Milo Ventimiglia and Christopher Eccleston. My head almost exploded. I am in love with it, and I missed ten episodes.

Chestnuts roasted by Katherine @ 02/20/2007 10:41 AM

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Great Article. A couple comments:
advertorial: Possibly my new favorite word, at least until next week.
McRib: Mmmm, McRib, Mmmmm…now I’ll have that insatiable desire for the rest of the day for pre-formed meat product.
Finally, I never cease to be amazed at the materials you find for your articles. Who woulda thunk it that anyone had the foresight to save 20 years of tray thingees from McD’s!!!

Chestnuts roasted by Mowntandew @ 02/20/2007 1:06 PM

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Nice article, lots of great memories there! I still have some of the Atari Scratch ‘n’ Win cards in my “big box o’ misc junk from the past” down in my basement.

Chestnuts roasted by Dirk Blackpool @ 02/20/2007 1:40 PM

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I didn’t know if I was going to be able to comment on anything McDonalds related because my comment would have been off-topic. However, after reading the comments, I have several comments to make about McDonalds.

First of all, to the post about the Fraggle Rock Happy Meal toys, those came out in the mid-80s. Fraggle Rock was still being shown on HBO (they stopped airing them in 1987) when they came out. Me and a buddy of mine were so obsessed with Fraggle Rock. The Fraggle Rock toys were only of the few HM toys in which I almost got the whole set. Usually I would be a “One Toy Wonder” when it came to Happy Meal toys because my family used to eat McDonalds for Sunday Night dinner once a month, and the toys would usually change every month. Anyway, on the rare months where we did have McD’s more than once a month, the HM toy I would get would be a double. That’s exactly what happened with my Fraggle Rock toy. Two weeks in a row I got the Gobo toy and when we tried to exchange it for another toy, we were told that was the only toy they had available (I had that happen to me another time years later with a Tiny Toons toy and I got duplicate Buster toys on two McD’s visits). Fortunately, my equally obsessed Fraggle Rock friend from school had the same thing happen to him only he had two Red toys. So we trade and I gave him my extra Gobo and he gave me his extra Red. As I said before, I “almost” got the whole set because my buddy later on got a duplicate Mokey and I did not have a Mokey, so he gave me his extra Mokey. Unfortunately, I was not able to get a Wembley/Boober toy so that was an unfinished Happy Meal toy set. I had another toy set that I almost completed that tied in with Bambi and all I needed was Thumper, and I even was at a McDonalds where they had Thumper available, but for some reason, no one got me a Happy Meal!!!!

Anyway, now to switch gears here, does anybody remember when McDonalds used to sell ornaments for Christmas? They usually would tie it in with a Disney movie that was released (or re-released) that holiday season. I got a Jack the Mouse from Cinderella one year and my sister got Sebastian from the Little Mermaid. My Jack ornament still is hung on the family tree every year. Also, while writing this, I remember when An American Tail came out in theaters and McD’s sold these story books based on the movie. I also recall getting a mini Fievel stocking. I was quite upset for it being so tiny because I would have LOVED to have a filled stocking with a picture of Fievel on it!

Okay, I have to make a comment or two about the Batman Forever glasses, and a couple other glasses collections that McD’s gave out through the years. At first, I only thought I had the Batman mug, and we had two of them, but now I do recall also having the Riddler mug as well. Also, does anybody remember the glass Garfield mugs back in the 80s? We had the whole collection at one time except the last glass we had broke. Actually, the scene on the glass was Garfield was laying in a hammock and Odie was holding up one end with his mouth while holding a glass of Garfield’s drink. I do recall a commercial in which that scene was shown but it had Odie holding a McDonalds cup. I can’t tell you how disappointed I was to see Odie just holding a normal glass on the glass decision. ALSO, I must mention this because this does take me back to the early 80s but does anybody remember any of the PEANUTS glasses McDonalds issued? We had about two or three of them but they broke because the glass was so cheap. They seemed to be stronger on the mugs though because I remember dropping a couple of the Garfield mugs a couple times and having them not break (which confuses me to how we managed to break one of those). Anyway, the Batman and Garfield mugs we still have, well, I myself don’t have them personally with me. They are back at my mom’s home in Chicago which is of course my Home Sweet Home whenever I’m home on Leave. Oh yes, and does anybody remember the Super Size plastic cups? My personal favorite were the “Honey I Shrunk the Kids” cups. Had a couple of them I do believe.

Okay, let’s see, I went through Happy Meal toys, glasses, is there anything I’m missing out? Well, I need to correct Matt here and say that the NFL placemat, or should I say promotion period, was from 1994 and not 1996. I remember because it was the first year FOX broadcast NFL games and I was a sophmore in high school.

Okay, before I wrap this up and remember other toys/promotions McDonalds had that I remember that I will forget, I just want to mention that I was wondering why they had a Burger King commercial on the videotape of the second TMNT movie. Of course, why would Burger King be promoting the turtles when all they eat is Pizza? Hmm, I do beleive Pizza Hut did some promotions for the first movie, even though in that movie they are eating Domino’s Pizza. Okay, is that all I have to say? Well, I do want to mention something in a previous article Matt wrote. When he wrote about the E.T. Happy Meal features and had the commercial clip, I vividly recall owning one of the E.T. posters because it hung outside my bedroom door. I was both overjoyed and frightened to have that poster. Frightened especially at night with all the lights out and I was in the kitchen going to my room, looking at my door in the dark and seeing E.T. staring directly at me! Gave me the chills I can tell you! Anyway, this is all I have to say right now. I hope you enjoyed (those of you who actually read my ramblings) my little trip down memory lane. Why does it seem as though McDonalds had a profound effect on my youth? Perhaps because…well…IT DID!!!!

Chestnuts roasted by BJ @ 02/20/2007 2:14 PM

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Great article! This is the type of stuff I need to be saving for my new daughters time capsul. Even if she will not appreciate it, I will for sure. I love the “old school” McD’s stuff. I had most of the hotwheels as well and I would kill to find a general lee shaped happy meal box. Keep up the great work Matt.

Chestnuts roasted by Tigerfan @ 02/20/2007 2:52 PM

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Jason Alexander (George Castanza off of Sienfeld) once told on the Tonight Show that he was fired from the McDLT commercial because he had sarcastically rambled on about ‘what a miracle of technology this is’ before shooting without realizing his mic was on.

Chestnuts roasted by dsyoungblood @ 02/20/2007 3:00 PM

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Holy crap! I had the jet car from McDonalds. God must have smiled on me too. I remember my friend becoming irritated at me and tried to stab me in the leg with it. The joke was on him because the nose was rubber.

I like how all the trayliners are grease stain free.

Chestnuts roasted by Bill @ 02/20/2007 3:19 PM

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oh, man i love your site. just recently found it. i totally remember the hot wheels cars. i used to love the red corvette…shit it had GOLD rims

Chestnuts roasted by firmpulse @ 02/20/2007 3:36 PM

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McDonald’s used to be a staple for me. But then I ate too much of it and now I need my stomach stapled.

Justice served I guess.

Chestnuts roasted by Nickelodeon @ 02/20/2007 3:44 PM

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Hey, this reminded me of something! Lately when I pass by the craft department at Wal-Mart there’s a section of McDonald’s themed fabric, and not just prints of Ronald and the Golden Arches. There’s the Happy Meal Gang and even one with Officer Big Mac. Kinda weird.

Chestnuts roasted by Mystie @ 02/20/2007 4:35 PM

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“Every time they did a Hot Wheels promotion that wasn’t coupled with Barbies, I would get so, so pissed. That Hot Wheels liner just brought back all those times…plus, they gave away real Hot Wheels, but never anything close to real Barbies.”

I was hoping somebody would mention the “Gender-Specific Happy Meal” debacle. My favorite memory of these was some commercial where the boys are happily playing adventure games with their Hot Wheels. Meanwhile, the girls are *just sitting around* with their teeny-tiny Barbies -also just sitting around- and one of the girls says “The Barbies are watching the cars race!”

I congratulate my younger self for being perceptive enough to want to strangle the producers of that ad.

Mystie – There’s Officially Liscensed fabric for EVERYTHING. Though McDonalds fabric strikes me as particularly disturbing. What the hell would anyone use it for? Actually, even scarier, what *kind of person* would use McDonalds-themed fabrics in a craft project?

-K – Furry crocodiles? This needs to be elaborated upon, please. I’m picturing a crocodile with fur.

Chestnuts roasted by Wolphin @ 02/20/2007 5:05 PM

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I searched really hard Wolphin, but this is the best I could come up with. It’s such a horrible quality vid, but I couldn’t find a pic at all.

One of the variants is on screen from 12-17 seconds. Right at the beginning. It’s a Hybrid Croc and it’s the big black thing, as opposed to the small black Viper that pops up. Picture its head on a human body and you have my childhood horror

Chestnuts roasted by K- @ 02/20/2007 5:37 PM

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