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Not enough cereal in MYSTERY ISLAND'S Pop Culture Unlimited Archives?

All right, well, my absolute favorite childhood cereal was FREAKIES, not so much for its generic "crunchy, sugary" breakfast cereal goodness, but for its overall A+ packaging and cereal treasure delivery.

Freakies had the best commercials, best cereal icons, (the Freakies family themselves) and the absolute best cereal prizes, again, the Freakies themselves!

The first prizes were the best, hard plastic (PVC) figures of the Freakies.



Seven Freakies existed: Boss Moss (the leader), Cowmumble, Gargle, Hamhose, Grumble, Goody-Goody, and Snorkeldorf (my favorite for unknown reasons).

They just looked really cool, small monsters you could carry inside your pocket. Hey, the original "pokemon" so to speak.
Pocket monsters.

After the PVC figures, rubber versions showed up in the boxes, then Freakies in cars ...



and boats, then magnets, even patches--as the budget seemed to dissolve into mushy cereal nothingness from there.

I should also mention Cocoa and Fruity versions of the cereal also existed as competitors to the ever-popular Cocoa and Fruity Pebbles Flintstones cereals...

Yup, good stuff. Freakies, a unique brand of cereal, a terrific gimmick, remains now a kooky and wonderful time-capsule of the 1970s (and poorly/shortly revived in 1986) but a very magical pop culture moment from my perspective: Saturday morning cartoons, The Super Friends. my key comic book buying days, skateboard and bicycle riding, and living in a perpetual world of imagination inside my 9 to 11-year-old head.

I wrote a tribute poem about the Freakies a few years back, published in Robert Berry's pop culture book: Frankenberry Uber Alles and can now be found at retroCRUSH, featured in the TOP 100 Monsters list.



"Freakies Cereal Article" by Bradley Mason Hamlin © 2006 Mystery Island Publications.
Updated: 08.17.09. All rights reserved.


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