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Mickey Mouse Magazine 1988
In the 80s every licensed property from The Muppets to G.I.
Joe had their own children’s magazines. Promoted as educational literature and
therefore an easy way to earn a subscription fee from parents concerned for
their kid’s intellectual well-being, these periodicals found their way into our
mailboxes multiple times a year. Mickey Mouse Magazine premiered in 1988 and I
must say was a welcome alternative to Highlights (ugh…)
The first thing you’ll notice about this cover is that
Mickey is sporting a hip new wardrobe that’s straight out of the latest episode
of Growing Pains. Gone are the red suspenders and in their place are a blue
blazer with rolled up sleeves. Mickey was either ready to hit the club or take
down some drug dealers in ToonTown Miami Vice style.
As we can see from our Contents page, there was quite a bit
of excitement packed into this issue which had a scattershot focus on New Years
Eve, the 1988 Winter Olympic Games and Polynesian pop groups. But in addition
to these features there were also lots of Disney merchandise ads, which we’ll
be sampling as we flip the pages.
First up is a the Minnie’s Diary section where we see that
Mickey’s gal pal has also gotten a makeover, which has found her rubbing elbows
with pop music act, The Jets. This collection of Tongan siblings and cousins
had quite a few radio hits back in the day, even being featured in anti-drug
and Hi-C commercials, but never seem to get mentioned in 80s retrospectives. I
remember a Tongan family in my neighborhood was was very proud of the
fact The Jets were their cousins. At this time the group was promoting their new
Christmas album and Minnie writes about attending a live concert.
Here’s an ad featuring the future star of Ducktales,
“Uncle” Scrooge McDuck who seems to believe that these Disney storybooks are a
great investment for the future, he may even put his nephews through college
with the earnings. I personally had half of the books featured here and even
came across that Snow White book just the other day at the thrift store. These
storybooks were a part of almost every kid’s personal library growing up. The
idea was that you signed up to receive the first 8 books at a discount, then
each month were sent 2 new books to keep and pay for or return after 10 days.
Kind of like the infamous Columbia Record Club for Disney loving parents.
Next we have a story about a 6 year old dedicated to the
idea of staying up until midnight on New Years Eve. But this is no ordinary
Kindergartner, it’s the “Cousin Oliver” of Family Ties himself, Brian Bonsall
who played Michael J Fox’s baby brother on that show. This piece is presented
in a poem as if it’s a modern day Twas The Night Before Christmas, with lines
like, “ Now whisper ‘cause Brian has fallen asleep, the hour too late for this
young star to keep, I guess my young friend will just have to wait, ‘til
morning to welcome in 1988.” I didn’t post the whole story here, but the kid
got high on candy and crashed hard before the clock struck midnight. Hey, it
was the 80s after all.
Did adults ever try to sell you on the idea that collecting
coins and stamps was a worthwhile hobby? If the coin was not a token for a
video game arcade and the stamp was not attached to a package for a prize I
mailed away for, I wasn’t interested. In this case the solid gold and silver
coins had Mickey or Snow White on them, but this ad didn’t even try to sell
direct, they wanted you to find your “Local Authorized Rarities Dealer”. The
stamps on the other hand were a 54 item set for $29.95 plus S+H. For a few tiny
pictures of Snow White with a sticky backing? No thank you, I’d rather buy the
T-Rex from Dino Riders.
In the Family Times section the editors were promoting VHS
and Beta tapes to pop into the VCR on a Friday night, but what’s odd is that
only one is a Disney film. Lady and the Tramp gets a push, but next up is a Gumby
tape of the recently rebooted TV series and most surprising of all, Don Bluth’s An American Tail. You see Disney
animation was in the toilet by 1988 and Don Bluth was a former Disney animator,
who had famously walked out with a bunch of their artists to form a competing
studio a few years earlier. An American Tail was a huge hit that defeated
Disney’s Oliver and Company at the box office in a big way, so for a Mickey
Mouse Magazine to be promoting the competition was a major snafu.
Now here’s a completely obsolete concept that was once an
essential part of every kid’s schoolwork, the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
Promoted as the “answer to everything” book, I specifically remember flipping through
the impossibly thin pages in order to gather enough info for a report on
Antarctica in 4th grade and being bored to tears. But that was what
we had to do pre-internet, find the alphabetically correct book in this “32
volume set” of incredibly heavy reference books, just so we could learn who
Franz Ferdinand was. In my case these were hand me downs from my older siblings
who got the books in the mid-70s, so much of the information I had on file was
out of date. I’m telling you, when the Alta Vista and WebCrawler search engines
came along it was a revelation!
If I’m being honest, the non-ad based representation of
Disney characters in this magazine so far has been disappointing, so with
Goofy’s Giggles it was nice to at least get a page full of cartoon characters.
I have to admit, some of the jokes are pretty clever. “What does Scrooge McDuck
like about winter? SNOW BANKS!” Others are terrible puns like, “What did Mickey
get his girlfriend for Christmas? A MINNIE-skirt!” Still others raise more
questions than laughs, “Why does Pluto’s pal act so silly? Because he’s GOOFY!”
Huh? Since when are Goofy and Pluto buddies? Plus, it brings up the whole issue
of Goofy being a dog who acts like a person and Pluto being a pet even though
they appear to be a similar species. Neurotic kids like yours truly were not
ready for this brand of humor.
This issue was being published in the Winter and so had to
have some tie to Christmastime. Thus we have this awesome ad for Tonka brand
playthings. First of all, Santa looks like Bob Hoskins’ Smee from Hook playing Jolly
Old St. Nick, but that’s besides the point, look at the toys! Those Super
Naturals with their holographic innards are the definition of rad, though I can’t
admit to having a connection to Spiral Zone figures other than knowing it had a tie-in
comic book from DC. My wife still has her Maple Town animal figurines and I
remember thinking as a boy that even for a girls toy, Keypers had a great gimmick.
They were animal shaped treasure chests with a little key to open them up, that’s
just neat.
One more feature is Sport Goofy’s report on the Olympic
games. Yes, just like Minnie’s Diary they have someone writing in Goofy’s voice
to tell kids about Figure Skating, Skiing and more snow based competition. What
strikes me as odd is the moniker of “Sport Goofy”. I’ve seen this title used
online and even on vintage branded lunchboxes at antique stores and it makes me
wonder if this is the Goofy we know and love or an extended member of the Goof
clan. I mean back in the day you didn’t have NFL or MLB commentators calling
themselves “Sport John Madden” or “Sport Bob Uecker”.
Closing out the issue is a recipe for how to make Mickey Mouse
pancakes and what could be more thematically appropriate? How about a pancake
that actually looks like the star of your magazine! Look, I know there are
certain limitations with food artistry, but they’ve added way too many extra
details that take the whole character off model. Number 1: Mickey does not have
whiskers. Number 2: His nose has never been red. Number 3: What is that white
stuff? Dandruff? Mickey is no slob and definitely has enough cash to invest in
some Selsun Blue. Number 4: The world’s most famous mouse does not wear a
yellow had with a feather, represented here by a dollop of butter and a
toothpick. This is something you’d order at a roadside diner that didn’t want
to pay the Disney licensing fees called “Most Famous Mouse Cakes”, certainly
not worthy of endorsement by The Walt Disney Company.
Also included in the issue was this beautifully illustrated fold-out
poster of Cinderella. I mean it only appealed to half the audience (I never
would have put it up on my wall) but it’s still a great representation of what
was the core appeal of Walt Disney’s output from the 30’s until the then
present day.
There you have it, Mickey Mouse Magazine from 1988. Thanks
for the turning the pages with me. If you want more Disney fun, I have a new
podcast called The 2 Goofs Podcast where my best friend and I share out stories
from working in costume at Disneyland. Lots of fun behind the scenes tales in
this 12 part series that you can find on iTunes, Google Play, YouTube or stream
on Podbean at this link https://twogoofspodcast.podbean.com/
AdamTheVictini Posted on Oct 26, 2019 at 02:27 AM
I want that Cinderella poster if only for the mice at the bottom of it.
OldSchool80s Posted on Apr 03, 2019 at 01:53 AM
Love this! Thanks for sharing.
Hoju Koolander Posted on Mar 29, 2019 at 05:52 PM
@jkatz What, you don't think kids are getting a decent education from all their apps? Yeah, me neither.
@Benjanime Yeah, I have a few issues of Nintendo Power with retro celebrities like Wil Wheaton and Michael Dorn from Star Trek: The Next Generation, New Kids On The Block and then some totally forgotten performers like The Jets.
jkatz Posted on Mar 27, 2019 at 07:06 PM
It's so wholesome to see a children's magazine promote reading.
Benjanime Posted on Mar 27, 2019 at 03:00 AM
i got a nintendo power vibe from that minnie's diary magazine section, the layout reminded me of the early issues of the magazine when they would feature celebrity interviews like tim allen. love coming back to nostalgic memories like this.
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