• From greasy posters to lazy finger puppets, we count ten of the worst toys to fall out
of Happy Meal boxes!
10 – Michael Jordan Fitness Fun Range, • McDonald’s has a long history of responding
to health critics with lazily conceived ‘health’ promotions.
This Michael Jordan Fitness Fun Happy Meals promotion was one of many examples.
• In 1991, the restaurant offered cheap plastic skipping ropes, plush balls, water
bottles and stop watches with the basketball superstar’s likeness in an attempt to shed
the company’s unhealthy image.
Jordan once played pro baseball, but the impractically small plush footballs had exactly nothing
to do with him.
• Nothing on the actual menu changed, but I’m sure some kids used their lame-o stop
watches to stage some epic cheeseburger eating contests.
Winner gets a jumbo-sized Coke!
9 – Airport Toy, • Apparently the idea here was that kids
could open up their Happy Meal boxes and turn them into an airport.
The set included four coloured planes piloted by McDonald’s motley crew of unlicensed
pilots, and the presumably rarer green hamburger helicopter.
• Unfortunately the idea was better suited to cereal boxes, and the toy quality was extremely
poor, with many calling it the cheapest McDonald’s toy of all time.
A high-flying disaster.
8 – Ronald McDonald Glove Puppet, • Another low point for Happy Meal collectibles.
These shoddily drawn hand puppets barely resembled Ronald McDonald and were obviously an afterthought.
I mean, a cheap plastic hand puppet?
What kid would want that?
Might as well give them an empty box and market it as ‘imagination’.
• Most McDonald’s locations simply used this toy as a back-up when they ran out of
whatever hot new Pixar toy was offered that week.
• McDonald’s toys vary in quality, but this was definitely on the low end of the
scale.
You just know a warehouse of Guatemalan families made them under terrible working conditions.
Threat of deportation is a powerful motivator. 7 – Gardening Toys,
• Forget bright colours and flashy games!
According to out-of-touch CEOs, there’s nothing kids love more than patiently raising
inanimate plants.
They go absolutely bananas for it.
Look at that grass grow, Timmy!
You’re doing a great job with those gardenias, Sally!
• Even for the minority of kids with green thumbs (you know, the pot dealers of tomorrow),
McDonald’s range of gardening toys were woefully lame.
• The bird feeder was too small for any creature to eat from, the watering can held
about a thimble of water and the gardening tools would snap if you even breathed on them.
6 – Shark Tale Jellyfish, • Part dildo, part magic mushroom – all
misguided clusterfuck.
This movie tie-in jellyfish supposedly comes from the movie Shark Tale but I think it actually
comes from McDonald’s Academy of Bad Toy Design.
5 – Star Wars Figurines, • Remember that scene in Jedi when Chewbacca
pops out of a commandeered AT-ST to wave at Han?
These toymakers remember it differently.
In their version, Chewbacca had a derpy expression and a forty-foot head.
• Kids generally love Star Wars crap.
Seriously, write ‘Ewok droppings’ next to your freshest St Bernard turd and your
little cousin will love it.
McDonald’s had the right idea, but these Clone Wars tie-ins were too stupid-looking
for older collectors and their ridiculous proportions ensured there was no place for
them in a younger fan’s toy skirmishes.
• Darth Vader says no.
4 – E.T.
Poster, • Posters aren’t the worst idea for kids.
After all, kids enjoy decorating their rooms and a wholesome movie poster is probably better
than those nude pin-ups you have lining your walls.
• The main issue is that the poster firstly comes all folded up, so it’s going to have
OCD-triggering creases all over it.
Secondly, it’s next to your serve of fries and cheeseburgers, so you know it’s going
to come covered in McGrease.
• Worst of all, McDonalds did this promotion twice.
The first time was when E.T.
was actually in theatres, which made sense.
The second time was three years later, when kids had moved on to whatever cool film franchise
the Eighties would throw at them next.
The real reason for this is probably that McDonalds had a shit-tonne of leftover posters
in their warehouse.
3 – Halloween Pail, • Give a kid a box and they’ll want to
know what’s inside.
Give them a colourful, kick-ass-looking Halloween Pail and they’ll be expecting the contents
to be the holy grail of candy surprises.
• So imagine the disappointment these young Happy Meal fans got when they opened these
up and received a big fat helping of… nothing.
• The pail’s not even big enough to store your trick or treat candy in.
You’re better off going with the less fashionable, more practical alternative: a plastic bag.
• I will give McDonald’s points for the slogan ‘McBoo’, though.
That is just fucking genius.
There are some serious thinkers in that organisation. 2 – American Idol Mp3 Player,
• In 2007, McDonald’s entered into a promotional partnership with Fox’s juggernaut talent
show American Idol.
• At this point, McDonald’s had come a long way from plastic hand puppets and offered
Happy Meal purchases actual mp3 players.
Unfortunately the devices came preloaded with exactly one song – the American Idol theme
song.
• Everyone in the country had already heard this hundreds of times, so it would’
1 – Ronald McDonald Mask, • Another lazy offering from the Mickey’s
House of D.
This extremely creepy Happy Meal ‘toy’ was basically just a piece of cardboard with
a vague resemblance to Ronald McMascot.
• This was perfect for kids who wanted to make their own horror short films, but everyone
else probably could’ve done without the additional nightmares.