Aw yeah! One of the best things about growing up in the 70s-80s was Underoos! Underwear That's Fun to Wear! (That was their slogan.) Designed to look like the costumes of kids' favorite heroes, kids could wear these underneath their normal clothes... just like real super heroes did!
Well... the GOOD Underoos looked like a super hero's costume. Unfortunately, The Hulk was hard to replicate as such, so his set were just lame white underwear with his picture on the shirt.
The same formula was used on characters like Fred Flintstone. What kid wanted Fred Flinstone over Spider-Man or Superman?
Also, Fred Flintstone's costume would have actually worked as a typical pair of Underoos. Just give him an orange spotted shirt with his frayed tie silk screened on it! But still... no one wanted Fred Flintstone. I'm guessing this style of Underoos kind of flopped. Here's a commercial devoted to just these styles. Like, c'mon kids pleeeeeeaaaaaassssse buy them!Archie Andrews?! Are you kidding me? That's worse than Fred Flintstone! You'd have to be a complete fag to rock those!
I guess Aquaman just barely avoided this fate. He's one of the few heroes without a chest insignia, so I'm sure they were probably challenged in coming up with a look for his costume, but cleverly, they translated his scale motif and then, just for clarity, added an "A." I had these over and over! They were OBVIOUSLY my favorite, with Robin swinging in second.The best commercials featured animation.
Here's one that I can't embed, but it's the best. I love the girl spinning to switch her regular undies into Wonder Woman Underoos!
Another fun bonus, the packages had these great full body shots of the heroes, just right for the clipping out and making little paper dolls!
The girl super hero sets came in two styles. Wonder Woman, Spider-Woman and the I-didn't-know-this-existed Catwoman had tank tops.
While Batgirl and Supergirl had... I guess you call them bras.
I guess "women" wore tank tops and "girls" wore bra tops?
Also, as I discovered yesterday, they also released long underwear as well. I never saw these and didn't know they existed!Here's a commercial I apparently never saw, featuring all the super ladies, including Catwoman! I'm guessing we all know how the little girl who wore Catwoman Underoos probably turned out. (Slut!)
I could have sworn that Green Lantern and The Flash had Underoos later on in the series, but the Wikipedia page only lists GL and I couldn't find a picture of it. No listing for Flash, although Iron Man appears to have had a set:
Their color schemes are the same, so maybe I got them confused.
And they did make Shazam!, whose costume is very similar to The Flash's.
During Underoos' time, pop culture shifted away from the licensing juggernaut of super heroes in the 70s to Star Wars and other live action properties. The first batch of Star Wars Underoos followed the same pattern of the heroes, by making them look like the garments worn by the characters in the movies.
I just loved Underoos, so I kept buying them, even after they made the switch from super heroes to these, but I wasn't very keen on it.
I'm not sure why C-3PO was for girls, but I gotta admit, they're kinda cute! I also don't get the line in the jingle, "C-3PO has lots of style." Isn't he technically naked? That commercial was pretty neat though. It must've been fun for the young actors, being on set with the real Star Wars characters!You can see the evolution of Underoos through the Star Wars line. I think eventually, they switched over from the "costume" look, to just images of characters across the board.
Empire Strikes Back Leia:
Return of the Jedi Leia:
You mean, they didn't think a Slave Leia costume would be appropriate for a 2-4 year-old? Madness!On a similar note:
What 2-4 year-old was watching The A-Team?! One who needed to be taken away from their parents or guardians, that's who!
It was clearly harder for them to come up with ideas for girl Underoos. Here's Daisy Duke... but COME ON!!! Denim-print Daisy Duke-style panties?! Ha ha ha ha ha ha!!! I love them!
Ms. Pac Man? And Family? Fail. But the boys line had its share of stinkers. If you thought Fred Flintstone and Archie Andrews were bad...
GOD DAMMIT!!! Why did they stick the fucking Ewoks on EVERYTHING?!?! FUCK THE EWOKS!!! What BOY in their right mind would want this shit over Han Solo?!
Hell, I'd take the Dukes of Hazard over Wicket the Ewok!!!E.T.?! That's almost as bad! And coming in third, "everyone's favorite, Pac Man!"
Not quite as bad, but still... not GOOD...
Tonto. Yeah, sorry... Robin may be a sidekick, but he's still a SUPER hero! NO ONE wants to be Tonto! And that design on the shirt is about as half-assed as you can get! Even so... I'd take this over Wicket, E.T. or Pac Man.Underoos lasted way longer than I realized. This commercial features late 80s properties M.A.S.K., Transformers and Thundercats. These are all lame "picture of the character" styles, which they'd seemingly completely switched over to, which sucks, because a flesh colored shirt emblazoned with He-Man's metal harness was really a no-brainer! Oh well...
Here's an interview with Larry Weiss, the inventor of Underoos!
There's plenty of super hero undies these days...
But they're not QUITE the same. Superman doesn't wear his logo on his junk.
I wish someone would pick up this license again and make them old school... plus, I mean, yeah, I so want a grown up set of Aquaman Underoos. I'd buy like... all of them and that would be the only underwear I'd ever wear!EDIT! I did NOT imagine it! They did make Flash Underoos! Also, note that The Hulk eventually got redesigned with a larger image in the middle of the shirt versus the small image over the heart.
No comments:
Post a Comment