The Toys That Made US

[Earth 2 Chris]

Huzzah!!!

[pmwasson]

Season 2 available on May 25th!

Available May 25
Ibiza (NETFLIX FILM)
Steve Martin and Martin Short: An Evening You Will Forget for the Rest of Your Life (NETFLIX ORIGINAL)
The Toys That Made Us, Season 2 (NETFLIX ORIGINAL)
Trollhunters, Part 3 (NETFLIX ORIGINAL)

[Bravestarr]

I need to see this but dont have netflix anymore

[huedell]

I would have thought She-Ra would have had the opposite effect since the animated series added the all new Horde characters.

Not to mention, a few MOTU characters who were too late to be included in the MOTU cartoon.

Would've been nice if POP gave MOTU new legs. But, regardless of if they hurt MOTU, they certainly didn't help. The Princess Of Power girl dolls weren't all that blendable with MOTU... even MOTU's Teela and Evil-Lyn lacked POP's rooted hair and stood a bit less imposing than their POP female counterparts.

And, according to the Toys That Made Us doc, the girl toys design department originally wanted to go much bigger (akin to Barbie), but according to the Mattel design women, those silly, insecure men designing the boy's toys said it was a bad idea to have such a thing occur.

The She-Ra theory is putting blame on someone else, pure and simple.

I'd say that's a reasonably inaccurate statement.

Blaming She-Ra in the context that it was explained in TTTMU as "little sisters making older brothers feel their territory was breached (and subsequently tainted and worth abandoning)" checks out sufficiently (logically) to me... and, unless you think that sounds entirely unreasonable (which, I concede you may), the 'little sister Kryptonite" theory's plausibility is one reason She-Ra's emergence taking both MOTU/POP down is not such a simple a theory to discard.

Interestingly, another theory of MOTU's initial demise put forth in that totally awesome TTTMU documentary (which Werewolf, as a big MOTU fan, MUST see) was hinted at in your post:

When I was in college ('93) there was STILL a four-foot wide MOTU clearance section full of less than popular characters...

The documentary stated that both He-Man and Skeletor figures were NOT being shipped out with those lesser known characters proportionally.
(Re-edited to acknowledge that Earth 2 Chris mentioned this same theory above)

Mucho Buzz-Off... Poquito Skeletor and so on.

Reminds me of how it was the opposite for me and Mego WGSH.... I never saw anything except the big 4 in stores (barring the wall of Kresge Riddlers in a K-Mart one time).

[comicmike]

(season 2) Next 4 episodes may be before April:

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/www.polygon.com/platform/amp/2018/1/10/16875164/the-toys-that-made-us-season-2-release-date-lego-transformers-star-trek-hello-kitty?espv=1

http://amp.denofgeek.com/us/tv/the-toys-that-made-us/270717/the-toys-that-made-us-season-2-netflix-brian-volk-weiss

https://m.facebook.com/thetoysthatmadeus/

[Klosterheim]

I would have thought She-Ra would have had the opposite effect since the animated series added the all new Horde characters.

[palitoy]

Mattel oversaturated the marketplace with MOTU, they did similar things with Big Jim.

When I was in college ('93) there was STILL a four-foot wide MOTU clearance section full of less than popular characters, Mark Huckabone was smarter than me and filled my trunk on more than one Canada trip.

The She-Ra theory is putting blame on someone else, pure and simple.

[Earth 2 Chris]

^Yeah, I was surprised that gave She-Ra that much credit for ruining He-Man. They do point out that Mattel didn't keep the core characters available outside of new versions of He-Man and Skeletor. That was a problem I knew well, as my He-Man's arm got chewed up by a neighbor dog, and I had to wait for what seemed like years before Mattel finally re-released "The ORIGINAL He-Man".

Mattel definitely gave up too quickly. In fact, all the major toy manufacturers did on the big lines back then. Even Transformers went lights-out for a few years before the G2 reissues started.

Chris

[Werewolf]

I haven't seen it, I don't have Netflix. But I have been reading about it.

On the He-Man episode, I wasn't surprised to hear that twenty percent of MOTU collectors were girls. I was disappointed to read the MOTU guys blamed the eventual decline in sales on She-Ra. It couldn't have been that the line had simply run its course or increased competition or The Real Ghostbusters had become the next big thing or the live action movie didn't click with audiences or the Sword and Sorcery genre was waning in popularity. No, it had to be She-Ra. I'm a little sad to hear they feel that way. The property had a VERY good run by the time sales had declined.

Personally, I think, Mattel has always had this mindset of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Even at its worst MOTU probably would have been considered still a success and viable property for any other company. I think they cancelled it too quickly only to realize He-Man and MOTU still had tremendous brand recognition. That's why we got the ill fated New Adventures reboot so soon.

[Bravestarr]

Fight fight fight LOL

[Falstaff13]

I've caught up and seen them all now. These are enjoyable and fun to watch, but I think they could probably have expanded both the Barbie and GI Joe ones to cover the history more in depth. They basically are looking at 5 years for MOTU and primarily the span of the original trilogy for the bulk of Star Wars, and the 45-50 minutes seems to work for those, but then it creates stretches for both Barbie & Joe that get glossed over. I'd be interested in more on both lines, and I haven't collected either. Given these seem to clearly be coming from a vantage point that's about my age (I was born in 1975, and the smaller RAH, MOTU, and SW are all the center of my youth), I'm actually surprised they aren't also doing one on Cabbage Patch (or maybe Strawberry Shortcake, but CPK would seem to be the next major toy to hit on).

I would like to see a more chronological approach, but I understand going this way. It would be great to see installments on Captain Action, Big Jim, Best of the West, Mego (I think the WGSH line by itself would be worth a separate episode), Fisher Price (both Little People and Adventure People), and, even though I never collected either, Care Bears or My Little Pony. I would guess the Gabriel Lone Ranger wouldn't fit an entire episode (and the toy that made me, Legends of the West, definitely wouldn't), but I'd love to see one on cowboy toys (maybe including licensed properties that had TV series, going back to Davy Crockett craze).

Is there a best recommended book on the history of figures? I'm especially interested in finding a history of the Hartland cowboy line.

[cjefferys]

Jeez, can we stop the preference fight already? Whatever floats your boat ok? Everybody wins.

1000 times this! Everyone has different likes and tastes, it's all subjective and therefore pointless to argue over.

Dare I dream we get a Captain Action Episode?

That would be awesome but I'm guessing we might get a superhero toy episode instead? (covering CA, WGSH, Super Powers, Secret Wars, etc). An hour wouldn't be anywhere near enough to cover everything though, that would be the bad part.

[Hedji]

^LOL. I just finished watching it. What a wonderful history of the brand. Nice collection there, Brian.

These are just sublime. The Barbie one was perhaps most surprising in its anecdotes. I have yet to watch the He-Man one.

Dare I dream we get a Captain Action Episode?

[palitoy]

Jeez, can we stop the preference fight already? Whatever floats your boat ok? Everybody wins.

[Teemu]

Again, in your opinion. It would not have existed maybe as its original SHIELD revamp at Marvel, would have not gotten the toy line that it did. Hasbro probably wouldn't have even existed into the 80s if not for GI Joe in the 60s and 70s.

Sure,it Pioneered the way....but still the most successful time period of G.I.Joe...that's a fact! Just because you maybe didn't collect it back then doesn't make it so.....80's toys was a time like no other