CHALLENGE: Don't take 3 years this time.

Popples: Pillow Pets of the Past

For those of you who don't know or care, Popples were a stuffed animal Mattel produced and sold in the 80's.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of Troll Dolls, it was the age of Ninja Turtles, it was the epoch of neon mini skirts, it was the epoch of shoulder pads. Then, out of the magical brain that created the original prototypes for Care Bears and Strawberry Short cake came...

Popples were basically mutated Care Bears that folded up into balls.

 You can see how the horribly malformed Popple still bears trademarks of it's much less ridiculous predecessor. The heart stamped hands and feet, the little tongue, the puffy cheeks. Why, it's practically a care bear if you don't notice the pronounced hunch, unnatural ears, disgusting color scheme, and purposeless tail.

POPPLE: THE UNKNOWN SPECIES

To this very day, the exact genus of the illustrious Popple is unknown. Because of the Popple's infamous pouch, it is widely believed the Popple is a marsupial. Some have noted the similarities between Popples and baby porcupines.*

*we here at natalieandtaliaspeak.blogspot.com do NOT recommend attempting to fold a  porcupine.

POPPLE: THE IMAGE
On the surface, Popples appeared to be just your ordinary unidentifiable creature. But under their layers of excess back skin lurked an exciting secret.

You could turn them inside out! That's right! And if your mom got mad that you were playing with your Popple after hours, you could just grab its limbs and head and jam them into its crotch! Voila! A ball without a face. Silly ol' mom will never know this thing is really a marsupial porcupine rabbit and my new best friend.

POPPLE: THE LEGEND
As if the plush toy alone wasn't enough, it didn't stop there. A whole cast of colorful characters made up the original Popple crew. This way, even if you had one Popple, it still made sense for you to want/need more Popples. There was: PC (as in Pretty Cool), Party, Pancake, Prize, Puffball, Puzzle, Pretty Bit, Potato Chip, and Putter. While they varied in size and color, they didn't vary in awesomeness.

Though every child wanted a Popple, not every child was ready for the responsibility. As made example of here in the classic Popple cartoon series, a little girl named Bonnie gets more than she bargained for in:

POPPLES PANIC AT THE LIBRARY!

It only takes watching about a minute of this video to realize that Popples make terrible pets. What else are they keeping in those seemingly bottomless pouches? Why do they even have legs if they just bounce everywhere? And what library carries school math books? The plot holes are gaping and many. Although I did like the epic camera angle when Bonnie thought she was resigned to failing "nothing important, just the world's BIGGEST MATH TEST!" Not that the her numerous Popples are going to help her anyway. They thought a tennis racket was a math book. 

POPPLES: BUY YOURS TODAY!

Popples actually still have a website, popplespopp.com! Now that you're pumped to get your new Popple, you can't have one.  The whole website is a lie that directs you to some other website that doesn't even sell toys.

POPPLES: THE DOWNFALL:

Unfortunately for the Popple, the good people at Mattel overestimated the intelligence and motor skills of the average child. I could NEVER get my Popple to fold back into a ball. It's like when you go to Qdoba or Chipotle and they wrap your burrito, you eat half of it, and somehow can't get the wrapper cover the entire burrito again. You KNOW it's supposed to work, but you don't know how. A quick scan of the internet revealed I was not the only frail idiot aged 10 and under in the 80s.

 They really were JimVarneysGhost, they really were.

CHALLENGE: The most frustrating folding experience ever.

After a long, long, long absence - suddenly a new post appears...

So, turns out that this doesn't look anything like I remember it. Hm. What I do actually remember is the crushing sadness I felt when the real life kids fall and almost squish this little girl's pet pigeon to death. I remember being like, "yeah, right on, save that pigeon". In retrospect - fucking gross.

Oh hey...i'm disgusting.

But I digress. So, my whole childhood, I hated going to church. Except for the part about the doughnuts. But other than the doughnuts, church was like having to take a nap with your eyes open - a total waste of a perfectly good day off of school. In tights. I figured that I was probably going to hell for feeling that way, but growing up passively Catholic pretty much insures a base level of guilt no matter how you feel about actual church attendance. Anywho, I knew so little about the bible and the stories contained therein, when the Kingdom Chums series entered my world, I was blissfully ignorant of the fact that I was watching something religious.

mmmmm....strawberry....

Our story begins with Peter and his sister Mary Ann, their obnoxiously stereotypically Jewish pal, Sauli (yes, you read that right. Effing Sauli). Some bad kids are teasing Sauli for his yarmulke - you know, tossing it around like a frisbee, like you do - and while grasping for his tiny hat, he falls on the shoe boxed bird. Mary Ann (played by Jenna Van Oy- hilarious) flips her shit and the kids go to her and Peter's house to fix it. Presumably with Popsicle sticks and Elmer's Glue. They douche around with the computer, looking for information (this is pre-internet...so I'm not sure what kind of amazing bird doctor program they thought they had uploaded on there), and somehow this light-brite like constellation appears, Mary Ann connects the dots, spells the word "LOVE" and the kids are sucked into the computer. Or something.

Enter David, an Israeli Raccoon from biblical times. The kids ride the "love light" to a cartoon past, where everyone but them is some kind of talking animal.

(a totally shitty screen shot of Peter, Sauli and David)

Lucky for them, today is giant fighting day in the land of poorly animated biblical rodents. David is to fight this terrifying mofo...

(He's supposed to be a warthog)

...with only his trusty slingshot. Now, like I said, I'm not heavy into the bible, but I'm pretty sure that the David in that story wins too. Oh, sorry - spoiler alert. So the giant is defeated, the kids cheer, and are chased off by the warthogs pissed off brothers. A convenient rainbow appears and takes the kids home, where they realize that their nifty little journey has only taken a minute of real time. Mary Ann discovers that her gross bird pet thing is better, and proclaims that her faith saved the bird and brought them home. Sauli (still can;t even believe that's real) gets all pumped and on the way back to his apartment he stands up to the bullies that had picked on him at the beginning, and for some reason, they leave him alone. Probably because he was still foaming at the mouth from the wicked LSD trip he just took.

I really wanted to get a yarmulke on that hit...but I'm totes not smart enough.

Now, believe it or not, there is an IMDB page for this obscure little gem. The cast, for the most part, are probably still waiting tables in Monrovia waiting for their next big thing. Jenna Van Oy went on to play Six in "Blossom" and then promptly fell off the earth.
So many hats.


The kid that played Peter either went permanently into the love light, or went on to originate the role of Boq in "Wicked" on Broadway. The world may never know.

Is that you, Peter?? Did you make it?

The voice of Goliath is a pretty successful voice over actor:

And...drum roll please....THIS GUY!

The man, the myth, the legend - Sauli himself, Andrew Martin Cassese. He went on to do the Revenge of the Nerds movies and some Broadway, but I'm sure this is the highlight of his resume.

What we have learned: Before there was Veggie Tales, there was this. Wee Jesus.