blue light special

If someone asked you what toy defined your childhood, what would you say? My kids would probably say Gameboy (Ryan) and Micro Machines (Nolan.) My brother would probably say NES. My sister would probably say Cabbage Patch Kids. My dad would probably say Baseball cards.

My answer comes without a moment's thought or second guessing: Star Wars figures.

They were affordable, easily obtainable at K-Mart, and allowed me to create my nine year-old version of fan fiction, reenacting scenes from "my most bestest movie ever" or making up my own. My core cast was Han Solo (in Hoth and regular outfits) Luke Skywalker (X-Wing Fighter or Bespin version) Greedo (shoots second, goddammit, version) Obi-Wan Kenobi (I lost the plastic robe and broke the tip off the light saber version), Princess Leia (pre-slave girl "man I wish I could hit that" version) C-3PO (tarnished version) and R2-D2 (head stopped clicking a long time ago version.) They spent a lot of time fighting on Tatooine (torn cardboard backdrop version), flying around while crammed into a TIE fighter (one wing really wants to fall off version) or rolling around the kitchen floor in my LaNdSPEEdR (kEpP YOU hANdS OFF OF It OR ELSE !! version.)

Yeah, I loved my Star Wars figures, and I took them everywhere with me. I never owned one of those official carrying cases that looked like C-3PO or anything, but they travelled with me in a Vans shoebox that could double as a rebel base whenever the need arose.

Last night, Nolan and I ate dinner at Islands, and right after we put our order in, I saw a kid, sitting in a booth at the end of our aisle, playing with Star Wars figures on his table. It was like looking through a wormhole into 1981, and seeing myself in Bob's Big Boy with my parents.

The kid was eight or nine years old, and had a mop of shaggy long hair that was probably cut by mom. He wore a dirty blue Hot Wheels T-shirt, maroon nylon shorts, and velcro tennis shoes. On the seat next to him, there was an open shoebox. His Star Wars figures were lined up on the table in front of him, and he made two of them fight.

I fell into the wormhole, and landed at K-Mart in Sunland, in 1981. It was back to school season for me, and my brother, and we were there to buy clothes and school supplies. My parents never let us feel how poor or white trash we really were back then, so I didn't know that shopping at K-Mart and getting an ICEE and a pretzel was a real luxury for us; like all kids, I just took it for granted that we got to have new clothes and treats, because, well, they were there, you know?

After our corduroy pants and collared shirts and Trapper Keepers and economy packs of pencils and wide-ruled paper were piled up in our cart, our mom took our three year-old sister with her to the make-up department to get shampoo and whatever moms buy in the make-up department, and my brother and I were allowed to go to the toy department.

"Can I spend my allowance?" I said.

"If that's what you want to do," my mom said, another entry in a long string of unsuccessful passive/aggressive attempts to encourage me to save my money for . . . things you save money for, I guess. It was a concept that was entirely alien to me at nine years old.

"Keep an eye on Jeremy," she said.

"Okay," I said. As long as Jeremy stood right at my side and didn't bother me while I shopped, and as long as he didn't want to look at anything of his own, it wouldn't be a problem.

I held my brother's hand as we tried to walk, but ended up running, across the store, past a flashing blue light special, to the toy department. Once there, we wove our way past the bicycles and board games until we got to the best aisle in the world: the one with the Star Wars figures.

Row after row of glorious Star Wars figures in blister packs hung from pegs in a wall that stretched up to the sky. Bright orange price tags, cut into jagged sunbursts marked $1.99! were on the corners of them all.

The smell of slightly-burnt popcorn, kind of like the smell in the Rainbow theater (where I'd go on countless dates of the 8th grade variety and watch Ghostbusters over and over again in 1984) hung heavy in the air as I stood there, experiencing what Douglas Coupland would eventually describe as "Optional Paralysis," pondering one of the most difficult and important decisions I would ever make: which Star Wars figure would I purchase? They didn't have the Chewbacca that I really wanted -- and needed -- to fill a gaping hole in my cast of characters. They had lots of droids, but I already had the only two that mattered. They had some cool snow troopers, but they could only fight Han Solo in his Hoth outfit, and I didn't even have a Hoth playset (it made sense at the time.) They had IG-88, who was kind of cool and had an awesome gun, but was only in one scene in Empire Strikes Back and didn't even talk. I stood at the wall of toys and wished, as I always did, that I could just get them all, and sort them out at home, while my jealous friends watched.

My brother said, "Come on, Wil. I want to go look at the Legos."

"In a minute," I said. I flipped through the ones I could reach, and hoped that maybe Chewbacca was in the back behind one of the lame figures up front (that's how I found Luke Skywalker in the Bespin outfit, which had a really cool lightsaber that you could take out of his hand and lose in the back yard the first day you played with it.)

"Come on, Wil . . ." my brother said, tugging on my hand.

"Quit!" I said. "This is important!"

"Lando Calrissian? He was a dick in the movie. There's no way I'm getting him. That guy with the bald head and the light up headphone thing around his head? What is this, the Bespin Cloud City store?" I thought.

"Willlllll," my brother whined, as my mom came around the corner.

"Willow, look what I found for you!" She held up a package of Luke Skywalker X-wing pilot Underoos.

"Oh cool!" I said. "Thanks!"

"And I have Batman for you, Jer Ber," she said to my brother.

"Wow! I'm Batman!" He said. "Thanks!"

"Did you find something?" My mom said, then pointedly added, "or are you saving this week?"

"Mom, I want to look at LEGOs," Jeremy said.

"Okay, Jer, I'll take you," she said.

She started down the aisle and added, "You need to be ready to go when I come back, Wil."

Left alone in the aisle, I could focus and make an informed decision. Suddenly, as if they'd materialized out of thin air, I saw several vehicles and play sets. The playsets were well beyond my budget, squarely in the realm of birthday gifts from relatives. A Death Star playset among them silently mocked me and my LaNdSPEEdR. However, the sunburst stickers on the vehicles were much more reasonable. I did some math in my head. If I saved, I could have my own Millennium Falcon in just a couple of months. If I could convince my mom and dad to let me do extra chores around the house, or if I got a commercial or something, I could even get it sooner!

Wow. The Millennium Falcon. It was so big, it took two hands to fly it. My friend Darryl let me watch as he put his together, and it had two sheets of stickers! It had this place where you could hide your figures, and you could recreate that cool chess game and Luke's fight with the training droid thingy!

Could I do it? Could I save my allowance until I had enough to buy it? What if they didn't have it when I was all saved up, though? Then what would I do? Mom would make me put my money in the bank, and I just knew I'd never see it  again, while it earned something stupid called interest.

My brother came running down the aisle, nearly losing his ever-present blue baseball cap in the process.

"Wil! Look! I got an airplane!" He held up one of those balsa wood planes that always broke on the second flight, provided you didn't break them during assembly.

"Oh no," I thought, "Mom will be right behind him!" I could hear my sister fussing in the cart as it turned the corner and squeaked up behind me.

"What did you decide, Wil?" My mom said. "Amy's getting fussy and we need to leave."

I hadn't had nearly enough time to make up my mind. This was all a plot by my mom to get me to save my money! I had to stall, so I pretended I didn't hear her.

"Oh, that's uh, neat," I said to my brother. "What's it do?"

It's a plane, you dolt. It flies.

"Wil?" My mom said.

"It's got a propeller, and that means it can fly for a long long long long time!" He said.

"Uh-huh," I said, my eyes darting from the vehicles to the figures to the playsets and back. "That's cool." A stream of numbers and calendar pages flew through my head, accompanied by John Williams' famous theme.

"Wil, I'm going to count to ten, and then we're leaving." My mom said.

Oh no! She was counting! This was serious.

". . . three . . . four . . . five . . ."

"Three? What happened to one and two?"

" . . . eight . . . nine . . ." Why couldn't I just make a decision? All the figures sucked. This should be easy.

"But there are so many right there, and how can I walk out of the toy department without buying something?! Jeremy has an airplane!"

"Ten. What are you doing?"

As if commanded by some unseen puppet master, my hand shot out and grabbed the nearest figure from the rack.

"I'm getting this one," I said. "This one is awesome."

"Ha! Take that, mom! Nobody is going to trick me into responsibly saving my money!"

"Okay, put it in the cart and let's go."

I looked down at the package in my hands, and saw my triumphant purchase: Lando Calrissian.

In my head, I thought of the worst curse word I could muster the courage to think.

"Wait. Mom!" I said.

"What?"

She stood there, hand on her hip, patience wearing thin. My brother flew his airplane -- which in the package didn't look anything like an airplane at all  -- around in little circles. My sister's fussiness was turning to tears. This was my last chance to back out, admit defeat, and tell my mom that I was . . . I was going to save my money.

I took a deep breath, and said, "I, uhm . . ."

My sister scowled and started to cry.

"What?"

The urge to walk out of the store with something in my hand and some stupid sense of victory overwhelmed the more rational thoughts of saving my money for something I really wanted.

"I, uhm, I want to carry it myself," I said.

"Okay, that's fine. Let's just go," she said. I thought of looking back wistfully over my shoulder at the Millennium Falcon, but I was so ashamed of myself, I was certain that I'd be turned into a pillar of carbonite. Instead, I trailed behind my airplane zooming brother and nap-needing sister, while my mother pushed the cart up to the checkout.

"Wil?" A voice that didn't belong at K-Mart in 1981 said.

I blinked, as the sounds of my infant sister crying were replaced with The Killers, and the smell of burnt popcorn was replaced with the smell of a fryer.

"Are you okay?" Nolan said.

". . . yeah," I said.

"Where did you go just now?" He said. It's a rather mature concept for a 15 year-old, but I vanish into memory so frequently he knows it when he sees it.

I told him about the kid over his shoulder, with all the Star Wars figures lined up on the table. "It's like looking at myself twenty-five years ago," I said, as John Williams' score began to play in my head.

He turned around and back. "You had Jar-Jar twenty-five years ago?"

"What?"

I blinked, and looked at the line of figures: Han Solo, Chewbacca, Luke Skywalker, Darth Vader, and way down on the end, there was Jar-Jar Binks.

A needle scratched across the record in my head. In my head, I thought of the worst curse word I could, and directed it at George Lucas.

Epilogue:

Lando Calrissian joined my cast of Star Wars characters, but was always the first to get killed in every battle and never got to pilot any of the ships. I tried to trade him several times, but his lameness was universally known around my neighborhood, and I was never successful.

A few months later, shortly after 1982 began, I booked a commercial. I didn't go back to buy a Millennium Falcon, though. Star Wars mania had offically given way to G.I. Joe mania, fueled by ultracool villains like Destro and Stormshadow. Over the next few years, Star Wars mania would take a distant third to Transformers fever, fueled by Megratron and Shockwave. Yes, like everyone else during the 80s, I gave in to the Dark Side.

Unlike George Lucas, though, I eventually came back.

Comments

[Sonicforever]

WOW Wil

I get the flashback daydreaming also.

[HPunster]

$1.99? Why do I feel like they were more expensive than that? Like, $4 or so? It was a tough chore to save enough to get one, I recall. Maybe we were poorer than I thought.

[AlCantHang]

Great stuff.

I think my favorites were Boba Fett, X-Wing Fighter, TIE Fighter (who's wings magically popped off at the first laser blast), and....

wait for it.

my Millenium Falcon

[Christine Noble]

I personally never went over to the dark side until the prequels came out. I know it will make me a pariah, but I loved them all. I don't care, I'll keep loving them and you can't stop me:P (The force is strong with you young Wheaton, but you are not a Jedi:D)

[gleek]

ah... icees and a pretzel! i remember the days of shopping at kmart too. AND playing with all of my brother's star wars figures (though i had my very own princess leia in the bespin outfit.. my favorite!)

thanks for bringing back the fond memories.

[PJDonnell]

Man, that's awesome. 'Course, I still regularly spend my money on toys instead of saving. I guess some of us just don't want to grow up!

[Allison]

Ah, Star Wars toys. I had one of those black plastic rectangular storage bins that had blue plastic shelves inside.

I never had the way-cool plastic vehicles, but my dad BUILT and PAINTED (out of wood in his home garage) an X-Wing and a landspeeder, which at the time I didn't fully appreciate 'cause I thought the plastic ones were better.

So glad that Lucas is releasing the "non-f@#%#ked around with" version on DVD. I still can't watch the new ones without a profound sense of grief and loss...

[GDISTORM]

It was great going down memory lane with you there Wil. Each of us have slightly different vesions. Myself, I was just at legal drinking age in '81. We lived a good 25 miles from the nearest theatre, we didn't have much money, and no allowance. So, outside of the original Star Trek, I didn't get a full introduction to Star Wars until I was in college. Fortunately, we had a 99 cent movie theatre to go to ... LOL! My lame childhood tended to be centered around card games I invented and playing with building blocks and matchbox cars. Your description of your childhood was very descriptive and enjoyable to read. That is, it felt like we as readers were experiencing it along with. But, of course, you are the writer ... and a talented one at that ... so keep up the good work ... we appreciate and enjoy it.

[ninevah]

Oh Wil, what an amazing memory. I'm sure I would have had a similiar memory when I was much younger, my pocket money burning a hole in my pocket as soon as it hit my jeans. Except I was born a girl and instead of lusting over Star Wars figurines, I drooled over She-Ra Princess of Power and My Little Pony figurines.

[wes3s]

Wonderful piece of work Wil! Thank you for sharing it here.

[PA_ChanMan]

Wil,

This is my first comment to one of your blogs, but I have been reading for almost a year now and I did hand over a few bucks to pick up your book.

This entry is just another example of how good you are at connecting to the rest of us geeks out there.

You mentioned Ghost Busters in the entry and that reminded me of some of MY favorite toys growing up. I still have me Echo1, ghost and ghostbuster figures, and my very own full size wearable proton pack and (my favorite part) a functional ghost trap. I can remember having hours of fun "trapping" ghosts in the trap. I plugged a tape player into an outlet designed for a lamp so I could flip the switch and the Ghostbuster music would play so I could go hunting for ghosts.

Thanks again for continuing to share some great personal memories!

[Peter]

Star Wars figures definitely played a part in my childhood, although I have to admit, not quite as much as yours!

A few observations;

I'm with you on the "Han shoots first" fiasco. What a farce. I heard they were going to go back and change blasters into bananas or something similarly stupid!

However, I do like the updated versions generally. I agree with his logic in doing them, particularly about making Mos Eisley bigger. The new explosions of planets and death stars are grouse (that's Aussie for fantastic).

And (this is my favourite fix) remember when Han and Chewie were chasing that squad of the storm troopers down that passageway? Then they turned the corner, saw what we were supposed to believe was heaps more troopers, said words to the effect of "oh shit" and ran away. Well, there wasn't really that many more than they'd just chased and it always seemed just a bit dumb. The first time I saw the update where there was a whole legion in that dock, I cheered and hooted and hollered like a crazy man!

There was *never* not a "man i wish i could hit that" time with Leia. I hope I got my double negatives right, there. First crush, I'll never forget her! She was only 19 at the time, if you can believe it!

Yes, Lando was the Jar Jar of the original series.

My cousin had the larger R2D2. It was maybe 8" or 9" high. It had a little compartment in the front which, conveniently enough, was big enough to take the normal size R2 that I had.

I never had the model of the Millenium Falcon, but I had a whole bunch of those schematic diagrams and cut-away drawings. They came in those exercise books and things that you'd get at the newsagent. (Then, a few years later, I got the same kind of diagrams of the Enterprise D :)

To me it was always the music. John Williams is my dead set hero. The music is the only thing I can remember from the first time I saw it. I must've been six. Mum and dad and my sister went along. I genuinely don't remember the movie itself at all. But that first burst after the 20th Centrury Fox music, when "Star Wars" comes up at the start of the scroll. Wow! Just Wow!

Recently my fiance and I went to see the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra play cinema tunes. The whole second half was Williams. I was in geek heaven. Star Wars, ET, Raiders, Superman. Even 1941, which while underrated as a movie I consider his best piece, apart from "Duel of the Fates" which is the bit playing while Quai Gon and Obi Wan are fighting Darth Maul.

Geez, gone on a bit :) Got off the track a bit, too! Probably the toy I remember most is one of those self propelling trucks. You know the ones that you roll the wheels a few times and that primes the spring so the vehicle then rolls by itself for a time? Very cool. It still works and mum and dad's where grandkids can play with it!

[NathanR]

Thanks for a great start to the friday morning. Been one of those weeks and this was just the thing to get into the weekend. Brings back memories of trips to the US and the UK and wishing now that I'd got the light saber toy for my birthday instead of whatever I can't remember I actually got.

Thanks as always for the continued postings and the insight into life that only a few bother to put down in words.

[Cuppojoe]

I don't say this often enough to you, Wil... Thank you.

In a lot of ways, your memories, experiences, and stories parallel those of the lot of us who come by everyday to read your work. Of course, I'm thankful for that but, more importantly, you constantly remind me to look back at my own life and revel in the good times.

Thanks again.

[starshine_diva]

I wish I had cool 80s stories... My favorite toy as a kid... SEGA GENESIS!!!!!

[meredith]

Wow, thanks for the walk down memory lane. :)

My parents were evil and never let me have any Star Wars figures. The one time they got me a TIE Fighter for Christmas, the wings broke off within 3 minutes, they refused to get me a new one, and that was that.

So I would play with my friend Gerry's figures over at his house. Gerry's parents were rich (or so we thought), and he and his bratty baby brother had every single Star Wars figure and playset ever made. He even had the Darth Vader carrying case to store all the figures in. It was awesome.

By far the coolest, though, was my friend Debbie's Millenium Falcon. She had the mondo-huge model version that she and her dad put together one weekend. Her dad was a serious amateur hobby photographer, and for her 12th birthday he gave her an unbelievable portrait he had shot of the Millenium Falcon model suspended in front of a backlit starfield he had made himself. It looked like a still from the movie. She had that hanging in her room until the day she moved out to get married. :)

(Yeah, I had a circle of uber-geek friends growing up. It was great. :)

[Punxking]

Your posts from childhood experiences, as a rule, so totally Rawk with a capital R! Once again, that was brilliant...

[norby]

Ah Star Wars figures, how did I love thee. When my parents moved a couple of years ago my mom shoved a plastic bag full of them into my hands and said will you please do something with these? Unfortunately the Falcon got lost in the shuffle somewhere along the way. What I remember most is leaving them in the yard in the summer and then having to put them in the freezer after they got all soft in the sun. And the Star Wars section was the first place I checked at the store. Actually, your description of the family trip to Kmart is frighteningly reminiscent of my own childhood.

[Fred]

Two words: Hot Wheels.

[marty01bear]

Wil,
I am a new reader to your blog. I have only been reading for about 3-4 months or so. I love it. I have read all the archives. I check it each day. Thanks for sharing your childhood memories with us. Priceless.
About my favorite toys from childhood, I dont recall a whole lot of them, I am age 44. But I remember having a tricycle that I triple loved and rode each day and would ride for hours and even get sunburned riding. Also, I had this portable record player that I would play my 45 singles on and sing along with...LOL.
As far as Star War stuff, I have a few things now, CP30 ,R2D2 and 12" Bobba Fett and some other figures and I have miniature droids and miniatures starships. All the star wars stuff my ex turned me onto a about 7 years ago. I collect miniature comic and cartoon characters and other stuff. I do enjoy the pvc figures that I collected from the shows I used to watch like Felix the Cat, Flintstones, Gumby and Pokey, New Zoo Review,etc.
Well I should end for now. Keep writing and we will keep reading. Thanks Wil.

[Freeman]

Wil,

My favorite childhood toy was marbles. You would draw a circle in the dirt, two or three kids would put some marbles in the circle and in turn shoot the marbles out of the circle with your "shooter". If you were really lucky you would have a "steelie" (a steel ball bearing) that was an excellent shooter. Your most treasured possession at the end of the day was a big bag of marbles.

Freeman :)

[Wil]

I just wanted to take a second and thank you all for your comments. Your shared experiences and feedback really mean a lot to me, and make the effort of writing and editing this stuff worthwhile.

[dbol39]

Wil Wheaton hates black people!

OK, just kidding--but seriously, your brother is obviously much cooler than you since he was all about the LEGO...

[Wil]

Hey, I loved (and continue to love) LEGO too, even when the company decided to get crazily specific and make all those "you can really only make this one thing with this set" sets.

But in my youth, I had lots of little portable computers that I imagined with a few standard bricks, some cleverly detailed slanty bricks, a few translucent tall antenna thingies, and some smooth 2x1 tiles that were discs.

This was around 1982 or 1983, and I'm surprised that my parents didn't heed any of the obvious nerd warning signs.

[Wil]

Oh, and the only people I currently hate are the Bush Administration and anyone who enables them.