ter.ri.to.ri.al.i.ty n. The behavior of a male animal that defines and defends its territory. cu.ra.to.ri.al.i.ty™ n. The behavior of a curator that defines and defends his collection and its history.
EXPANDING UNIVERSE: 1971-1990 You start a journey and everything seems so fresh and new, and then before you know it, you're already looking at the end of the trip. I feel like we just got started talking about our museum's exhibition of pop culture memorabilia reaching all the way back to the 1700s (and occasionally beyond) and now, here we are, standing two hundred years later with the finish line in sight. But there are still a few things to point out in our last gallery and a half, and I have a sneaking suspicion that this particular one, like our 1928-1945 room, might take two installments of this column to really explore. We'll see.
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This time around, we're entering the final full gallery in our timeline of American entertainment, and sadly, due to the realities of architecture and space more than anything else, we're forced to cover two decades in one room instead of the single decade we've been showcasing in the previous couple galleries. One whole wall of this room is a virtual cornucopia of comic and cartoon characters from the 1970s and 80s, from Strawberry Shortcake and Underdog to the Marvel superheroes and the Transformers. The Planet of the Apes characters are on hand here too, as are some bizarre caricatured politicos like Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan. G.I. Joe is still on duty from the previous gallery, although he shrinks quite a bit in size, and you'll even catch a glimpse of horror icons like Freddy and Michael Myers. And somewhere in there is a suitcase-style Mickey Mouse record player that a certain curator once used to listen to his Power Records. True story.
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Where else can you see Miss Piggy hanging out with the Bionic Woman, Lynda Carter, and Florence Griffith Joyner? Why, in our "Wonder Women" case, a special retrospective on all the prominent female heroines and stars that made that era such a step forward for the depiction of women in entertainment. Keep an eye out for the Charlie's Angels "Beauty Hair Care" set, though, and you might wonder just how much progress is really going on.
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Fast food franchises certainly contributed to our shared pop culture experience in those decades, not least through the many Saturday morning and weekday afternoon commercials that pressured all of us to buy hamburgers and fries with the added enticement of acquiring all those little plastic Happy Meal toys. At GEM, you'll see the first-ever film tie-in Happy Meal promotion covering Star Trek: The Motion Picture, and even that creepy Burger King that torments me in my sleep thanks to all those new commercials is here alongside rival Ronald McDonald. Remember the California Raisins? Well, so do we, and the Pillsbury Doughboy, too. Did you know that his name is actually Poppin' Fresh? Did you know that he had a wife (also showcased here), called Poppie Fresh? And did you know that these pasty white icons had a whole extended family including a son, daughter, grandparents (whose side, we don't know), and even pets? Then you didn't look them up on Wikipedia like I just did.
While it may not be an entire medium per se, we do feature the advent of video games in this gallery, taking a look at some of those electronic handhelds that everyone in high school was required to own, whether it was baseball, football, or head-to-head. Up above you'll see one of the earliest Pong game systems ever offered, the Coleco Telstar, while at the bottom of case is the quintessential home video game console of the 1970s and early 80s — the Atari 2600. With its faux wood-trimmed design, iconic joystick controllers, and vast library of cartridge-based games, the Atari defined the very concept of the home video game console, and with the debut of its first licensed game, Space Invaders, success was assured. And of course, there was the orally inclined Pac-Man, that irrepressible cad; talk about fast food. We even step away from video games to gaming in general, paying tribute to the powerful influence of fantasy role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons. All I can remember is spending weeks rolling up a character and about five minutes actually playing the game, but that's me.
We've covered so much and yet this gallery feels half done. But that's because I've saved the best for next time. We'll be staying here in this gallery for our next visit, so be sure to come back and witness a galactic phenomenon enthrall a generation. It's time for a saga from a long, long time ago to usher in a new age of entertainment and mass marketing. Join together with us and we will rule this pop culture empire side by side! And this time I mean it.
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This is a guest article. The thoughts and opinions in this piece are those of their author and are not necessarily the thoughts of the Certified Collectibles Group.
