Time To Grow Up, Toys R Us "kids"..

You could say the writing was on the wall when their magnificent Times Square location was closed 3 years ago, but it's now officially the end of the Toys R Us retail chain, following the slowest liquidation sale I ever did see. It really did feel like the last two months they were offering everything at only 10% discount.

Did I get to buy anything good?

Well, it's not like that ferris wheel was ever available to own..

I brought the "Toys R Us Exclusive!" Funkopop Fraggle Rock figure of Sprocket the dog, because it just looks fantastic (at 20% off) and the DVD of Woody Woodpecker: The Movie (at 10% off)..that was in the early days..I had a hunch that by the time they got to 50%, I would be staring at empty shelves. They had an iron grip on the Lego merchandise - I wouldn't be surprised if they just boxed those up and shipped them to some outlet mall chain or Family Dollar or whatever. I was curious about buying the updated version of Clue that replaced Miss White with Dr. Orchid, but I wasn't committed to keeping track of anything. Prior to this liquidation, I had gotten into those Funko "Mystery Minis" mini-figures of characters from The Disney Afternoon and wound up with three Negaduck figurines.

Toys R Us was never particularly good at sales...it was only by comparison to the mom-and-pop toy stores, the Kmarts, the Targets, the comic shops...then it looked like they offered better deals by a narrow margin. Plus, unlike the comic shops and mom-and-pops, you could get your money back or make exchanges without difficulty. I don't think the mom-and-pop shops will re-emerge as the main place to shop for toys and games, but there's something about Toys R Us' pricing  strategies that eventually kept them from meeting their quota in the wake of increasing options to shop online or go to other stores. As a kid, I remember Kay Bee Toys and Lionel's Kiddie City toy stores were more popular because they had better prices on popular toys and video games, whereas Toys R Us usually only had lower prices on racecar test tracks and plastic toy dinette sets. They did have good prices on Hot Wheels and Matchbox toy cars; tourists would buy them a lot, as they were actually more expensive in countries outside the U.S.

Because the name of the store is such a recognizable brand across the globe, I wouldn't be surprised if the brand was acquired and the stores were revived, albeit in a smaller scale, possibly as a chain of upscale boutique toy shops..yeah, that's certainly not the same, plus it depends on whether or not the marketplace for upscale plastic toys, but I'm picturing something that can survive between the gentrified boutique and seedy-looking videogame stores.

Should it only be about selling toys? With Kids R Us and Babies R Us it looked like they were testing the waters before just sticking with the Babies department before the 90's ended, but I suppose the word "Toys" in the name kept them from thinking outside the box and feeling like they were overreaching if they were to add a "Home Furnishings"/"Intimate Apparel"/"Food" department...then it would really look like a Kmart.

And bring back Geoffrey the giraffe...they'd been kinda non-committal by keeping giraffes in their marketing material for the last decade or so, but it always seemed like Geoffrey had been retired, yet he was prominent during the chain's heyday...food for thought.

So...have I watched the Woody Woodpecker movie?

To be continued...

Fishing For Batgirl Movie Hype...

"Because the TheBatgirlTheMovieHypedotcom knows that movies in development are in development even when we know nothing about whether anyone involved in working on development of The Batgirl film is actually working, we're experimenting with discussion posts. For dealing with pure speculation, our head writer will publish some loosely-connected thoughts on the subject, for which he'll leave open the already-open comment section for readers to discuss.."

1. I'm almost done reading Batgirl: The Bronze Age Omnibus. This is a large book reprinting a batch of Batgirl stories in full color with nice paper. I believe 6 of the comic book creators who contributed material reprinted in this book are still alive, so collecting autographs is not out-of-the-question, plus if you count the foreword by Gail Simone, that bumps it to 7...the best stories in the book are the batch by Frank Robbins & Don Heck, particularly near the end, when Commissioner Gordon co-stars with Barbara Gordon, building up to the reveal that he knew all along that she was Batgirl and didn't stand in her way. It makes sense for the Commish to be part of Batgirl's main supporting cast; ideally, I could see him playing the role of confidante that Alfred Pennyworth plays to Batman, but they never realize that potential...even now, after a storyline in which Commissioner Gordon was Batman..it is amazing how the stories aren't too different from modern Batgirl tales at the core. Of the stories in this volume, Batgirl encounters 1 A-list villain  (Catwoman), 3 D-list villains  (Killer Moth, the Cavalier, the Joker's Daughter), 2 wannabes/neverweres (Mr. Scratch, the Maze syndicate) and a bunch of run-of-the-mill grifters snd gangsters. The best writing comes from the Don Heck-illustrated half of the Frank Robbins run, though I did enjoy Gil Kane's art for that story inspired by Pop Art icon Andy Warhol getting shot at his infamous "factory" studio. I recommend this book..not sure if I'd pick up a Volume 2, since it's hinted that the stories and art are handed down to the B-list/C-list creators as Batgirl's adventures tumble around through Batman Family and Detective Comics..maybe if the shop has a "display copy" to peak through first.

2. I had found two interviews online with Christina Hodson, the screenwriter of The Batgirl and Harley Quinn's Birds of Prey movies. The first is really a sound bite on YouTube, the other is a podcast interview from last month in which she only offers a one-sentence answer when inquired about whether she's writing The Batgirl, to which she answered that, yes, she is. And that was all she said about it. The interview revealed that she's not on any social media, which is frustrating, because I was curious to see if I could learn insights about her as a working writer - what kind of movies she enjoys, does she read anything, does she know who Batgirl is..little stuff. The podcast interview revealed that she liked writing gothic children's stories in the style of Edward Gorey and thought references to the latest technology in movie scripts tend to date badly...in that regard, I think her approach to Barbara Gordon's other guise, Oracle, might be interesting for what she chooses to focus on/avoid...granted, I always thought Oracle's tech skills sounded like she used a lot of technobabble to hide from Batman & Black Canary that all she really did was use Google.

And I watched Unforgettable, one of the two movies she wrote that's available to rent...I don't know when exactly did Katherine Heigl begin to resemble Wendi McLendon-Covey, but if the producers of The Goldbergs have yet to cast an actress to play Beverly Goldberg's sister, they should contact Katherine's agent.

3. In my imagination, the perfect casting choices for Barbara Gordon are between Lily Collins and Hailee Steinfeld. I'm not sure if Collins is interested, but a search online revealed fans have her on their lists. She's my top pick for the role. Steinfeld has gone on record as saying that she'd like to play Batgirl, so it's a matter of a simple screen test to see who wins it. If neither of them want the part - hypothetical situation, really, since this could be a breakthrough gig for either - then you have to dip back into the pool of Alexandra Daddario, Felicity Jones and Lindsay Morgan and other alleged possibles..or they could just cast Emma Watson, instead. That's a choice that just occurred to me. It could happen.