That 90's Kidd

Moving the blog

2011-08-20T08:52:00.001-07:00

Hey Everyone sorry for the lack of posts....
I will be moving the blog to a different server in the coming days due to various circumstances. Please bare with me at this time

-90s kidd

McDonald's Arch Deluxe: The Adult Happy Meal?

2011-08-13T15:39:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the lack of posts....been busy but I think this article will more than make up for it.

McDonald's really seemed to hit their stride in the 90's when it comes to Happy Meals. Direct product placement for movies by making toys of the popular characters lead to McDonald's becoming one of the main sources of kid's film promotion during the decade. From Lion King Toys (Writers note: I cannot wait to right THAT) article to Super Mario Bros. Toys, McDonald's received merchandising licenses for most movies aimed at the 4-12 year old demographic.

The Happy Meal was one of their most popular products on the menu, kids loved them because they had fries, chicken or a burger, and a soda; parents loved them because they were cheap and the toy could shut their kids up for a little bit.

"These should keep em quiet" -Average Soccer Mom

McDonald's honestly must have loved the sales of the Happy Meal because they decided to capitalize on them; they not only created a happy meal for the young adult demographic (Mighty Kids Meal), they also created the Arch Deluxe.

If your sandwich needs a diagram, it's probably gonna fail. Sorry Ronald.

What was an Arch Deluxe? If you are asking yourself that, then you are the 99% of the population that did not give a damn about McDonald's Adult burger. I don't blame you because apparently, according to stomach-witness accounts, it sucked. Yet, even after doing some test markets for the adult sandwich, McDonald's did a hard debut for the sandwich, complete with a marketing campaign that lightened the wallets of Ronald and his McDonaldland friends by somewhere in the ballpark of $300 million dollars. Yes, $300 MILLION dollars. For a fucking sandwich.

The price of this sandwich? $2.49. The price to market it? $300,000,000.00 Do the math.

McDonald's marketed this sandwich by having commercials saying that it was for adults, having kids say "I don't get it", and having fresh ingredients shown flashing by. None of this seemed to appease consumers. While McDonald's expected this sandwich to make them $1 billion dollars in its debut year, the sandwich fizzled out and was soon moved to the coupon section, being sold for only $1.00, before finally being taken off the menu entirely.

Arch Deluxe went the way of the McDLT, the Hula Burger, McHotDog, McLobster, and the McLean , it went to fast food heaven....

.....well maybe its fast food hell

Next Blog Post: What Do you want to see?

2011-08-11T21:35:00.001-07:00

For my next blog, I'd love to know what you want to read...music, movies, food

Comment on here or follow the Twitter @That90sKidd and reply there and I'll try to make your idea a reality

90's Baby Debut Article: Blue's Clues!

2011-08-09T18:13:00.000-07:00

Blue’s Clues. Face. Gullah Gullah Island. Barney and Friends. If you have no idea what I am talking about you probably do not consider yourself a “Nineties Baby” like I do.
Being the second child to a family of four born in the nineties, I was able to enjoy television programs aimed both towards Preschoolers and Elementary Schoolers. Lucky for me, "That 90's Kidd" has decided to share his spotlight with his younger sister. These articles will be written under the pseudonym "90's baby".

Three clues and the mystery is solved! Yup, Blue’s Clues is probably the most popular children’s show of the 90s. Living in an animated house, with an animated dog (Blue), Steve shared his daily mysteries with the young kid demographic.

Walking through Steve and Blue’s house, the adventures keep the children on edge. However, skidooing in and out of windows, pictures, and books gave a new sense of imagination to the show’s viewers. “Blue skidoo we can too” put the idea that kids at home could really skidoo. Can they? No. Did they try? Yes. Did I try? Yes.

Episode after episode, "mail time" after "mail time", thinking chair after thinking chair, not only were children somewhat sick of the monotonous plot but the host felt the same. In 2002, Steve left the show to pursue a music career...
I’m sure you’ve all heard of Steve Burns, the award winning, sound writer.

...........OH WAIT.
Should’ve stayed with the good stuff, Steve!

The Next post

2011-08-08T18:19:00.001-07:00

Will be up tomorrow, with 3 straight days of posts coming up. get excited!

An Ode to Nick Game Shows 2 : Do you have it? GUTS!

2011-08-05T20:33:00.000-07:00

I wonder what the Aggro Crag was made of...

If you don't know what I am referring to, you probably did not see much of GUTS, a sports game show on Nick from 1992-1996. GUTS (and its sister spinoff, Global GUTS) was a show in which kids would compete against each other in extreme versions of standard sports (this was during the infancy of the X movement in sports, but more on that in another article) in order to earn points and reach the final competition, the treacherous Aggro Crag.

Don't the lights and smoke make it scary?

The Crag was seemingly made of metal, glass, and lots and lots of foam. Ten thousand miles high (or so it seemed to my 5 year old eye), the Crag separated the men from the boys, the cream of the crop reached the top of this gigantic structure. Avoiding boulders was the main goal of the scores of athletes that scaled the ominous structure. And what did you win if you avoided the boulders? A piece of the very same mountain you climbed.

Can you believe someone sold one of these for $35,000 on eBay?

Now while the show's competition was captivating, much of the entertainment value came from the host, a young nobody named Mike O'Malley. O'Malley tended to stay away from the competition, only introducing the competitors and interviewing them after their competitions. The job he had to do seemed kinda bland and the only thing that seemed to make his work even necessary was his great commentating he did over some of the strangest competitions outside of American Gladiators. His charisma was evident and I guess TV execs noticed this because he got some pretty decent TV jobs after that. You know, like Kurt's Dad on Glee, a role that lead him to his first Emmy Nomination and his first People's Choice Award

Skinny and Fame-less vs. Bald and Famous

If I had to grade GUTS on a 1-10 scale, I would give it an 8. It was a novel concept; American Gladiators for kids, with no need for expensive prizes to give away. Win-Win

The other two kids clearly look like they wanna beat up the winner of the foam trophy

An Ode to Nick Game Shows pt. 1: Have you ever seen a Red Jaguar? Legends of the Hidden Temple

2011-08-03T15:14:00.000-07:00

How come no one could solve the Shrine of the Silver Monkey?

In my childhood, the "big three" game shows of Nickelodeon were GUTS, Double Dare, and of course, Legends of the Hidden Temple. In my next three blog posts, I will discuss a standard episode of each show and where the host is today. My first post features Legends of the Hidden Temple.

If you don't remember (which means you were living under a rock, or the Hidden Temple) what Legends was all about, the show featured a gigantic rock head, Olmec, giving clues about various historical figures and contestants needed to answer them in order to move into the final round - the temple. The teams that reached the trivia portion of the competition had to first swim across an olympic pool covered in steam. It was so difficult that they needed to wear protective gear (so. fucking. dangerous)

Notice the oversized helmets and mouthguards

Once one team answered enough questions to reach the bottom of the short staircase, they moved on to other physical and mental challenges in order to earn small pendants that they could use in the Temple because, you see, there were scary Temple Guards that, if they were not given the cardboard circle, would kidnap the contestants and remove them from the Temple (it's a kids show, duh). Once one team had the majority of the pendants, they would move to the TEMPLE RUN.

Part of the Temple

The Temple consisted of 10 or so rooms, and if a team could get through the entire structure, going through the task of each room in order to open the next door. In my life, I rarely saw teams complete the Temple; it was just so ominous. Without a doubt, the hardest part of the Temple was the Shrine of the Silver Monkey. The task consisted of putting a giant aluminum monkey body together, legs, torso and head. Three pieces, hundreds of failed attempts. How freakin' hard is putting the legs down, then the torso, then the head? Its simple anatomy.

Finally, someone can do it

What did contestants win? Nothing significant, but who cares? The entertainment value came from the giant talking head and the kids getting stuck in the giant jungle gym.

Oh yeah, the host. Kirk Fogg did not do much before Legends, and I have not seen him since. But he will always be remembered as the OTHER host of Legends, after the giant fake-rock head.

A 90's Memory : Surge

2011-08-02T14:56:00.000-07:00

Let me preface by saying that prior to College, I was addicted to soda. It didn't matter if it was Coke, Pepsi, Tab, Mountain Dew, or A&W, if it had bubbles , I drank it. However, nothing pierced my interest in my childhood quite like Surge. Everything about Surge was 90's- hell, Fatboy Slim were featured in one of their commercials. The color of Surge, Septic Green, was something that could grab kids attention- as did the marketing campaign which featured the "extreme kids" trying to "feed the rush" by pushing eachother through the global guts set while screaming SURGE! (Viewed Here) I still remember seeing that for the first time, sitting in my grandmother's house in Florida, and thinking, "I want whatever this product is" (note to coca cola ad reps- nice work, ya hooked me).

What I remember about the first time I had Surge was the fact that it tasted horrible. Green sugary piss. But it had to get better, right? If I drink it enough I'll look like Kevin Nash right?

I continued pestering my parents to buy it, and they did. Eventually I had Surge 3 meals a day; Breakfast: Bacon, Eggs and Surge, Lunch: Turkey Sandwich, Ritz crackers and Surge, Dinner: Meatloaf, Broccoli and... well u get it.

Eventually Surge Was removed from the market, replaced by Vault, and lost in the annals of sodaistory. That didn't stop me from buying an expired can on eBay for the purposes of this article.

It still tastes horrible.

My first real post

2011-08-02T04:23:00.001-07:00

My first real post will be up by the end of the day.

Get Excited

Why I Started This Blog

2011-07-31T21:09:00.000-07:00

7.29.11

Atlantic City.

NKOTBSB.

It's amazing what kind of effect one night can have on a person. I got home from my job at 4 pm and immediately opened the newspaper to read that New Kids on the Block and the Backstreet Boys were performing less than a half hour from my house. I jumped onto Craigslist, got a 4-pack of tickets and called up 3 friends that I grew up with, knowing that they would leap at this experience as much as I did.

I spent the more formidable years of my life listening to 98 Degrees, LFO, nSync, NKOTB, and of course, The Backstreet Boys. From the age of 8 to 11, the only CD's (yes I'm young enough for CD's but not old enough for Cassettes) allowed when I was in my parent's car were "Black and Blue" and "Millennium." No room for Janet Jackson, Cher, Guns n Roses, Bon Jovi, or Meatloaf; I needed my boyband fix. I memorized music videos step by step, learned lyrics and could effectively sing every part in a five-part song. Although I was a huge fan, I never got to see BSB live; at least until I was 19.

As I stood through a collection of childhood memories in the form of song, I realized how much I missed about my childhood. What happened to things like Surge Soda, The Fresh Prince's music career, French Toast Crunch Cereal? This blog aims to reminisce about such things, and give my fellow 90's lovers an outlet to voice their own opinions; who the best boyband was, why Leo was the best actor of the decade, why David Hasselhoff was a lifeguard at the age of 35...all of the important questions left unanswered by the decade.

Please leave a comment about topics you would want to hear about. If you wanna hear about a certain food, i'll find an old box of it on ebay and write a review. If you wanna hear a review of a certain song, i'll dissect that song and write about it. This is not just my blog; this is the 90's blog.