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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 on 07/17/2008. E-mail me!



Discussion Thread: 264 comments
1 2 3 … 11

Ahh pokemon I love em. =)

Chestnuts roasted by ULTRAMAN @ 07/17/2008 11:23 PM

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.

Chestnuts roasted by ULTRAMAN @ 07/17/2008 11:28 PM

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.

Chestnuts roasted by Paul @ 07/17/2008 11:29 PM

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

Chestnuts roasted by Clockwork @ 07/17/2008 11:30 PM

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.

Chestnuts roasted by alfonso the bat @ 07/17/2008 11:30 PM

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.

Chestnuts roasted by Rocker313 @ 07/17/2008 11:31 PM

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.)

Chestnuts roasted by Matt @ 07/17/2008 11:31 PM

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.

Chestnuts roasted by Paul @ 07/17/2008 11:31 PM

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.

Chestnuts roasted by K-town @ 07/17/2008 11:32 PM

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.

Chestnuts roasted by Ronnie Lane @ 07/17/2008 11:35 PM

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.

Chestnuts roasted by ULTRAMAN @ 07/17/2008 11:35 PM

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

Chestnuts roasted by punkass1 @ 07/17/2008 11:36 PM

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.

Chestnuts roasted by Jester @ 07/17/2008 11:36 PM

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

Chestnuts roasted by Paul @ 07/17/2008 11:36 PM

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.

Chestnuts roasted by mandy_Reeves @ 07/17/2008 11:37 PM

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!

Chestnuts roasted by Rocker313 @ 07/17/2008 11:37 PM

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

Chestnuts roasted by Bookafish @ 07/17/2008 11:38 PM

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

Chestnuts roasted by punkass1 @ 07/17/2008 11:38 PM

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

Chestnuts roasted by Paul @ 07/17/2008 11:40 PM

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

Chestnuts roasted by K-town @ 07/17/2008 11:41 PM

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

Chestnuts roasted by K-town @ 07/17/2008 11:41 PM

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

Chestnuts roasted by Bookafish @ 07/17/2008 11:42 PM

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

Chestnuts roasted by Clockwork @ 07/17/2008 11:44 PM

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.

Chestnuts roasted by stonetumbler @ 07/17/2008 11:44 PM

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?

Chestnuts roasted by Vic Sage @ 07/17/2008 11:45 PM

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