Before I step away from the Spiral Zone for awhile I thought I'd talk about another interesting angle this series took with its advertising and marketing.  Though the Spiral Zone franchise had its share of merchandising (with a small toy line and lunch boxes at least), it potentially reached most of it’s audience outside of the cartoon through the 4-issue DC Comics mini series and its subsequent comic ads in other DC titles back in 1987.  It's an assumption, but one based on the idea that the comics had a greater reach at the time as they were offered in so many more locations than the toys, and even if the actual SZ comics weren't connecting with people, comic readers most likely saw the ads while flipping through their favorite titles…

What sort of fascinates me about this advertising is that DC and the ad designers chose to reuse a striking panel from the first issue of the comic featuring the character Tank worrying about his boy who is held captive in the zone.  He's imaging all the other children sucked into zombie-like obedience to Overload, which Carmine Infantino chose a bunch of ghostly floating heads to illustrate the point.  It's a striking image, more so in the actual comic than in the ad above as there are many more children depicted so it really nails that feeling of hopelessness and loss.  I think the idea to highlight this panel was both genius and frightening as a way to draw potential young readers into the series by making them the prime candidates for zonification.  Sort of a call to "Read the issue and watch as the Zone Riders take on the Black Widows, or Overload might be coming for you!"

This is sort of a similar tatic used in the editing of the opening sequence for the cartoon series.  After the opening scene with Overload warning the viewers to "surrender or pay the consequences", there is a barrage of imagery and one bit in particular with is really eye catching.  It involves a short bit where a zoned child is standing in the path of Max Jones as he's speeding by on his mono-cycle.  Just as he's about to hit the kid he swerves a bit and garbs him, taking him along on a trip out of the zone…

The totally empty and slightly sad expression on the kid really sells the danger of the Spiral Zone and it's a bit harsher in terms of disturbing imagery than in your typical 80s cartoon.  It reminds me of some of the darker 80s kids flicks like The Lady in White, Explorers (at least some of the family life subtext behind the Darren Woods character), or more specifically, Something Wicked This Way Comes.  It can be really unsettling to watch children having to deal with the problems of adults, in particular with the risk of imprisonment, slavery or death, and that's sort of what's touched on it the Spiral Zone.  The opening credits scene with the kid getting scooped up by Max Jones comes from the series pilot episode called Mission into Evil…

The episode opens with a kid out shopping with his mother at the edge of the zone territory.  Even though there are a bunch of signs and barricades "blocking" entrance into the mists of the zone, the kid wanders over to take a peek and is surprised to hear the faint lilting tune of circus music being played on a harpsichord..

Not able to fight his curiosity the kid gets close enough to the zone that he's easily snatched up by Duchess Dire and pulled into the murky mists to be zonified.  This sequence feels like it borrows heavily from the influence of Something Wicked and the lure of the circus that two boys just can't fight.  What's weirder and even more disturbing is that the boy is left alone to wander the zone, waiting from any possible orders from Overloard.  I guess in a way it's also riffing on the Pinocchio story as well.

There's another disturbing turn in this episode after the child is brought out of the zone.  Even though the Zone Riders saved him, he was still under the influence of Overlord and at one point he gets his hands on a laser pistol which he then levels at the heroes.  Though it's easily taken from him, the imagery is still weirdly out of bounds for 80s cartoons, and it's an example of how far television animation had come by 1987.

For the last couple months I've been working with my favorite local Atlanta band, the Serenaders, on their new album My One and Only You (the album cover is featured above.)  I've been doing a bunch of graphic design and illustrations for their CD and vinyl LP, as well as on some record release party flyers and posters.  I've been super psyched as this stuff has been coming together at the same time as they've been hard at work recording the album and I can't wait to see everything done and in print.  I've gotten a chance to listen to a bunch of tracks off the album and they are really nailing the sound without losing any of the intensity of their live show.

The album is set to be released on May 24th, but in the interim the band is looking to raise some additional funds to help promote the record and to get it out into the hands of the public.  So they've begun a Kickstarter campaign to help out and I really want to help get the word out about the band and their music.  If you're unfamiliar with Kicksterter, it's basically a pledged fund drive, but instead of simple donations there are a bunch of tiered rewards that people receive for their pledges.  So it's not charity, but a way to help the band while buying copies of their record, T-Shirts (featuring the above heart illustration I did) and gig posters, win-win.  But they have to make their projected goat of $6500 in order to receive any of the funds or all of the pledges are cancelled.  I'm also super excited about this since I designed and illustrated the album art as well as the artwork for the T-shirts and posters, so I'd love to know that this stuff was getting out there.  So, help the band out with a pledge today and you can get your hands on some awesome music and some of my artwork.  There are 42 days to go and they still have a ways to go, so if this sounds like something you might want to help support, please head on over to their kickstarter page, watch their pitch, and listen to some of their tunes while you're at it!  Thanks for taking a gander…

Also, if you live in the Atlanta area and want to attend the Serenaders record release party, it's being held on May 28th, at 8:00pm at the Goat Farm.  Admission is $10, and with that you get a complimentary copy of the CD, so again, win-win.  Go on over and RSVP to the event today...

The end of the 80s really was a time of transition for me, not so much in that the decade was coming to a close, but because there were a lot of changes in my life.  Id just turned thirteen and most of the family was uprooting from out home of the previous 12 years.  My sister had decided to stay behind in Florida as the rest of us made our way up north to Massachusetts (a temporary stopgap on the way to New Hampshire where we'd only end up spending nine months before moving back down south to Georgia.)  I was stuck in that awkward phase where I still wanted to collect toys and spend every afternoon and Saturday morning watching cartoons, but at the same time I was trying to act more like an adult after moving into middle school and riding the same bus as the high school kids.  Heck, even though I still loved a lot of the cartoons and toys from my childhood, these properties and franchises were beginning to die out.  There hadn't been an peep on the Star Wars and He-Man fronts for a few years at that point (except for the New Adventures of He-Man which I was ignoring), and G.I. Joe and Transformers were both starting to convulse with the death throws of ailing toy lines (Pretenders and G.I. Joe in space anyone?)  Though there was a brand new crop of cartoons that were vying for my attention, only a handful caught my eye (C.O.P.S., Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the Real Ghostbusters, and Beetlejuice.)  For the most part, in those last few months in Florida I started tuning out to kid's stuff.

After the move, when we first got settled in our Massachusetts apartment, I went through a weird mourning period.  I wasn't enrolled in school yet because we were waiting for our new house to be finished in New Hampshire, and there were no kids in the complex where we lived.  It was the middle of winter, my first experience being cooped up during snow and ice storms, and I was really starting to miss my friends.  Even though I'd lost a lot of interest in the current crop of cartoons, they were a link back to Florida and happiness, so I started gorging on them as much as I could.  We didn't have cable during that time so I only had access to a couple of UHF channels and the main networks, and what I discovered were a bunch of shows that I'd never seen before.  I didn't realize it at the time but most of these new cartoons were actually a couple years old and I count myself very lucky to have been exposed to them before they disappeared into obscurity.

There was Denver the Last Dinosaur about a group of kids who unearth a bipedal talking brachiosaur from a giant egg in a tar-pit, and Bionic Six which was basically a cross between the Brady Bunch and the Six Million Dollar man.  But the one show I really fell for was called The Spiral Zone…

Set 20 years in the future of a potential 2007, the story follows an elite band of heroes called the Zone Riders led by Col. Dirk Courage who are Earth's last defense against the Spiral Zone.  The zone is a cloud of dark mist that engulfs half of the earth's landmass.  Created by mad scientist Dr. James Bent, the biological zone mist is dispersed by a sort of organic mechanical generator that the doctor developed, and it has the effect of turning most humans into mindless zombie slaves.  After being dismissed from military service, Bent hijacked a space shuttle and started "planting" these generators all over the Earth.  He took on the moniker of Overlord and built a specialized army, called the Black Widows, to help him take control of and rule the world.

Though society continues to function in non-zone areas, Overlord is gaining ground and it's up to the international members of the Zone Riders, Wolfgang "Tank" Schmidt, Max Jones, Hiro Taka, Kat Anastasia, and Col. Dirk Courage (who are equipped with special armor and vehicles that can protect them from the zone mist) to stop him.

First and foremost, what really stuck me as a kid, and even now, is the interesting visual design of the series.  The zombifying effect of the zone causes the skin to break out in vivid red lesions, as well as a yellowing of the eyes and a slack jawed expression.

For an action cartoon from the 80s, this is pretty disturbing stuff and adds a very serious tone to the overall production quality of the show.  I especially love how these zone symptoms were worked much more artistically into the character designs of the villains.  Take Overlord for instance.  With his overly exaggerated black brow, under which his small eyes are sunken into large skull-like red lesions, and the batwing-like design around his nose and mouth he is both ghoulish and evil looking.  Add to this the skeleton tooth-like texture on his upper lip and it makes for a truly frightening visage.

The mix of symmetry and character traits is also intriguing.  Though all the villains have heavily patterned red facial lesions, there is a distinct separation between those full invested in the cause (or who are too dumb to know otherwise) who have very eye-pleasing symmetrical splotches, and those who would even stab Overlord in the back who tend to have asymmetrical blots (usually giving the character a Two-Face like appearance.)  This level of thought put into the character design is awesome and it's a trait I wish I saw more often in animation.

Though the hero characters are overly wholesome and "white bread" in their character designs, a lot of care was put into their very iconic vehicle design that also really floors me.  Col. Courage pilots what can only be described as a giant cannon mounted on top of a huge wheel.  He sits at the center of the wheel and is balanced on both sides by ski-like skids.

All of the other characters drive very interesting anime-influenced single wheel motorcycles that are both compact and very novel in design.  As far as I can tell, the Spiral Zone cartoon was very loosely based on Bandai's Japenese toy line of the same name (of which pretty much on the design of the vehicles and some of the armor makes the transition), but the idea of mono-wheel mechanical transportations is hardly a new one (with examples of potentially fuel-based working models dating back as far as 1931, as well as many modern designs.)  Though I first saw them in the Spiral Zone cartoon, they were also a popular mode of transportation in another Japanese property, the Venus Wars from 1989.  In fact, when I was first exposed to the Spiral zone I only caught a couple of episodes and even though the character design had a big impact on me I probably would have completely forgotten about it if I hadn't taken a chance on picking up a copy of the Venus Wars back in the early 90s when anime was making its first huge influx into America.  Watching that movie over and over is what kept the vehicle designs from the Spiral Zone alive and well in my memory.

If the super awesome character and vehicle designs weren’t enough to cement this show as a seriously interesting bit of animation history, there is also a legacy of top notch writing on the series.  Though like most 65-episode syndicated cartoon series of the 80s the level of the writing can be hit or miss, there was some great talent working on this show including J. Michael Strazinski (though he did end up taking his name off the credits in lieu of a pseudonym) and my favorite animation writer from the 80s, Michael Reeves.  Reeves penning scripts for a series is almost always a great sign of boundary-pushing and iconic concepts my all time favorite being the episode of Dungeons and Dragons where Hank and gang decide to take the offensive and hunt down Venger), and Strazinski has a history of helming great series like Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors and The Real Ghostbusters.  Because of the main plot, the series deals with a lot of higher level concepts beyond just good versus evil and strays into some odd territory for children's programming like survivalist militia groups and acceptable losses during war.  I'm not saying that the episodes are all heady Band of Brothers-like romps into morality, but there are a lot of issues brought up that you don't tend to see in cartoons.  They're just undertones most of the time, like the racial genocide theme in the original Transformers cartoon.  Also, unlike its predecessors G.I. Joe, The Transformers, He-Man, etc., the series does feature a bit more violence.  Characters typically use laser guns and rifles, and there are sequences with characters getting hit, though it's usually always on a "stun" setting ala Star Trek.   It does add to the grittiness of the series though.

Also, this show was also one of the series Bruce Timm worked on before striking out a couple years later with Batman the Animated Series.  The voice cast is great as well featuring many Sunbow actors including Michael Bell, Frank Welker, Neil Ross and Dan Gilvezan…

The series also features one of my favorite cartoon theme songs from the 80s.  Written by Stephanie Tyrell, and performed by Steve Tyrell (husband, brother?), Max Gronenthal, and Ashley Hall, the tune is a hair-metal-inspired classic with a pumping chorus that would be right at home with the soundtrack to Transformers the Movie.  Seriously, the song will put hair on your chest.

Before this becomes a dissertation of intriguing obscure animation, I'll cut this installment short with some more general facts about the franchise.  Though the series did receive a full 65 episode order, it didn't make a huge impression on its target audience.  The toy line, adapted from Bandai by Tonka in the states, was also a relative dud, most likely because it centered on the classic G.I. Joe and Barbie 12" doll format which never really caught on in the 80s.  Honestly, figures any larger than the 6" Masters of the Universe line tended to be duds (including Bravestarr and V.)  It was merchandised a bit with a least a lunch box and a 4-issue comic book series released by DC (written by Michael Fleisher and penciled by Carmine Infantino.) 

The series was never officially released on DVD (though it was released on a handful of VHS tapes collecting a smattering of episodes), but there is a complete set floating around on the internet produced by Spiral-Zone.com with the aid of the original series supervising director Pierre De Celles (who provided the series masters on VHS to the website for DVD production.)  Though it's currently listed as sold-out on the site, the webmaster seems open to limited print runs when there’s enough interest.  I bought the set as soon as it became available a few years ago and I have to say it's pretty darn cool.  The quality on most episodes ranges from about a 7-8 out of 10, definite VHS quality, but they are far from unwatchable and pretty much are only available in this format.

For today's WWPA I thought I'd share a wrapper for a set of cards and stickers that I haven't been able to get my hands on just yet.  The 1983 Fleer Dragon's Lair game cards and stickers…

The few times I've played the original arcade game it totally kicked my butt.  It was beautiful though, as Don Bluth's animation tends to be.  To hear all about it check out episode 81 of the Retroist Podcast!

I'm back with episode 22 of the microcast.  This time I have a couple of topics.  First off I continue the discussion of soda nostalgia and nerdery from last episode by looking at the crazy concoction known as a Suicide…

…but I spend the majority of this episode talking about the Rambo cartoon and how there was a perfect storm in the 80s that would lead to an R-rated film being adapted into children's animation.

I also throw out a couple nods to other podcasts, namely the Roboplastic Podcastalypse and the Retroist Podcast.

Since I ended up talking about the Rambo cartoon yesterday it only seems fitting to end the week with a bit of Rambo Wax Paper Pop Art.  This wrapper is from the 1985 Topps card set (I've posted about the stickers in the past…)

More or less, the tone that I try and keep here at Branded is one of an earnest optimism.  Personally I find a bit tedious to read articles filled with ranting and too much mockery, and when it comes down to it, it's just more fun to talk about stuff that I love.  Every once in a while though, there's something that I want to write about that stretches the limit of credible good natured excitement.  It might be something that I enjoy, but when it comes down to it I'm probably enjoying it for unfortunate reasons.  Like watching a particularly bad Ed Wood movie (yes, there is a range in his filmography and, no, Plan 9 From Outer Space is far from his worst film), or tuning in to the first couple of episodes of American Idol to see the current year's crop of horrible singers, sometimes one can't help but revel in stuff that is just gloriously bad.

For today's Cartoon Commentary I'm going to take a look at an episode of Rambo and the Force of Freedom which originally aired in 1986.  Produced by Ruby Spears, and based on the action film franchise starring Sylvester Stallone, the Rambo cartoon is one hell of a strange nut to crack and was the keystone in one of the oddest merchandising machines of the 80s.  Throughout the 60s and 70s with the adoption of the Motion Picture Association of America ratings system, lines were being drawn around what was considered proper entertainment for children.  For the most part, most films and TV shows didn't have a ton of crossover appeal when it came to their intended audiences, but there were some that landed in that magical spot smack dab in the middle of the age appropriate Venn diagram.  On top of this, with the amazing blockbuster success of films like Jaws and Star Wars, whole new avenues of merchandising potential were opening up.

So with the release of films like Alien, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Conan, all of which were aimed at an adult audience, the studios were seeing an interest from a much younger demographic and it was making the marketing of and merchandising of these flicks very complicated.  Bottom line, there was money to be made on R-rated films outside of ticket sales, and no one was quite sure how to tap into this pipeline.  With Alien we saw the release of a toy based on the iconic xenomorph (from Kenner in 1979) as well as a series of bubble gum cards and stickers from Topps also in 1979.  In 1982 we saw the release of an Atari 2600 video game based on the Texas Chainsaw Massacre where players strangely took on the role of Leatherface slaughtering npc's while trying to hurdle fences and cow skulls.  More important to today's topic is the proposed merchandising of the Conan film back in 1981-82.  Mattel toys were interested in acquiring and developing a line of toys based on the Schwarzenegger fantasy film, and this would eventually morph into the Masters of the Universe toy-line and Filmation cartoon.  Though not direct Conan merchandising, the He-Man and the MOTU franchise was indelibly influenced by the film and barbarian phenomenon of the late 70s and 80s.

So it shouldn’t be that shocking that with the success of the Rambo films, toys, lunchboxes, stickers and a cartoon were soon to follow…

The Rambo films are the quintessential over-the-top American action flicks of the 80s, the second of which is also the textbook definition of a cash-grab sequel.  Rambo: First Blood, Part II, though wildly successful, was an utter parody of the first film, ratcheting up the violence, gore and mayhem a thousand fold and turning movie's protagonist into a live action cartoon character.  Hell, the title alone shows how commercial this film was intended to be both recalling the title of the first film while also adding the character branding, a colon and a comma.  So while the live action counterpart of the character was busy killing hundreds of characters on screen, it fell upon cartoon studio Ruby Spears Entertainment, and in particular head-writer Michael Chain's shoulders to try and figure out a way to make an animated series palatable for kids and parents…

I can't help but find this cartoon hilarious and horrible on so many levels.  Drawing on influences such as He-Man and the Masters of the Universe and G.I. Joe A Real American Hero, Rambo and the Force of Freedom tries way too hard to appeal to kids and parents while also trying to stay true to its roots to absurd effect.  Though he totes around an improbably arsenal of combat knives, rocket launchers and machine guns, the Rambo character in the cartoon is more or less played as a pacifist (much in the same way He-Man was characterized in the MOTU cartoon) always looking for a non-violent solution when confronting villains.

Each episode opens with an animated suiting up montage swiped wholesale from the second film.  This is followed by some general plot narration in the style of the A-Team (performed by the legendary Don LaFontaine, here's the theme song and narration), stating:

"Rambo!   Anywhere and everywhere the S.A.V.A.G.E. forces of General Warhawk threaten the peace-loving people of the world, there's only one man to call.  Get me Rambo!  From the canyons of skyscrapers, to the canyons of remote mountain peaks, liberty's champion is unstoppable.  Rambo!  Helped by the mechanical genius know as Turbo and the master of disguises named Kat, the honor bound protectors of the innocent.  Rambo, the Force of Freedom."

All I can say is that Rambo like's protecting canyons.  "Hey Rambo, a family is being held captive in a nearby suburban home!  Will you help?"  "I don't know, would you consider the spaces between the houses to be canyon-ous?   If so, I'll do it!"

Seriously though…no wait, this is the point, it's hard to take this show serious on any level.  The episode I'm going to talk about today is called Terror Beneath the Sea, and it was written by Steve Hayes.  Typically I look at the first broadcast episodes when I tackle a cartoon, but I only have Vol. 4 of the DVD releases, and this is the one that really jumped out at me (of the eleven available on the disc.)  The basic plot of this episode revolves around a remote Eskimo village that's being attacked by an insane killer whale named Corac.  Much like the horror movie Orca, the whale pops up at random, breaking through thick sheets of ice in the village and then skating along the surface gobbling up igloos and causing unparalleled havoc…

A couple military officers happen to be flying by and quickly land to see what the ruckus is all about.  The whale ends up dragging their plane underwater trapping them in the village.  Apparently when killer whales nonsensically attack an Eskimo village and strand two officers, there's only one man you can call.  Rambo!  Incidentally, he just happened to be busy saving one of the dumbest children ever born from getting eaten by a grizzly bear at that moment…

My guess is that instead of adding a Rambo-hosted segment at the end of each episode teaching kids some general dos and don'ts ala G.I. Joe's Knowing is Half the Battle segments, the producers thought it would be more effective to include them in the actual episodes.  But rather than trying to tie them into the plot of each episode, they'd just feature an unrelated scene of Rambo spreading him wisdom before having him receive the call that the world needs him.  In this particular episode, we get a chance to see a kid in a forest park watching a bear eat out of a trash can.  Even though there are like six million signs warning not to feed the bears, the kid gets out of the car he was sitting in and tries to feed the bear a hot dog.  Good thing Rambo was there to deter the bear and to point us to the very obvious signs.

Anyway, that segment wasn't all that bad, but I found it hilarious that seconds after saving the kid, Rambo's Force of Freedom team pulls up in one hell of a crazy vehicle.  Decked out with both a mounted machine gun and some sort of cannon, this set of wheels is what the team was using to tool around the forest cataloging the animals for the park rangers!  Were they expecting a secret terrorist cell during their scouting mission?  Jesus, talk about over-preparing for the job…

Learning of the killer whale attack and the stranded officers, Rambo and his crew make their way up to the village.  Of course they encounter the crazy killer Corac in a scene swiped right out of Jaws…

In this scene we get some of my favorite lines from Turbo, the master mechanic.  As their boat is bumped by the whale he shouts, "Holey pajamas, what was that!"  Wow, that’s an awesome exclamation that I’m going to have to try and work into my repertoire.  After Corac starts munching on the boat there's also a great line where Turbo yells, "Shoot Rambo, Smoke that sucka!"  I find it fascinating that the writer was more or less penning dialogue for the characters that is very reminiscent of what you'd hear in an R-rated flick.  Again, it's another example of the off dichotomy of adapting this sort of material.  Expanding on this weirdness a little is the fact that the production designers on the cartoon decided to include all realistic weaponry instead of taking the G.I. Joe route and creating more futuristic laser-based guns.  So instead of featuring a laser rifle that could be "set to stun", Rambo instead chooses not to fire on the whale after he spots a weird box on its dorsal fin.  A bit later, after jumping out of the boat onto some floating pieces of ice, Rambo does use his machine gun to help secure his escape from the killer whale by shooting a ledge of ice creating an obstacle between them.  What really surprised me was the realistic firing sound effects, and even some spent bullet cartridges flying off of the weapon.  Weird.

Similarly, after they find a secret base where they realize the officers they've been looking for have been kidnapped and stored, the team is confronted with a locked door.  Instead of having the mechanical expert pick the lock, Rambo just pulls out his rocket launcher (which he affectionately named Hanna) and from point blank range fires on the door!  Though the writers were trying to be clever in how they showed Rambo using his weapons in a non-violent manner, they only really succeeded in illustrating how insane and unintentionally violent his problem solving skills are.  Again, the unintentional hilarity of a scene like that is just astounding to me.  What's even sillier is that moments after trying their darnedest to portray Rambo as non-violent, they write a scene where in order to get some information they need he dangles a villain scientist over a pool that houses the killer whale.  Threatened with the fate of being eaten, the scientist tells them what they want to know, and I couldn't stop laughing at the length to which the writers were willing to basically show Rambo torturing someone to get information.  Granted, I see that it's tame, especially compared to what Jack Bauer might do to someone on 24, but for a kid's show in the 80s this was extreme…

Also, there are some crazy scenes with the whale furiously writhing around in pain that are both sad, and sadly hilarious…

Anyway, Rambo ends up realizing that the scientist was using a pain-inducing box to train the whale to attack the nearby villages, so he scuba-suits-up (with yet another montage), and makes friends with the whale by removing the box.  After some fun bonding scenes, he and the team take the whale out to General Warhawk's second hidden underwater base so that they can try and end his wintery evil scheme…

There was some surprising talent on this show.  In addition to some great voice talent including Alan Oppenheimer (Skeletor), Neil Ross (Shipwreck on G.I. Joe), Peter Cullen (Optimus Prime), Frank Welker (Megatron), and Michael Bell (Duke from G.I. Joe), Gil Kane and Jack Kirby also worked as consultants, I'm sure designing the look of the series and characters…

All in all, this series is beyond ridiculous, and lacks all the style and panache of series like G.I. Joe and He-Man.  The characters are ridiculous and the plots are gut-splittingly funny, and honestly I can only recommend the show as an example of 80s excess gone horribly (and hilariously) wrong.  Yet, even so, I still watch it as a piece of my past…

If you're curious, all 65 episodes were released by Anchor Bay back in 2005 over a series of 6 single disc DVDs (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6).

Well, a bit delayed, but finally here is the 1988 Donruss/Leaf set of Baseballs' Greatest Grossouts sticker cards that I teased a couple weeks ago…

This set is the second series and the sister set to the Awesome All*Stars stickers from 1988, and again features the artwork of B.K. Taylor.  Like its predecessor, this set is huge and featured 88 stickers as well as a ginormous 36-cardback poster.  Unfortunately I wasn't able to procure the poster as these puzzle-backs were all on doubles of the main cards in the set. It was hard enough tracking down all these cards.  Because of the size of this set and the fact that one needed a ton of doubles to get all the puzzle pieces it probably drove kids batty back in the day trying to collect them all.  It's probably also a factor which lead to the downfall of sets like these as both this and the Awesome All*Stars came out in the same year…

One of these things that I really dig about this second series is that Taylor took the monster designs a bit further into a more creepy/scary territory.   There are a metric ton more sharp fangs and brutal-looking monsters which is pretty gnarly.   There are also more direct baseball parodies with obvious nods to team mascots which is an improvement over the last series…

Even though Topps has been the king of cool painted sticker cards over the last 50 years, Leaf/Donruss sure did give them a run for their money, if not in quantity, then in quality with these two monster baseball themed sets as well as their Zero Heroes stickers.  It sure beats the heck out of what Fleer had to offer with their Grossville High and Robot Wars sets…

I wonder why they never produced any monster themed footballs sticker card sets?  You think it's be a no brainer...

I'm not that big on anniversaries, but Branded in the 80s turns 5 years old this month and since I've been getting prods to record some new episodes of the podcast I thought this would be a good opportunity. 

This time I invite the listener to peek behind the curtain a bit as I share a silly story about the debacle of my Soda Pop Culture column here at Branded.  I talk a bit about why I started it, what the plans were, and how it all fell flat (oh puns.)  Will I do more shows?  Nobody knows…

Some of the links mentioned in this episode:

Liz Vitale and her Puppatoons site

Charles over at Eclectorama

The Retroist

Some pictures of the insane amount of soda I purchased

So, I thought I was going to be able to get to scanning the Baseballs' Greatest Grossouts stickers earlier in the week, but that fell through so I thought I'd bump up this week’s Wax Paper Pop Art.  Hopefully I'll be able to tackle those stickers tonight.

Anyway, in keeping with the slight theme of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles I thought I'd share my collection of TMNT wax wrappers.  Before I get to that though, I wanted to give an update for the postcard project I started on Tuesday.  22 of the 24 postcards have been claimed, and so far they're being mailed out to twelve different states and provinces in the US, as well as four other countries spanning three continents.  There are two left, an April O’Neil and a Splinter, waiting for homes to be mailed to, so check out the post below for details.  I'm super excited at the response to this idea and I think I might do some additional postcard runs in the coming year (I already have an idea for this coming October…)

Now, on to the WPPA.  First up we have the four wrappers from the 1989 Topps cartoon stickers and cards set…

Next up is the wrapper for the 1990 Topps movie cards and stickers…

I must have seen this movie at least a hundred times over the years.  It's been one of my go-to comfort classics and it reminds of a lot of when I first left Florida as a preteen.  In 1990 my family pulled up roots and moved to New England for a year, and coming from the sunny beach minded southern peninsula it was a shock to my system.  Not only was the weather and landscape different, but the general vibe I got from the kids up there was a whole heck of a lot different as well.  That summer when the TMNT movie came out in theaters, it felt like a link back to my childhood in Florida.  My introduction to the toys and cartoon series was one of my last memories with my longtime friends down there and collecting the movie cards when they came out brought me out of an isolating funk…

This next set of wrappers jumps back to the cartoon series.  The first one is for the 2nd series Topps cards that came out in 1990…

…and these next three are also from that series of cards, though they're a bit different.

These are from what I believe is the Canadian variation of the 2nd series cards.  Though they're not labeled as O-Pee-Chee (the Canadian version of Topps), I'm taking clues from the title change (these are Teenage Mutant HERO Turtles), and the ingredients for the included gum which have the classic Canadian/UK spellings of flavour and colour with the added "u".  The Michelangelo wrapper above also has an alternate illustration, whereas the rest of the wrappers feature the same imagery from the 1st series packaging.

Last up today is the Topps wrapper for the 1992 live action sequel to the TMNT movie, Secret of the Ooze…

This flick also marks a strange place in my nostalgia as the end of my toy collecting for the most part.  By '92 I was more into comic books and roleplaying (not straying very far from the Turtles though as I was a Palladium TMNT and Other Strangeness junky throughout high school), and toys were taking a backseat.  Add to this the weird toyline from this flick with all the freckles and the goofy vibe of Vanilla Ice, and I pretty much lost interest in the film series and collecting the action figures.  I have a soft spot in my heart for the flick now, though it was a long time in coming…

**Update** Wow, I'm super stoked by the response to the postcards!  A bunch have found homes all over the world, but there are still some left.  So if you'd like to receive one and haven't written in yet, don't hesitate!

Over the holiday a great friend of the site and all around super gracious guy, HooveR, sent me a neat Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles postcard book.  It was originally published by Random House in 1990 and features 20-odd removable postcards with all sorts of characters from the cartoon iteration of TMNT.  While flipping through it the other day I decided that it could be really fun to finally use this book as it was intended, and it could be a fun way to connect with some readers of this site.  These postcards have sat dormant for almost 21 years and they're begging to be mailed out into the world…

The artwork on these is both kind of goofy and kind of awesome, and this weird dichotomy has to be shared.  So I've decided that for anyone who is interested in receiving one of these postcards, I'll mail one out to the first 24 people who send me an email with "TMNT Postcard" in the subject line.  I'll need a snail mail address to ship it to, and please, only one postcard request per address. 

I'd like to spread these out over the entire country if possible, and it would be super cool if, after receiveing the card you took a snapshot of yourself with it.  If I get any photos I'll make sure to post them on the site in a new column tentatively called Postcards From the 80s (or something catchier, I don't know.)

Here's an example of some of the cards…

So if you've ever wanted to get a piece of handwritten correspondence from me and Branded in the 80s, here's your chance, just click on the card below…