I asked my friend Keith about this and he emailed me the following response,
"yes, I ordered shit by mail ALL THE TIME when I was a kid. Remember Ralphie waiting for his Secret Decoder Ring in the mail? That feeling was magical! Some of my favorite items (which I no longer have, of course):
- an official Luke Skywalker jacket from the Star Wars fan club - "rare" Legos that you couldn't find in the stores - X-Ray glasses - a Batman flashlight - Sea Monkeys and their tank - miniature comic books (postage stamp sized) with a magnifying glass and mini treasure chest to store them in"
I notice that JPX didn't bother to include the Star Wars Survival Pack, a small collection of accessories like Hoth backpacks, a pack for carrying Yoda, and the gasmasks Han has handy in the Falcon for when you trod around inside giant worms.
I sent away for my Survival Pack and it never came. Blarg.
I have the survival pack because it came with the AT AT. I couldn't find a picture of the Luke Skywalker slide viewer, which is arguably the coolest mail-away I've ever received.
The Luke "Skywalker Slide Viewer" is great because it's such an earnest attempt to meld the Star Wars universe into our own woefully-technologically-unadvanced society.
Luke has those digital binoculars, and a sentient robot plays his holographic "messages" for him. By contrast, a 1970s family has...um...some slides...on film...that you need an optical lens and a diffuse light source to look at...um...so here's a slide viewer...don't you feel like Luke Skywalker now?
Technically ADP, they're not free. "Proof of purchase" is on the package of something you BUY - and I'm sure the boys spent lots of loot in order to get enough POP's to send away for stuff.
Yeah, it's this ridiculous system where you accumulate these scraps of paper "only" available by buying their products and finding the detachable little card or cutting a tab off of the label or whatever. Then you mail in all this crap and they (eventually) send you the item in question.
You wise up pretty fast about "lowered expectations." They're not under much obligation to accurately present their amazing toy you want when they show a murky photograph on the back of the comic book or whatever. As you can see from the photographs accompanying this post, it's not exactly "Lucy-flips-over-backwards-in-Peanuts-level" quality in what you're getting. In fact a great deal of it seems downright perfunctory (especially given the incredible delays in shipping etc.)
Remember also that this was a pre-internet transaction and that everybody, child and adult, just dealt with the unbelievable shipping delays in everything mail-ordered or ordered by phone or in any way involving another human being who is paid to deal manually with sending you your 'Star Wars Mos Eisley Cantina Mail Away.'
These days, you get the stuff three days later after emailing or texting in your order. But then, these days I can't walk into Starbucks without my phone suddenly offering to sell me the tune they've got playing at that moment.
When I was in college I would go on this Marxist routine about Proof of Purchase. "It's not enough that we buy their crap?" I raged. "Now we have to prove it, too?"
January 23, 2008 5:26 PM
[Image] Octo and I have spent a lifetime saving up proof-of purchase documentation for various "free" action figures. There's nothing more exciting to the "collector" than receiving something that you are only able to acquire by sending in proof-of-purchase stuff. Of course, in the era of Ebay this is all moot, but it was a lot of fun to receive those non-descript white boxes in the mail. The above picture from X-entertainment is funny and typical of the experience. Go here to read it.
So what have you guys sent away for? Below are just a few examples of things I sent away for over the years,
[Image] The horrible Star Wars Power of the Force Mail away Spirit of Obi Wan Kenobi (JPX accidentally broke his arm 3 seconds after taking it out of the package)
[Image] Star Wars Power of the Force Mail away Han Solo in stormtrooper outfit
[Image] An "official" Shadow ring, which literally took a year for me to receive
"The mail-away"
10 Comments -
I have never mailed away for anything using proof of purchases. Clearly I have suffered because of this.
January 23, 2008 7:16 AM
That's only because you're a girl, girls don't send away for stuff.
January 23, 2008 7:58 AM
I asked my friend Keith about this and he emailed me the following response,
"yes, I ordered shit by mail ALL THE TIME when I was a kid. Remember Ralphie waiting for his Secret Decoder Ring in the mail? That feeling was magical! Some of my favorite items (which I no longer have, of course):
- an official Luke Skywalker jacket from the Star Wars fan club
- "rare" Legos that you couldn't find in the stores
- X-Ray glasses
- a Batman flashlight
- Sea Monkeys and their tank
- miniature comic books (postage stamp sized) with a magnifying glass and mini treasure chest to store them in"
January 23, 2008 8:53 AM
Rare legos? What the hell?
I notice that JPX didn't bother to include the Star Wars Survival Pack, a small collection of accessories like Hoth backpacks, a pack for carrying Yoda, and the gasmasks Han has handy in the Falcon for when you trod around inside giant worms.
I sent away for my Survival Pack and it never came. Blarg.
January 23, 2008 10:26 AM
I have the survival pack because it came with the AT AT. I couldn't find a picture of the Luke Skywalker slide viewer, which is arguably the coolest mail-away I've ever received.
January 23, 2008 10:48 AM
The Luke "Skywalker Slide Viewer" is great because it's such an earnest attempt to meld the Star Wars universe into our own woefully-technologically-unadvanced society.
Luke has those digital binoculars, and a sentient robot plays his holographic "messages" for him. By contrast, a 1970s family has...um...some slides...on film...that you need an optical lens and a diffuse light source to look at...um...so here's a slide viewer...don't you feel like Luke Skywalker now?
January 23, 2008 2:52 PM
what is this proof of purchase thing? Why doesn't exist here? I want free stuff.
January 23, 2008 3:05 PM
Technically ADP, they're not free. "Proof of purchase" is on the package of something you BUY - and I'm sure the boys spent lots of loot in order to get enough POP's to send away for stuff.
January 23, 2008 4:43 PM
Yeah, it's this ridiculous system where you accumulate these scraps of paper "only" available by buying their products and finding the detachable little card or cutting a tab off of the label or whatever. Then you mail in all this crap and they (eventually) send you the item in question.
You wise up pretty fast about "lowered expectations." They're not under much obligation to accurately present their amazing toy you want when they show a murky photograph on the back of the comic book or whatever. As you can see from the photographs accompanying this post, it's not exactly "Lucy-flips-over-backwards-in-Peanuts-level" quality in what you're getting. In fact a great deal of it seems downright perfunctory (especially given the incredible delays in shipping etc.)
Remember also that this was a pre-internet transaction and that everybody, child and adult, just dealt with the unbelievable shipping delays in everything mail-ordered or ordered by phone or in any way involving another human being who is paid to deal manually with sending you your 'Star Wars Mos Eisley Cantina Mail Away.'
These days, you get the stuff three days later after emailing or texting in your order. But then, these days I can't walk into Starbucks without my phone suddenly offering to sell me the tune they've got playing at that moment.
January 23, 2008 5:24 PM
When I was in college I would go on this Marxist routine about Proof of Purchase. "It's not enough that we buy their crap?" I raged. "Now we have to prove it, too?"
January 23, 2008 5:26 PM