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07/17/2008: X-E’s ‘08 Summer Megaparty: Burger Tyrant.


Bah, this shit’s ridiculous. I’ve been seeing commercials for this Burger King “Club BK” kids’ meal starring Pikachu and Apple Fries for a while now, and it seemed like just the type of neoclassic Happy Meal worth blogging about. I realize that Burger King doesn’t make Happy Meals, but you know what I mean.


I expected the world, but what I got back was this sad, boring bag, with a Pokemon toy haphazardly shoved in with overcooked fries and crown-shaped chicken tenders. They didn’t have Apple Fries in stock, which is kind of unbelievable. If there’s one thing I’d never expect anyone to sell out of, it’s APPLE FRIES.

That isn’t what’s bothering me, though. What really bugs me is the total lack of customized packaging. There’s no “experience” to this.

BACK IN MY DAY, the Happy Meal was as much about its flashy bravado as its toys and cheeseburgers. Was there a single kid in the country who didn’t at least try to keep the house-shaped Happy Meal box in perfect working order throughout their meal, free of folds and fry oil? Hell, a good many of us, myself included, went so far as to take those boxes home with us, working under the idea that we’d keep them forever and ever. We never did, but the fun was in the notion that we could.

Those Happy Meal boxes, with their colorful artwork and random puzzles, were as much a part of the filthy food experience as anything else. When McDonald’s began phasing out the boxes in favor of less-artful bags, I was sad, but at least the bags still had the same gamut of illustrations and puzzles…albeit less colorful ones.

But this?! An unrelated bag lacking any kind of kiddy theme? APPALLED.


To protest, I refuse to acknowledge the neat holographic Prinplup card or the Pokemon-themed card holder it came with. Take that, BK.

In anti-celebration of this disappointing turn of events, I’d like to institute a new survey. In the comments, talk about your favorite Happy Meal toy ever. Yes, the free toys you got from other fine greasy food establishments are totally fine to talk about, too.

On the plus side: If getting pissed about the quality level of a Burger King “Club BK” kids’ meal is the worst thing that happened to me today, I think I’m still in the black.


Posted by Matt. E-mail me!

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Discussion Thread: 263 comments
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Ahh pokemon I love em. =)

Ghosted by ULTRAMAN @ 07/17/2008 11:23 PM EDT

My fav fast food toy was from McD. It was those fast food items that transfromed into robots. My sec favs were the Nintendo toys they had when Super Mario Bros. 3 first came out. Also from McDs.

Ghosted by ULTRAMAN @ 07/17/2008 11:28 PM EDT

I always thought the Teenie Beanie Babies were a great deal, considering how they were perfect miniatures of the actual toys. I think I got them all, even the bears.

More than the toys that came with the meals, I enjoyed BK’s premium toys, like the Toy Story Buzz and Woody puppets you could buy and the bean-bag reindeer they had many Christmases ago. And Alf puppets! And the Simpsons dolls! Damn, BK used to have great stuff.

I also remember buying a ton of those Land Before Time puppets from Pizza Hut.

Ghosted by Paul @ 07/17/2008 11:29 PM EDT

BK was akways the bastard cousin of McDonald’s anyway.

Ghosted by Clockwork @ 07/17/2008 11:30 PM EDT

My favorite toy was always the little red plastic firetruck that had the rip cord. I don’t remember if it was McDs or BK, and it was a pretty cheap little toy, but man did I love when they brought it back as the happy meal toy every now and then.

Ghosted by alfonso the bat @ 07/17/2008 11:30 PM EDT

Gotta go with the Super Mario 3 toys McDonalds put out. Man-o-man I just had to collect all of those – my poor parents allowed much McDonalds during that promotion in return for less begging.
Second best – Alien Mix-ups from Wendy’s back in the (im guessing it was) early to mid 90’s.

Ghosted by Rocker313 @ 07/17/2008 11:31 PM EDT

Paul: The ALF puppets were great. Weren’t there small plushies, too?

In terms of BK, though, I don’t think anything will top those Simpsons dolls. I preferred BK’s old TMNT promotion, but in terms of sheer must-have-immediately, that Simpsons promotion came out at exactly the right time. (I believe it was our first real chance to own such things, or at least, it was one of the first.)

Ghosted by Matt @ 07/17/2008 11:31 PM EDT

I also loved the McDonalds McNuggets with costume changes. The Halloween ones were obviously the best, but I also remember have a police officer McNugget.

Ghosted by Paul @ 07/17/2008 11:31 PM EDT

BK kids meals were always second rate. I mean they had those cartoon kids as their mascots that were drawn as cool “nineties” kids, but then they never updated them! The one kid was still sporting a flat top haircut in 1997! Anyway, any nintendo themed happy meals deserved a gold star.

Ghosted by K-town @ 07/17/2008 11:32 PM EDT

Mine was probably a Millenium Falcon I got from Taco Bell when they did the Special Edition trilogy, back when I was too young to notice whether Greedo shot first or not… Ah, the memories.

Ghosted by Ronnie Lane @ 07/17/2008 11:35 PM EDT

BK may not have the flashyness of Mcd, but I always prefered thier food to McDs. BK is by no means a Gourmet resturaunt, but at least their food is SLIGHTY edible, as opposed to McDs food, which is something I can’t imagine even cockroaches enjoying. lol.

Ghosted by ULTRAMAN @ 07/17/2008 11:35 PM EDT

could this question be any easier? the mc nuggets with the Halloween costumes

Ghosted by punkass1 @ 07/17/2008 11:36 PM EDT

When I was little and Living in Alaska, We had to drive 45 minutes to get to the nearest McDonalds or Fastfood joint in general. So the treck down to Anchorage was something to be celebrated only through Birthdays. My Birthday unfortunately falls on Dec. 9th. So We could never ever go because Dec. in Alaska is pretty much like walking through the Ice Age.

Well one year, my dad made this big announcement that he’s going to go to McDonalds to get me a Happy Meal for my birthday. But I wasn’t allowed to go just in case the car broke down. I was 6 at the time and we were in the midst of a horrible blizzard.

So my dad goes out an gets into the SUV and heads out into the storm. Three and a half grueling hours later he returns. With a SINGLE happy meal.

My two brother were FURIOUS. Dad walks up and hands me the Happy Meal and says “Whew, I’m glad I went when I did. They give out special toys to kids having Birthdays, and the storm has caused them to be in short supply. I wonder what special toy they put in there?”

I opened my happy meal and beneath the extremely cold French Fries, and hard as a rock Cheeseburger, I saw the corner of a Box. I pull the food off and revealed none other than. MEGA MAN 2! for the NES.

I know this isn’t technically a prize from the Happy Meal Collection. But I still have that game, with the French Fry grease stained box. It’s proudly displayed on my bar in my apt.

To this day, I have never EVER received any present that I covet more than that game.

Ghosted by Jester @ 07/17/2008 11:36 PM EDT

Was it McDonalds that had the Muppet Babies on big wheels? I played with those forever!

Ghosted by Paul @ 07/17/2008 11:36 PM EDT

My fave was the simpsons halloween toys from BK.

Also the muppet babies toys from the mid 80’s at McD’s and the Plushie Christmas Muppet Babies from Mcdonalds. The halloween mc nuggets also were cool.

Ghosted by mandy_Reeves @ 07/17/2008 11:37 PM EDT

http://www.kathysfastfoodtoys.com/images/AB_00_WendysAliens.jpg Link to pics of the Alien Mix-ups for those who don’t remember them.

The ALF hand-puppets were great! I remember getting ALF in a baseball outfit on a family roadtrip – still have him!

Ghosted by Rocker313 @ 07/17/2008 11:37 PM EDT

I don’t know if these count as “toys” but i remember having the ghost, pumpkin, and witch pails from which my meal came in one halloween. My constant ebaying has yielded no results thus far.

On the actual toy front, nothing beats the chicken nuggets with their cusom halloween outfits. The looney toon figures that came from Arby’s were awesome too

Ghosted by Bookafish @ 07/17/2008 11:38 PM EDT

HOLD IT! scratch my last comment! My favorite wasn’t really a toy but the vhs taped movies like wayne’s world and indiana jones that were for sale there priceless

Ghosted by punkass1 @ 07/17/2008 11:38 PM EDT

Oh man, now I’m thinking back to everything I loved as a kid. The Bambi toys were awesome! Linked in my name.

Ghosted by Paul @ 07/17/2008 11:40 PM EDT

Buying a kids meal for the food? That is borderline un-american, but fresh McDonalds food is only slightly better than McDonalds food regurgitated.

Ghosted by K-town @ 07/17/2008 11:41 PM EDT

BTW, when did the mcnugget costumes come out? I’m drawing a blank.

Ghosted by K-town @ 07/17/2008 11:41 PM EDT

Almost forgot, i also had all the TMNT video collection that was handed out by burger king way back in the day, i ran them till they were dead. I was impressed with the video game promo they were pushing for the x-box, until i saw it was only lame bk games

my anger at the fast food establishment makes me want to pwn some poor fool w/ Mr. Game and Watch

Ghosted by Bookafish @ 07/17/2008 11:42 PM EDT

Being absolutely enthralled with Fraggle Rock, I loved the Fraggle Rock vegetable race car happy meal toys.

Ghosted by Clockwork @ 07/17/2008 11:44 PM EDT

I think I still have some Muppet glasses that were handed out by one of the chains from back in the 80s. I think they did Star Wars glasses too. Probably my fav was when they handed out the Gremlins read along books that came with the 78 records. They had a whole series of them. I did not live very close to a fast food place so I only got a few, but they were great.

Ghosted by stonetumbler @ 07/17/2008 11:44 PM EDT

The best was the early 80’s McDonald’s Flying saucer with rubber alien. At my school there was a big craze over these. I seem to remember that there were four aliens and two of the four were harder to get than the other two. There was a lot trading associated with the rarer two, which were the cooler of the four, of course. There was one I could never obtain and it was the greatest of the four. I think I had a friend who let me see his for a few minutes.

Or did I imagine all of the above?

Ghosted by Vic Sage @ 07/17/2008 11:45 PM EDT

Anyone remember when these chains could rule our world? i am in possesion of a McDonald’s restaurant playset for the Little people collection. The closest thing i can find like this now-a-days is McDonald themed fake food at toys-r-us

Ghosted by Bookafish @ 07/17/2008 11:47 PM EDT

When I was a kid, my Dad and I collected McDonalds toys and BK toys, and we’ve got a few 5ft high moving boxes with packaged toys in them.

My favorite, were the pullback cars featuring Ronald, The Grimace, the Hamburgler, and that duck-faced bitch with the goggles. I think they came out around 1984.

Still work to this day. lol. I love it.

Ghosted by NintendoMan @ 07/17/2008 11:47 PM EDT

I think you mean you’re still in the black? Alternately, you could be having a red letter day :D
I had a Genie (from Aladdin) toy that I carried around in my pocket as a little buddy for awhile that stands out as a sentimental favorite. I loved those Taco Bell Star Wars toys, and the ones Burger King did recently are great too. I keep spare change in Han Solo’s carbonite casing. I think the Tiny Toons ones were my favorites of all the McDonald’s car toys over the years.

Ghosted by squee4242 @ 07/17/2008 11:49 PM EDT

A happy meal in a bag is like Star Wars toys with bendable joints. What is the world coming to?

Ghosted by Bill @ 07/17/2008 11:50 PM EDT

My favorite thing was the Halloween buckets. I loved those. I also loved the Barbie toys and the transformer burger, fries, and nuggets. I also miss the foam containers…

Ghosted by gingela5 @ 07/17/2008 11:51 PM EDT

23k Gold-plated Pokemon Cards …

Ghosted by craig @ 07/17/2008 11:51 PM EDT

I feel so neglected tonight. *sniff*

Ghosted by Karen Ross @ 07/17/2008 11:52 PM EDT

I just found out, after, like 26 years, that the Grimace is supposed to be a tastebud.

What the hell? D:

Ghosted by NintendoMan @ 07/17/2008 11:52 PM EDT

Nintendoman, a tastebud? really? i always thought he was supposed to be something related to the shakes he represented. I feel a little thrown now, like juno with fingernails

Ghosted by Bookafish @ 07/17/2008 11:56 PM EDT

Come to think of it, I remember being pissed that I never got the rarer Doozer toys…Wonder if ebay has them.

Ghosted by Clockwork @ 07/17/2008 11:56 PM EDT

gingela5: I LOVED the Halloween buckets! =D I actually used them for trick or treating! Along with couple of HUGE pillow cases!

Ghosted by ULTRAMAN @ 07/17/2008 11:57 PM EDT

Grimace is a TASTEBUD?! HUH! Well that solves the mystery I guess. If it’s true that is.

Ghosted by ULTRAMAN @ 07/17/2008 11:59 PM EDT

More trivia: Grimace was originally “evil” and had four arms for the purpose of stealing milkshakes.

Ghosted by Clockwork @ 07/18/2008 12:00 AM EDT

Man, fast food toys. Got to love them. There’s a McDonalds in Roswell, NM that has a bunch of old toys on display.

Man, I don’t think I can limit myself to just one. So I’ll list a bunch.

Any Happy Meal involving LEGO was automatically awesome. I mean, toys that you can integrate with your other toys? REAL toys, not cheap crap? Awesome.

I have a Men in Black memory eraser thing that I think was from Burger King. It’s pretty cool because it’s just like a miniature version of the movie prop. I don’t think they made a “real” toy like it…I still have it, too.

I also like the Batmobile toy from McDonalds from Batman Returns.

I seem to remember Chip and Dale rescue ranger toys were cool.

Any Nintendo-related toys were automatic wins for me. I especially loved the Pokeballs from BK. Those were great. When they came out I used to go get two BK meals at one time, just to get two different toys. Bear in mind I was in High School for this. I never did get the elusive Pikachu toy, though. :(

Also, McDonald’s boxes: I have a vivid recollection of collecting at least three of the Jungle Book boxes when it was re-released in theatres in the late 80s. You could pop out parts of them and connect them all to make a fortress.

Man, now I really miss happy meal boxes. Bags just don’t cut it. You need the cool box.

Ghosted by Cameron T. @ 07/18/2008 12:01 AM EDT

My son has that same case. He saw the commercial and for the first time ever requested BK over McD’s.

I remember the ship or boat happy meal. It was and always will be my favorite happy meal toy. I would totally consider buying THAT off of ebay.

Ghosted by kb @ 07/18/2008 12:02 AM EDT

Anyone remeber the pirate that used to try and steal the filet o’ fish?

Ghosted by Bookafish @ 07/18/2008 12:02 AM EDT

Captain Crook!

Ghosted by Clockwork @ 07/18/2008 12:03 AM EDT

I refuse to believe that Grimace, the purple Alien that I have come to know and love, is a Taste Bud.

To be honest, I had no idea what the hell it was. But a Taste Bud? Seriously?

Wow

Ghosted by Jester @ 07/18/2008 12:09 AM EDT

I loved the Super Mario 3 toys, but my favorites were the oft-commented on McDs Changeables. Sadly, I was only around to have the versions that turned into Dinosaurs. But still, awesome. All the food was still served in styrofoam back then.

I, too, still have those BK Simpsons dolls.

One of my co-workers discovered that our local McDs still carried the Big n Tasty, you just had to request it. I don’t think I will, because as it turns out, it’s actually the McDLT, but without the environment-destroying styrofoam package.

Ghosted by Invader Norbert @ 07/18/2008 12:12 AM EDT

I couldn’t remember any specific toys at all.
That is until norb mentioned the SMB3 toys, I think I had mario on a spring or something.
My memory aint what it used to be, I appologize.

Ghosted by JoshC @ 07/18/2008 12:15 AM EDT

The McDLT became the Big Xtra during the Arch Delux years, and then later the Big ‘n’ Tasty

Ghosted by Bookafish @ 07/18/2008 12:17 AM EDT

Alot of fast food snadwiches are really the same thing, they just have different names.

Ghosted by ULTRAMAN @ 07/18/2008 12:19 AM EDT

Oh man, you people are reminding me of too much shit.

I’ll have to do a top ten or something

10. This Japanese paper placemat that I took from a McDonalds in tokyo with the intent of somehow sending it to Matt:
http://keitheng.net/justinspace/japplacemat.jpg

9. These plastic big wheeled monster trucks from some local Pizza place in the town I was born in. Nothing special, but I had them for ages, and they were the first such thing I ever got from a food joint. They were called Stompers, or so my cousin who is getting married tomorrow said.

8. The Little Mermaid toys, particularly the Flounder that squirt water. My sis made me watch that movie until I hated it when she was 6, but I still counted those toys as awesome.

7. X-Men comics and VHS tapes from Pizza Hut around 1993-94

6. Toy Story woody puppet, as well as Buzz Lightyear and RC. I was a bit old, 11 or 12 but it was such a great movie and such high quality toys, who cares?

5. The several million Hotwheels cars added to my collection of several million other hotwheels and matchbox cars from years of asking for them every chance I got at Bombergers, where they were 87 cents and no one was going to say no.

4. The buckets mentioned earlier that looked like ghosts and pumpkins. The second year was better simply because the ghosts glowed in the dark. Those smelled like fries for months, which I think was half the appeal. The mcnugget characters came in these. good combo.

3. Batman Forever clear mugs. Not a kids meal thing, but I was 11 so I wasn’t eating happy meals anyway.

2. Rescue Rangers in vehicles with detatchable parts. At the time my sister and I were so into that show you wouldn’t believe it. We were 5. We never found any other toys based on those characters, so those were gold to us. I can’t think about this without getting choked up.

1. The Land Before Time handpuppets. Got more use than any of the others and I still have them. We didn’t have a Pizza Hut location until I was like 8, but when I was 5, my aunt managed one far away and brought us everyone but Sharptooth and Petree. We found a sharptooth in adulthood, but still no petree…

Ghosted by Justin B @ 07/18/2008 12:27 AM EDT

I’m sure I’ll kick myself for forgetting many, but below are my favorite Happy Meal promotions ever:

- McBoo Pails
- Halloween McNugget Buddies
- Fast Macs (Pull-back action cars with Ronald, Birdie, etc.)
- Changeables (McDonald’s food items that transformed into robots)
- Super Mario Bros. 3 figures – doy.

There were also a bunch of Hot Wheels promotions that I loved, because the toys were exactly the same as what you’d buy in stores.

Ghosted by Matt @ 07/18/2008 12:35 AM EDT

either the line of super mario bros toys or the rescuers down under slide viewers…

Ghosted by Andrew @ 07/18/2008 12:35 AM EDT

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