I didn’t order the 5 foot balloon, though as I think of it, it would have been fun playing The Prisoner and having it chase me down the block, with me screaming “I am not a number, I am a free man!” as I ran. Just look at that kid in the picture; you can imagine he’s practically screaming those words before the big weather balloon engulfs him.
But I did get the spankin’ monsterkid-cool Horrorscope. The packaging it came in was even more exciting than the viewer. The monster illustrations on it were colorful and brash, daring you to watch. The design was fairly nifty, too, though I recall it being a bit hard to crank.
Of course, I lost it along the journey from dream-filled childhood to reality-numbing adulthood, but when you can say you had a great monsterkid toy–scarce and expensive to find now– as opposed to not ever having it, well, that’s a plus, right?
“What is most unique about the success of the Captain Company was the fact that it survived for so long. While it is understandable how reruns of the films would remain popular it is nothing sort of shocking how such massive volumes of tie in merchandise were still selling well into the late 1970’s. Much of the reason for this was the Captain Company’s unique ads that promoted monster “stuff” as the coolest thing in the world and this kept kids sending off their money orders for these great items. Unfortunately, nothing lasts forever and the horror fad faded and interest in tie in merchandise waned to nothingness. But, for a time it was incredibly popular and even more incredibly cool!” (Captain Company and the Lost Era of Magazine Marketing)