Season 2 will have Legos and Transformers. Watching these brought back some memories. I had He-Man before GI Joe and TF. Enjoyable docuseries.

The Star Wars episode was awesome. The history of Kenner was cool. Because I wasn't old enough I was unaware that it took over a year from the release to get the toys on the shelves. Thats nuts.

I am about 20 mins in to the He-Man episode. He-Man was a big player for me, as was GI Joe.

Saw the He-Man one and really enjoyed it.

Watched episode 1 for obvious reasons. Great insight. Kind of crazy that Kenner had such a great deal in the 80's.

Definitely need to add this to the watchlist. Thanks for the heads up!

Didn't watch the Barbie episode, but watched the other three. Really enjoyed the Star Wars episode (and I am old enough to remember how long we were waiting for the toys).

Hoping they do a Mego Superheroes episode.

I have watched G.I. Joe and He-Man. Very fun series. Saving Star Wars for later. Netflix describes it as an 8 part season. Anyone know who the other 4 will be?


Possibilities:
- Transformers
- Legos
- Matcbox/Hot Wheels
- Super Powers (DC superheroes)
- Cabbage Patch
- Pokmon
- M.A.S.K.
- Smurfs
- Care Bears
- Strawberry Shortcake
- Go-bots
- Thundercats
- Atari / Nintendo (seems like other docs have covered this ground)

I figure the series will cater to boys, but maybe more women like nostalgic documentaries than I'd expect. What others would you want to see?

I watched three Eps. Of course I skipped Barbie. I really enjoyed them.

They've probably realized the shoes on girls' toys is not worh the money. Funny how only guys will watch this kind of documentary, and we all skipped Barbie.

DO NOT watch the Barbie episode with small children. It is completely inappropriate for small girls to watch, adult subject matter.

Beanie babies has to make an appearance at some point.

Did the Kenner episode discuss Starting Lineup figures? Those things were such a big part of my life.

To answer the last two posters:

Nope.

For those of you with kids, do you ever notice how crappy and crappily made toys today are?

Awesome!

dave99ag said:

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I was already a bit old, but TMNT was pretty dang big. Transformers would definitely fit the bill for an episode. How many cartoons turned into a huge movie franchise (movie quality aside)?

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For the older millennials. TMNT, Power Rangers, X-Men, Pokemon, & Playstation will be the ones that will probably define more of that generation.

I watched the Star Wars episode last night... that was great!

Thanks for the heads up. Loved the Star Wars episode. It's crazy that Hasbro let the deal with LucasFilm expire after they bought Kenner.

Series was pretty good but the production value was kind of low.

I feel bad for the inventor of GI Joe. Take 100k or 50k with 1% royalty. Always take royalty! Thought his son was going to cry.

I have enjoyed the business aspect of these shows. So many companies said no and lost millions and millions. So much about timing and a little luck with hard work.

Star Wars and GI Joe were the best.

Jasomania said:

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Series was pretty good but the production value was kind of low.

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I had the same thought.

Everyone thought Star Wars was dead. Didn't they say Lucus said no more Star Wars. Then right after the contract expired he came out and said nvm! But for 10000?!? You'd think they would just pay it for ever.

Yeah, 10k is nothing for them. Just pay it to cover the 1% chance Star Wars comes back.

Also, I really liked the interviews with those old Kenner guys. They were interesting, and you could tell they loved their jobs. The lawyer was funny.

Interesting first episode. Enjoyed it quite a bit.

For anyone interested there is a store that started in McKinney and has now moved to Allen called Order 66 toys that is 1 part toy store 2 parts museum that has a lot of the original Kenner figures and toys. For anyone into this stuff it's a pretty fun place to go and see some of the older models of toys and what used to be out there

This is from Jedi forums. I thought it a good post:

few weeks ago, my grandmother discovered a box of my old Kenner Jurassic Park toys I left at her house way back when and promptly forgot about. I decided to pass them on to my kids (somewhat grudgingly lol) and put fresh batteries in the electronic screaming raptor, and it worked just as well as it did 22 years ago when I first received it.
Sure the paint's chipped in a few areas, and one leg is bent at an angle that won't let it stand up straight anymore (easily fixable with boiling water), but it works.

Meanwhile....I found a Celebration III talking Darth Vader on eBay. Still sealed in the packaging, never touched aside from the button to make him talk....and when it arrived, after playing two or three phrases, the voice box started dying. I figured it was just the batteries, (raptor completely dead after 22 years, it would only make sense for Vader to be slurring like a drunken sailor after 10)....so I replaced them (Hasbro had enough foresight to allow access to the battery compartment without actually opening the packaging). The voice sounded okay at first, but then the slurring continued after cycling through his sounds two or three times.

And then just yesterday while at Wal Mart, the kids wanted to go look at the toys...and I noticed the new Jurassic World toys are pretty damn awful...they apparently aren't even making human figures.
And there's a reason all of the promotional images of the Chomping Indominus Rex figure show his left side....the right side is full of holes where the hard plastic body was screwed together. The Chomping T-Rex is all hard plastic with a weird flapping jaw that looks like a ventriloquist dummy. Worse, the head isn't even a solid sculpt....there's a seam in his nose where you can tell the snout was molded separately and then glued/snapped into place during production.
Needless to say, it's a pretty sad day when the LEGO toys are actually of better quality than the main line.

So what happened? I know that Hasbro bought out Kenner and shut them down after the Phantom Menace debacle (in short: Kenner oversaturated the market with Star Wars toys in anticipation of kids and collectors going nuts over the Star Wars prequels....which didn't happen), but was it so really hard to continue Kenner's reputation for creating quality

Iowaggie said:

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Was Stretch Armstrong discussed in the Kenner parts?

I bet that's something they could have made longer.

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Loved that thing

Did you see they have a mini version available now? Less than $10 and about 5" tall...
Stretch, GI Joe, and a couple of Barbies; also a mini Rubiks Cube - they were perfect for stocking stuffers.

Both the Star Wars and he-man episodes were fantastic. Had no idea that Kenner was basically the only company who'd offer to make SW toys. Then hasbro completely screwed up the best deal in toy history. Idiots!!!

I didn't get into to SW toys until ROTJ. But I remember buying some of the original line at Traders Village to play with.

Watched Lego today, too. Fascinating origin story, and I never would have guessed they faced financial ruin within the last two decades. Seems like they've been a major force my whole life. Shows how precarious a big business can actually be in a world of changing tastes.

Wish I still had my 1980's space legos. One of my coolest toys, and there was always the extra pride because, "I made this!"

I hadn't thought about Star Trek, but those toys would have been before my time. Heck, I'll watch Hello Kitty because even the Barbie episode was interesting.