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Burger King Kids Club Toys
By: Hoju Koolander
Last time I introduced you to the members of the Burger King Kids Club via a surviving playplace from the 90's. The Kids Club meals usually featured a toy inspired by the latest cartoon or movie, but did you know that these fast food mascots also found themselves immortalized in hard plastic for our post-chicken nugget playtime? Let's explore some of the coolest Burger King Kids Club character toys from 1989-1999 and see what we find.
As I mentioned last time, these characters seemed ready-made to star in their own animated show, so when toys featuring Kid Vid, Jaws, Boomer and I.Q. were found inside the burger bag, it didn't seem odd at all. I personally remember getting the nerdy I.Q. toy and wishing it was Kid Vid. But soon grew to love the little orange haired fellow, realizing I was much more of an outcast among my peers and I figured he was going through the same thing. Sorry to get so deep into my psyche on the first entry here.
After you make the basic character toys, of course the next logical step is to give them vehicles. In the Transporters line we got 2 more members of the club to join in on the fun. Snaps rode around in a giant camera car, I.Q. in a Book-Mobile, Jaws in a Burger-Buggy, Boomer in a Sneaker (should have been roller blade boot) and Wheels? Well,I guess this was the rest of the group's way of making him King For A Day. As usual, Kid Vid got the most enviable accessory, cruising around inside a Sega console! Although it looks to be more based on the Master System than the popular Genesis system. Either way, that's still a sweet ride!
In the Water Mates series, which took the kids from Mad Max to Waterworld by giving them aquatically based vehicles less tied to their personal character traits. Wheels upgraded to a fan boat, I.Q. has tamed Flipper (or Ecco the Dolphin to keep the Sega tie-in going),Snaps is borrowing Wonder Woman's less publicized invisible row boat and Lingo is finally part of the team on his Jet Ski. These would definitely have been a fun in the pool or at bath time.
OK, now it gets weird. You know how when a franchise runs out of ideas they send their characters to space? Well Burger King did that and finally brought the club pet, J.D. into the mix while piloting a space ship. Though it looks like Jaws was the victim of an Alien experiment that awkwardly transplanted his head onto a robot body. Boomer looks like a resident of Munchkinland and Kid Vid is channeling his inner Inspector Gadget with a helicopter backpack. In case you can't make it out, that's I.Q. inside the space-walker, likely of his own design.
So after you've gone to space, what do you do next? Give your characters fantasy jobs and make them glow! Yes, Burger King Kids Club Glo-Force turned the kids into doctors, deep sea divers, safari guides, astronauts and ski instructors, which seems like enough of a gimmick. But then they gave them ghostly, glue-stick looking bodies that actually glowed in the dark! Why not add a scratch n' sniff feature while you're at it and include some 3-D glasses in the bag? Talk about overkill. But despite the pleas of Susan Powter, this time the insanity continued.
Just when you thought there was no where else to go, now the twisted minds of the Burger King advertising department mutated the kids into radioactive Troll dolls! Yep, Snaps, Jaw, I.Q. and Kid Vid now had wild Troll hair and chubby, wrinkled faces that could actually glow-in-the-dark. Can you imagine if this was the premise for a cartoon series that actually took off? Halloween night comes around and kids are wearing glowing Troll masks with Kid Vid costumes? That's just the kind of mixed-up world I wanna live in and in some alternate timeline, I'm sure I did.
There were many more offering in the 10 years that the BKKC was around, but these were the most outstanding. Special mention goes to the Kids Club Coolers that allowed us to drink sweet juices from the heads of our favorite character, because Vampirism and consumerism go hand in hand.
Also, thanks to ebay seller pite84 for the photos of these wacky toys.
So, which of these wild Kids Club toys did you own? Who was your favorite character?
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