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Junk TV: Program-Length Commercials
| Article
# : |
11775 |
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Section : |
LIFE
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| Issue
Date : |
4 / 1987 |
1,812 Words |
| Author
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Leil Lowndes
Leil Lowndes is a free-lance writer and model agency owner
living in New York. |
It's 5:00 P.M. Do you know where your children are? You think you do because you see them sitting happily in the living room, munching on a box of Fruit Loops, their eyes transfixed on the television screen. They may be safe from physical harm but not from developing a severe case of "exaggerated consumerism."
Your children could be venturing in their fantasies on the distant planet of Eternia, where Prince Adam miraculously changes into He-Man and does battle against the evil Skeletor and his legion of dastardly villains. Or they may be pretending they are soldiers flying off on a G.I. Joe aircraft carrier - or rock stars engrossing audiences around the world.
Wonderful adventures perhaps, yet many of the new children's programs were created to capture children's imaginations for the sole purpose of selling a toy.
Unlike many of the programs today, Captain Kangaroo, Kukla, Fran and Ollie, and Bullwinkle were not conceived as animated sales pitches. Shirley Temple, Mickey Mouse, and Sesame Street's Big Bird and Cookie Monster were not created to sell dolls, lunch boxes, and pillowcases. The products came after the show. If a children's television character was successful, the creator or production company would sell the rights to manufacture a doll or figure to a toy company. In the eyes of many parents and activists, these types of licensing are acceptable because the shows themselves were not designed to sell the products.
Since 1983, the merchandise has increasingly taken center stage. Many of the animated cartoon heroes and villains that dance across your television screen are tied in with a product line, having been conceived and developed in conjunction with toy marketing, sometimes by the toy manufacturers themselves.
Whatever adventure your children in the living room are experiencing, they are also developing desires to own many of the toys they see on television. There are more than forty shows that have been developed to sell them a bill of goods - Hasbro Bradley's G.I. Joe, Transformers, Wuzzles, and My Little Pony; Mattel's He-Man and masters of the Universe, She-Ra: Princess of Power, and Jayce and the Wheeled Wariors; Kenner's Hugga Bunch, Care Bears, and Mask; Tonka's Go-Bots; and LJN's Thundercats. There are approximately thirty-five small G.I Joe figures available, costing three to four dollars each - G.I Joe's aircraft carrier alone costs one hundred
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