No, no. I want an official ride out when I shoot YOU IN A CHAIR. WHERE’S MY LEG RIFLE? >> You’ll shoot your eye out, kid. >> Satanic trolls, barfing babies, and brine shrimp with questionable ties to the Third Reich. Sometimes innocent looking toys mean big trouble. Cabbage Patch Kids were ubiquitous in the 80s, but the chubby little kids saw their share of wild, unsubstantiated rumors.
According to various online recollections, the strange dumpling faces were designed by the Reagan administration to get people used to the appearance of mutants after a nuclear war with the USSR. Other weird rumors suggested that the dolls were eligible for death certificates if returned to the factory after being damaged.
>> They’re the worst looking things I’ve ever seen. I mean, they are pathetic looking. They’re homely. >> Even though these rumors are false, the dolls still have a dark history. They were at the center of some of the first toy buying frenzies in the United States. At about $30 in 1983 currency, or about $100 today, the dolls were expensive.
But that didn’t stop holiday shoppers from stripping shelves bare and injuring one another in the process. [music] But sometimes it was the dolls themselves hurting people. >> Wow, she really chewed. >> A late ’90s snacktime version of the doll could eat plastic food, but it also ended up ripping out and eating human hair and chomping on fingers before it was recalled.

Even the origin of the dolls was troubled. An early lawsuit alleged that presumed inventor Xavier Roberts had ripped off the work of a folk artist named Martha Nelson Thomas. The parties [music] settled out of court for some that was never revealed. Cabbage Patch Kids were so overhyped that it was only natural that a parody would emerge from the phenomenon.
Enter the Garbage Pale Kids, a series of trading cards by Tops featuring Cherabic children suffering from disfigurement, dismemberment, or just unable to control their bodily functions. >> It looks communistic. It looks like maybe someone is trying to break the American family. >> It wasn’t the first time a trading card series had caused moral outrage.
1962’s Mars Attacks cards were even more explicit in their depictions of violence and gore. So edgy trading cards were nothing new. But kids love gross stuff. Kids covered in boogers or with exploding heads were a delight. And the cards were immediately popular, riding in on the tail of other popular gross out card series like Wacky [music] Packages.
The creator of the concept was none other than Art Spiegelman, who’s probably best known today for creating the moving graphic novel MUS about his father’s experiences during the Holocaust. The training cards were joined by more merchandise and even a notoriously bad live-action movie that was even stranger than the card set. >> Come on, kids. TAKE A SHOT.
SHOW THEM what we really got. Of course, the makers of Cabbage Patch Kids weren’t too happy about any of this, so they sued Topps, alleging that the parody versions were effectively just barfing Cabbage [music] Patch Kids. A compromise was reached, which involved a bit of a redesign of the overall look and the property’s logo.
[music] Topps produced 15 series of cards between 1985 and 1988 before taking a hiatus and returning full force in 2003, remaining on shelves even today. Laboos aren’t a new thing, but they truly took over the world in 2025 thanks to the appearance of a Lubu charm on the bag of K-pop star Lisa from Blackpink.

The human animal monster hybrids feature toddler-like bodies, rabbit-like ears, and pointy teeth that make the critters hard to identify and ded little mischievous. Usually sold in blind boxes that don’t reveal what specimen of Laboo is inside, the toys drove a collecting spree in 2025 with rare versions fetching huge prices. But some people thought the ugly cute trinkets were genuinely demonic.
Their critiques weren’t about capitalism or plastic waste or hyperconsumerism. They thought laboos were the work of the actual devil. The origin of the labu demon connection seems to be the fact that the dolls have teeth. The name is broadly similar to the Babylonian demon pizuzu. And there are some Tik Toks of the dolls quote [music] doing demon stuff.
At least according to an editorial on catholic 365.com titled, “Beware the cute little monster, Lebu, the devil, and our children’s souls.” Facebook moms went off reposting alleged ancient illustrations of Pizuzu that were actually recently generated AI images designed to look like Leaboos and spreading the familiar satanic panic that’s resurfaced every few years about all manner of toys.
These included everything from E-Man to Dungeons and Dragons. They take the pieces of the game, they would throw them in the incinerator or the fireplace, and screams would come out. >> And yes, even Smurfs and Care Bears [music] were subject to the satanic panic. So, an urban legend was born, made stronger by manufacturer Pop Mart’s request to return any Laboo that moved on its own or whispered. Genius.
Mattel has a so-s so history of inclusion when it comes to their Barbie line of toys. Dolls with prosthetic appendages, skin conditions, and autism now exist. And the company has embraced nine body types, and 35 skin tones, which is a positive move towards making sure every kid has a doll they can relate to. It’s clear they’re trying, but they don’t always hit the mark.
In 2023, Mattel released a Barbie with physical features related to Down Syndrome as part of their fashionistas line. The dolls with Down Syndrome were officially endorsed by the nonprofit National Down Syndrome Society and included feedback from actual people with Down Syndrome. Much of the press reaction was positive, noting finer details in the doll’s design, like a pendant incorporating colors and symbols related to the Down Syndrome [music] community.

Ellie Goldstein, a model who herself has Down Syndrome, served as a face of the launch. >> So, when I first saw the Barbie, I was like, “What the heck?” >> But not all reactions were positive. [music] An editorial in the Miami Herald written by the mother of a child with the syndrome argued that the Barbieification of Down syndrome wouldn’t actually give her daughter better access to opportunities or acceptance in the real world.
It also criticized the initial doll for an idealized depiction of a pretty blonde [music] person with Down syndrome, but other skin tones were added later. In translating the condition into the Barbie world, it still just looked too much like a typical Barbie. In Mattel’s defense, the reaction from the people this doll is actually for has been largely positive.
>> [music] >> The toy buying public of the early 1990s just wasn’t ready for earring magic. Ken, with AIDS still a mysterious and deadly disease and the Clinton administration winding up for the Defense of Marriage Act, gay men were not seen as fully part of American society. Earring Magic Ken, part of a wider range of Earring Magic Barbies, wasn’t canonically gay, but did have an earring, a pendant that some interpreted as an adult toy, a lavender leatherrett vest over a lavender mesh shirt.
He had a vibe. Mattel had based the doll on what actual girls had thought would be a cool update for Ken’s dated style. And while they [music] were correct, parents just didn’t understand. Mattel recalled the doll even as it flew off the shelves and into the collection of adult buyers who were tickled by a mass marketed doll that broke barriers.
Earring Magic Ken may be the most memorable and profitable Ken in Mattel’s history. And I have an earring, a magic earring. >> These were actual Kens. >> How do you tell kids that the world is a dangerous, unfair place where fate can strike you down at any moment? Fortunately, mid-60s parents would be all set to talk about life’s many atrocities with the help of Little Miss Noame, a neglected homeless doll put out by toy giant Hasbro.
>> Look, [music] she has a tear on her cheek. Little Miss Noon Name is sad because she doesn’t have a pretty dress. >> Little Miss Noame, who would presumably [music] get a name once adopted by your kid, came with giant wet eyes with a huge detachable tear. The dolls also featured an outstretched hand and a patched burlap sack for a dress.
Little Miss Noame had been designed as the anti- Barbie, a doll with no glamour or polish as a reaction to the theoretically hip and empathetic 60s. Unfortunately, Hasbboro absolutely biffed it with the grim little doll despite a heavy marketing campaign that even included hot chocolate crossovers. Little Miss Noame was only briefly on shelves.

But today, resale prices of the doll designed to teach children about poverty and the cruel unflinching scythe of fates regularly hit the triple digits. Even more if the specimen still has her tear. 90s kids would get a slightly less icky repeat of the phenomenon. Lost in Founds were a series of whimpering stuffed animals with huge eyes that actually cried about being orphaned in a big terrifying world.
Nothing like a doll with a side of guilt. Kids have been bombarded with ads for sea monkeys since the 1960s. First in the back of comic books and later as weird TV commercials. >> Your very own [music] instant real life pets. Watch them swim, teach them tricks, give them names. Allegedly, they were an exciting pet that could be ordered through the mail or picked up at the local toy store.
But despite ads depicting vibrant humanoid societies, the sea monkeys were just dried brine shrimp eggs, a common crustation. These creatures have an important role in the food chain, supporting populations of larger animals and migratory birds, and are often farmed as fish food. Unfortunately for kids who saved up to order a packet of just add water playmates, brine shrimp are incapable of forming complex social structures or playing with a human child in any recognizable [music] way.
They weren’t going to build little homes or bond with you or watch over you while you slept. The ads in the one season live action series starring Howie Mandel clearly portrayed animals more relatable, peppy, and engaging than an actual tiny shrimp. Even more troubling, however, is the fact that all the sweet sea monkey money went to funding some pretty hateful causes.
Investor/scammer Harold von Bronn Hut, who also was known for creating the notoriously non-working X-ray specs, had well-known Nazi sympathies, an unusual stance for someone born Jewish. His misleading products made him rich enough to arm KKK chapters, which is a pretty dark legacy to leave behind. In 1987, a company called Entertech put out a line of far too realistic water guns.
>> Fully automatic and with a detachable clip that you filled with water, the gun would keep squirting as long as it held water and you kept your finger on the trigger. The main model looked a lot like an Uzi, a line of submachine guns widely used by military and security forces.

If you think it’s disturbing and possibly dangerous for a child to be running around with a toy that looks like something you’d take with you on an invasion of the Cyani Peninsula, you wouldn’t be alone. At the time, toy guns were so realistic that television consumer reporter David Horowitz was taken hostage with one live on the air and was forced to read a statement about a bizarre CIA conspiracy.
[music] Subsequently, Horowitz was inspired to lead a campaign banning realistic toy guns. By that time, Entertech and other toy guns were already implicated in a series of confrontations and shootings when the police mistook them for real weapons, a problem which still continues today.
State and federal legislation soon required the guns to look less real and incorporate brighter coloring. The real killer here was the advent of the Super Soaker in the ’90s, which blasted its rivals through the wall. I’m so loving it.