Innholdsfortegnelse for The Ultimate 90s Collection - Special i The Ultimate 90s Collection

Arguably the best decade of the 20th century, the ’90s had it all – fantastic music, iconic movies, timeless TV shows, the best (and worst) of fashion, and some of the greatest toys and games ever created. Packed full of passionate tributes and stunning photography, the Ultimate 90s Collection is a celebration of the decade that brought us Friends, Jurassic Park, Harry Potter, the Super Nintendo, Britpop, the Spice Girls and so much more. Join us as we take a trip down memory lane and revisit the films, albums, videogames, tech, toys, TV shows and clothes that made the ’90s so special.…

How did you first get into The Simpsons? I first saw The Simpsons as shorts on The Tracey Ullman Show on 19 April 1987. I’m not sure if I’ve seen them all. Then I heard that they were having a Christmas special on 17 December 1989. I watched it then. Then I heard that they were having regular episodes airing. I did what most people would do and watched a few episodes to see if it was worth it to keep watching. By that March, I got hooked. I like The Simpsons for the humour. Bart Simpson has and always will be my favourite Simpsons character. How did you get into collecting Simpsons merchandise? When I got hooked on the show, I saw some Simpsons merchandise in stores. I really…

Anyone who watched The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air during its run from 1990 to 1996 will undoubtedly be able to recite the series’ backstory. It was right there in the glorious opening theme song, Yo Home to Bel Air, which was written and performed by DJ Jazzy Jeff and rapper-turned-actor Will Smith, who was undoubtedly the star of the show. It was the tale of how the Fresh Prince’s life got flipped-turned upside down when he was forced to move from a rough neighbourhood. The Fresh Prince tells us how he became the prince of a town called Bel Air. But there was so much more to this show than that earworm, Quincy Jones composition, because the Fresh Prince’s working-class, West Philadelphia background frequently clashed with his auntie and uncle’s…

Inspiration really can come from anywhere, and that was most certainly the case for Joanne Rowling. The idea for the 11-year-old wizard, Harry Potter, popped into her head while she was on a long train journey from Manchester to London. She spent the next few years writing Harry Potter and The Philosopher’s Stone, juggling the pressures of being a single mother, surviving off benefits and raising her daughter. Six years and 12 rejection letters later, the story of the young wizard and his first year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry became a reality. This book introduced us to all our favourite characters – including Ron, Hermione, Dumbledore and Hagrid – setting the stage for further adventures to follow. Inspiring adults and children alike, Philosopher’s Stone is the first…

On paper, a show about lifeguards looking after beachgoers on the sands of California shouldn’t have been a success, and it very nearly wasn’t. Baywatch actually premiered on US TV at the very end of the ’80s, and did so poorly in the ratings that it was cancelled after a single season and put production company GTG out of business to boot. Baywatch, it seemed, wasn’t destined for success. However, the show proved a popular hit in Europe, and with Knight Rider star David Hasselhoff and creators Michael Berk, Douglas Schwartz and Gregory J Bonann dedicated to getting the show a second chance, they bought back the rights to the show for just $10. And what an investment it was. With new star and former Playboy playmate Pamela Anderson on…

01 THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: LINK’S AWAKENING » RELEASED: 1993 » PUBLISHER: NINTENDO » CREATED BY: NINTENDO » BY THE SAME DEVELOPER: F-ZERO Although it features an ending that’s the Linkian equivalent of finding Bobby Ewing in the shower, this charming adventure remains one of the Game Boy’s best titles. Set on the island of Koholint, Link’s Awakening has the intrepid adventurer trying to awaken the mystical Wind Fish. His trials take him through some fantastically designed dungeons, see him battling some impressive bosses and generally meandering around a beautifully detailed world. The lack of certain Zelda elements – it’s not set in Hyrule and Ganon is nowhere to be seen – may upset some, but you’ll be doing yourself a grave disservice if you turn your nose up at…

Released in Japan two years after its main competitor, the Mega Drive, the SNES impressed with its more advanced graphical and sound capabilities (though the Mega Drive remained competitive on the speed front). For example, while the Mega Drive could display 61 colours from a possible 512 on screen at any given time, the SNES could display a whopping 256 from a possible 32,768. Add to that the SNES’s pseudo-3D capabilities, shown off by titles like F-Zero and Pilotwings, and there’s no denying that it had the edge technically speaking. However, to understand what made the SNES such a huge hit and, to this day, one of the most-loved consoles ever released, you need look no further than the games that were released for it. The console helped to cement…

01 GOLDENEYE » RELEASED: 1997 » DEVELOPED BY: RARE » BY THE SAME DEVELOPER: SABRE WULF When Rare’s GoldenEye first appeared in 1997 first-person console shooters were instantly given a massive shot in the arm (pun fully intended) and its impact sent shockwaves through the industry that continue to be felt to this day. Sniper rifles, four-way split screen, multiple missions, even duel analogue support (via two N64 pads) all made their first-person console debut in Rare’s excellent shooter and even today it remains incredibly fun to play. With its wonderfully designed missions, intelligently structured level design, excellent array of weaponry and utterly amazing multiplayer it should come as no surprise to learn that the only N64 game to ever succeed it was the development team’s very own Perfect Dark.…

For many a girl and boy in the early 1990s, few toys were as sought after as Polly Pocket and Mighty Max. These miniature creations were a merchandising giant, offering a set of tiny figures and a playset all contained in one little hinged toy. Polly Pocket was the first to hit the market, originally starting out as a homemade toy created by British inventor Chris Wiggs. Around 1983, Wiggs used an old makeup compact case and fashioned a dolls’ house inside for his daughter, Katie. Six years later, Swindon-based company Bluebird Toys licensed the idea, and a new line of must-have toys entered the market. The figures included were around an inch tall, with bases that could be secured onto fixed points inside each playset. Its portability made it…

It is becoming hard to remember the time when tech giant Apple was on its knees. But back in 1997, it was on the verge of bankruptcy until Steve Jobs – its gifted founder with a penchant for mock turtleneck sweaters – made a triumphant return and gave the company back its bite. He blew a fresh breeze through the corridors of Apple’s Cupertino headquarters, sweeping away a large and confusing line-up of computers and projects. Working with the now-acclaimed designer, Jonathan Ive, he also came up with the all-in-one desktop computer, the iMac G3, costing consumers in the US $1,299. With its gorgeous curved, egg-shaped styling and a translucent casing that eventually came in 13 different colours, the computer was a bold statement, and unlike any other computer on…

We take the internet for granted today. It is, after all, an ever-present constant within our lives. It allows us to communicate better (arguably at least) and it lets us conduct research, buy items and have lots of fun. Yet in the early ’90s, the world wide web was a virtual land of mystique and infinite possibility. Time magazine summed it up in April 1993 as ‘the info highway’ that was ‘bringing a revolution in entertainment, news and communication’. Indeed, a year later, the web browser Mosaic Netscape 0.9 was launched, achieving three quarters of the market after just four months. It evolved into Netscape Navigator, and anyone using it will remember how slowly pages loaded on the wheeze-sounding dial-up connections of those pre-broadband times. You would have to tell…

When Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Eric Cartman and Kenny McCormick piled onto our screens in 1997, our worlds changed forever. These profanity-filled, 2D, stop-motion animated adventures were like nothing else on TV. What started out as Spirit of Christmas – a four-minute stop-motion animation shot on 8mm film based on poorly cut-out characters – evolved into a slightly longer, award-winning, stop-motion animation based on poorly cut-out characters. And its fans wouldn’t have it any other way. Created by Matt Stone and Trey Parker, South Park focuses on the adventures of four school kids, their families, and the local community in a small Colorado town. No controversial topic is off limits, which makes for hilarious, amazing and bizarre viewing. Most of the characters are inspired by people in Trey and Matt’s…

“Carter fought hard for Anderson, and was rewarded when she won several awards for her portrayal of the sceptical agent” It’s easy to forget just how phenomenally successful The X-Files was on its original release. Chris Carter’s creation elevated David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson into the stratosphere, spawned two films and a spinoff TV show, and led to endless merchandise that ranged from books to videogames, playing cards and everything in between. Countless actors, including Jack Black and Seth Green, as well as Jane Lynch and Aaron Paul, all had fresh-faced appearances on the show before they hit the big time, while Mark Snow’s incredibly creepy theme tune reached second place in the UK singles chart, staying there for three weeks. At one point in the ’90s, Chris Carter’s show…

Even today, there are few cartoons able to elicit the same nauseous mix of riotous laughter, creeping unease and guttural revulsion as animator John Kricfalusi’s edgy Nickelodeon classic. Launched on the orange-splat network in August 1991 alongside fellow Nicktoons trailblazers Doug and Rugrats, Ren & Stimpy was a gross-out tour de force filled with surreal, often disturbing imagery that enthralled young watchers and left swaths of concerned parents asking the honest question: Is this weird show, starring an angry chihuahua and a dimwitted cat, really for kids? Kricfalusi, who had worked on cartoon staples like The Jetsons and Tom & Jerry prior to setting out on his own, was a huge proponent of completely unique animation frames, often discouraging his team from ever drawing the same movement or facial expression…

Some viewers couldn't get past the laughter: the incessant “heh, heh, hehs” of two of the most socially incompetent, sex-obsessed, teenage delinquents to have ever graced our television screens. But whether they were getting into scuzzy self-made scrapes or passing their judgement on myriad music videos while plonked square-eyed on a couch, Beavis and Butt-Head's penchant for boobs, violence, mayhem and heavy metal proved hugely influential. Whether that was cool or totally sucked seemed to depend – to a degree – on age. For the young viewers of Generation X, Mike Judge's jabbering duo were supremely brave, if not without controversy. They made their debut in a cartoon short called Frog Baseball in 1992 – with Beavis throwing amphibians for Butt-Head to splat. Its success led to MTV commissioning a…

Grunge started out of the Seattle music scene at the end of the ’80s and early ’90s. It quickly captured the hearts and minds of many music fans at the time, helping to define the era and a generation. Popularised by record label Sub Pop, this musical genre had many influences: chiefly heavy metal, punk and alternative rock, including – but not limited to – Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, Metallica, Pixies, Sonic Youth, Buzzcocks, David Bowie, Melvins, Sex Pistols, Velvet Underground, The Slits, Vaselines and Joy Division, but also even as far reaching as the Beatles and 1940s’ talented folk/blues singer Lead Belly. The result? A raw, unpolished sound like nothing the world had ever seen or heard before. The ‘Seattle sound’ was first coined by indie record label Sub…

The Simpsons is the greatest TV show of all time. It’s a cultural touchstone that crosses generational boundaries. A merchandising marvel that’s produced T-shirts, pencil cases, videogames, toys, stamps, a feature film, theme park rides and just about anything else you can think of. It’s an endless source of internet memes. A treasure trove of quotable lines. The coiner of universally recognised expressive noises like ‘d’oh’, ‘yoink’, and ‘meh’. A pioneering production that popularised the idea of animation for adults. For all those reasons and more, The Simpsons is one of the best things the 1990s produced. It all started when Simpsons creator Matt Groening was contacted by executive producer James L Brooks about making a series of animated shorts based on his long-running Life in Hell comic strip for…

“You can find a Simpsons version of pretty much every famous board game” Given that early Simpsons fever was centred around Bart, it’s no surprise that merchandising efforts began by cashing in on the spikey-haired rebel’s popularity. A talking Bart Simpson doll was one of the first examples of Simpsons toys. It would spout catchphrases like “Don’t have a cow, man!” and “Ay carumba!” Alongside the dolls, Bart Simpson T-shirts were an essential for the ’90s kid. You couldn’t go anywhere without seeing an image of him saying ‘eat my shorts’ on the T-shirts of passers-by, or hanging from racks in the shops. We’re pleased that the Simpsons series soon realised it could do better than rely on catchphrases, but they proved valuable in the early days of shifting Bart…

Box office became a big deal during the ’90s, with many of the decade’s biggest hitters effortlessly surpassing the $500 million mark that the films of the ’80s failed to dent. 13 films smashed the barrier with ease, while Titanic went one better, earning over $1.843 billion. Money wasn’t the only thing that was changing: audiences’ tastes were, too. Horror movies that had been hugely popular during the ’80s began to fade, only returning later in the decade, while gross-out comedies like There’s Something About Mary and Dumb and Dumber found new audiences. The runaway success of Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs reignited interest in crime capers, while Dances with Wolves and Unforgiven are largely responsible for making Westerns fashionable again. While action stars like Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger no…

The idea behind the Tamgotchi was simple: what if you could take your pet with you everywhere you went? Tamagotchi creator Aki Maita answered that question by developing a small, egg-shaped digital device with a keychain that made it easy to carry with you. You started with an egg on your screen, which was meant to be deposited on earth by an alien species, according to Tamagotchi’s own mythos. You would wait for the egg to hatch and, eventually, out would pop a small pet. Using the three buttons under the screen, you had to feed it when it was hungry, bath it, play with it, give it medicine if it got sick, and clean up its poos. If you neglected your Tamagotchi, the poor creature would pass away and…

If you ever played Dream Phone, there was no forgetting it. The board game had the Dream Phone itself as the centrepiece, a giant bright pink phone in the middle of the table. The board was anchored around the phone, as was all the action. But what was its purpose? The idea of the game is that one of 24 guys fancies you, and you need to find out who. Each player has photo cards with a guy on and his phone number. By calling each number on the Dream Phone, you’d get a clue as to who the guy is. Clues would range from useful (“He doesn’t like pizza”) to vague (“He looks cool in whatever he wears”) to unhelpful (“I know who it is… but I’m not telling!…

The ’90s was arguably the most important era in videogame history. The fierce battle for console supremacy between Nintendo’s SNES and Sega’s Mega Drive kicked the decade off, the rivalry taking the world by storm as kids across the globe went to bat for their favourite system, and the companies’ mascots, Mario and Sonic, became household names. That rivalry fuelled the creation of countless 16-bit classics – games like Super Mario World, Sonic the Hedgehog 2, Golden Axe, Super Mario Kart, Streets of Rage II and Super Metroid. It wasn’t just Nintendo and Sega churning out great games. Other developers were creating some of the most influential titles of all time. We’re talking about the most important fighting game in the genre’s history: Street Fighter II, FPS juggernauts Doom and…

The Mega Drive was a powerhouse at the time of its release. It had a separate processor to handle its audio, freeing up the main processor to work with the video processor, and a palette of 512 colours to push big sprites in vibrant scenes. Using those tools, the system offered incredible graphics that had never been seen in the home before, delivering an impressive library of arcade ports such as Golden Axe and Altered Beast. The system also enjoyed strong support from third-party publishers, most notably the first entries in EA’s juggernaut sports series, FIFA and Madden, the latter of which was important in helping the console gain traction in the US, where it was known as the Genesis. The series most strongly associated with the system, however, is…

01 SUPER MARIO KART » RELEASED: 1993 » PUBLISHED BY: NINTENDO » CREATED BY: NINTENDO » BY THE SAME DEVELOPER: SUPER MARIO BROS We’ve been playing the original Super Mario Kart on and off now for over 25 years and it still remains fresher than a baker’s dozen that’s just popped out the oven. Meticulously designed circuits, a well-balanced range of weapons – including the greatly missed feather – and impressive visuals proved perfectly that there was so much more to everyone’s favourite plumber than simply jumping on wayward Koopas. While the cups provided plenty of fun, it was the stunning time trial mode and sublime multi-player games that kept us constantly going back for just one more go. Those who missed out first time around can now experience it…

Sony’s PlayStation was an upstart console that shook the gaming world. It was all about Nintendo and Sega until the PlayStation came along and shocked everyone by shattering their dominance and overtaking both companies. This was a system that embraced the future. It was the first console to focus on 3D, positioning it at the cutting edge of the medium. Indeed, Sony consciously played on the idea that it was on the edge, marketing the console towards young adults in a successful bid to be viewed as the cool system. The PlayStation’s use of CDs, rather than cartridges, was another forward-thinking move. The lower costs of the media and higher storage capacity proved to be a big advantage, and effectively signalled the death of cartridges. Using discs meant that the…

The ’90s saw plenty of children’s TV shows transform into cultural phenomena, but not many of them were aimed at preschoolers. Yet, when Teletubbies debuted on the BBC back in the spring of 1997, the simple and colourful world of four strange little baby creatures captured the imagination of kids and parents alike. It also became a merchandising beast, with the plush toys of its titular quartet – Tinky Winky, Dipsy, Laa-Laa and Po – becoming one of the most sought-after toys at Christmas that year. Teletubbies went head to head with Tamagotchi that year, with the red-coloured Po proving the most popular gift. When it dropped onto BBC Two (back when we didn’t have rolling kids’ TV channels, but small slots on weekdays when children’s television programmes would be…

When Israeli-American TV producer Haim Saban travelled to Japan on a business trip in the mid-’80s, he came across a broadcast full of characters in bright costumes, imbued with superhero strength and acrobatic fighting skills. That show was Super Sentai, a series that had been a staple for young Japanese fans since 1975. When he returned to the States, he eagerly helped put together a pilot – known as Bio-Man – which he shopped around various studios. When Bio-Man failed to catch a break, the show was re-edited with footage from Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger (a contemporary version of Super Sentai) and renamed Galaxy Rangers. When Fox Kids picked it up in the early ’90s, the rest, as they say, was history. When the show premiered in 1993, it was more…

If you happened to be a child or teenager during the 1990s, you’ll know that this was the decade for must-have toys. Kid-friendly items that were not just must-have accessories as they had been in previous decades, but were now their very own phenomenon. Much like Mighty Morphin Power Rangers six years earlier, it would be another show with Japanese origins that would spawn a brand-new craze to take over school playgrounds and Christmas wishlists everywhere. Pokémon was upon us. The late ’90s saw the Japanese brand take over the world on all fronts. Starting out as a series of videogames on the Game Boy released in Japan in 1996 (we wouldn’t get any of them in the West until 1998), a trading card game was soon launched the same…

Today, Beanie Babies are as ubiquitous as most other soft-toy brands, but back in the ’90s it was a toy craze that became so popular collectors descended into bank-balance-destroying bidding wars to own the most exclusive editions. Some single toys would go for as much as ten times their original prices. Creator Ty Warner would often ‘retire’ certain designs, a tactic that made them even more popular – and sent collectors into overdrive in a mad bid to acquire each new rarity. The Beanie Babies craze reached its peak in 1998, with sales exceeding $1.4 billion, but they were first released back in 1993 with only nine different designs on offer. Warner’s decision to only sell them to select retailers made them novelty items at first, but a promotional campaign…

When the students of Bayside lit up the small screen in 1989 with their high-school high jinks and comedy adventures, there was a sense of familiarity for many viewers. After all, actors Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Dustin Diamond, Lark Voorhies and Dennis Haskins had appeared together on a previous show called Good Morning, Miss Bliss. But it was the hit US kids’ sitcom Saved by the Bell that made household names of their characters, Zack Morris, Samuel ‘Screech’ Powers, Lisa Turtle, and the beloved principal Mr Richard Belding. Disney had decided not to recommission Good Morning, Miss Bliss, so NBC stepped in, axing all but the aforementioned four, and bolstering them with Zack’s love interest, Kelly Kapowski (played by the all-American gal Tiffani-Amber Thiessen); the strong, perm-haired, feminist brainbox Jessie Spano (played…

The revolutionary and inspirational work of Public Enemy, NWA, Run DMC, Eric B and Rakim, Afrikaa Bambaataa and more put hip hop into the hearts, minds and ears of fans across the world in the ’80s, yet the ’90s provided a launch pad for many artists to innovate and showcase their skills. While this big melting pot of styles divided audiences at times, there was no denying that music fans were spoilt for choice with the offerings. On the one hand, you had Fresh Prince, MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice producing – let’s say – accessible tracks that raised the profile of the genre to mainstream audiences. Yet, on the other, groups such as the East Coast Native Tongues collective were positively influencing the music community with socially conscious hip…

When trying to put your finger on what it is that makes The Simpsons such a great TV show, it’s hard to look past its characters as the starting point. There tended to be a veneer of fakeness about the sitcom families we were exposed to when the show debuted. Despite being bright-yellow cartoon characters, the Simpsons, in contrast, felt uncompromisingly real. Every member of the family is flawed. Their relationships are troubled and the resolutions they reach to overcome their problems often feel patchwork and makeshift. Precisely because the Simpsons aren’t idealised, precisely because their relationships are messy and difficult, we can identify with them. We can see their flaws in ourselves and our family members. We can laugh at the way The Simpsons brilliantly exposes the reality of…

Wrestling fans of the ’90s may remember Bret ‘The Hitman’ Hart, the British Bulldog and SummerSlam 92 from the early years of the decade, but, following a slump in popularity, it wasn’t until the Attitude Era hit that wrestling became a worldwide sensation. Towards the tail end of 1997, WWE began shifting away from being a product aimed primarily at kids and its traditional good-guys-versus-bad-guys template to take a more adult, edgy and controversial approach. Before you knew it, WWE (WWF at the time) had a new ‘scratch’ logo, wrestlers were smashing each other with chairs and crashing through tables, TV ratings had exploded, and wrestling was cool again. The Attitude Era had begun. There were several stars that helped WWE attain this new level of cultural relevance – The…

Every decade has its defining pop-culture moments. But for the millions of viewers glued to NBC’s warm and lovable sitcom, Friends, it came towards the end of an episode that debuted on 9 November 1995. It showed Rachel clearing up at the Central Perk coffee shop and Ross walking in, sparking an argument and leaving. As Rachel sat with her head in her hands, Ross could be seen standing by the door. Rachel walks across, fumbles with the locks, finally lets him back in and the pair find themselves in a loving embrace. It was Ross and Rachel’s very first kiss. And it felt just as right for those watching as it did for the characters. But then it was always meant to be that way – at least up…

By the beginning of the ’90s, board games were either a family game played on a lazy weekend or the imagined canvas for groups of bespectacled roleplayers. But then along came a game that changed all that, introducing not only a fresh injection of horror, but a new interactive element that no one had attempted before. This was Nightmare (or Atmosfear if you live in the United Kingdom or North America). The unusual yet instantly addictive combination made it a smash hit, with its success peaking around 1993. Later versions of the game would swap the video cassette for a DVD, but popping in that clumsy VHS and pausing/playing each section was all part of its charm at the time. With a board, pieces and cards, the aim would be…

The Game Boy was far more basic than handheld competitors like Sega’s Game Gear and the Atari Lynx. It only had two-buttons to complement its d-pad and a single-colour screen, as opposed to the vibrant colour offered by its rivals. However, its simplicity worked in its favour, the console’s accessibility broadening its audience, and the simple screen giving it an incredible battery life that smashed the pitiful efforts of its foes. This helped make the Game Boy a huge success. It enjoyed strong sales right out the gate, and had an unusually long lifespan. It was still going strong in the late ’90s when the release of the Game Boy Color in 1998 and the first-entry in one of the most successful videogame franchises of all-time in Pokémon Red and Blue…

01 SONIC THE HEDGEHOG 2 » RELEASED: 1992 » PUBLISHED BY: SEGA » CREATED BY: SONIC TEAM » BY THE SAME DEVELOPER: SONIC THE HEDGEHOG After the success of the original Sonic The Hedgehog, it came as no surprise to see the lovable scamp returning a year later in a brand-new adventure. With a refined engine, the addition of Miles “Tails” Prowler, a greatly enhanced bonus stage and an excellent two-player mode, Sonic The Hedgehog 2 is easily one of the hedgehog’s most memorable 16-bit outings. While the core gameplay is little different to that seen in the original, Sonic Team threw in plenty of new touches to ensure that gamers wouldn’t feel short-changed. The end result is not only one of the Mega Drive’s greatest platformers, but quite possibly…

Go back to the early days of 3D gaming and you can find plenty of titles that have aged badly. That’s not true when it comes to the Nintendo 64’s key games, and that’s evidence of the fact that it laid down the template for how to do 3D right. After defining 2D platforming with its mascot, Mario, Nintendo did the same for 3D platforming with Super Mario 64. The game featured a ground-breaking open approach that let you explore Bowser’s Castle at will, a revolutionary dynamic camera system, and amazingly precise movement, setting new standards for 3D gaming. That wasn’t the only influential title on the console either: The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time’s lock-on system has become an action-game staple, and GoldenEye 007’s thrilling multiplayer matches popularised…

In the early 1990s, two words were absolutely synonymous with dripping popsicles, playing outside until the sun set, and those wonderfully schoolless summer months: Super Soaker. Created by prolific patent-holder and NASA scientist Lonnie Johnson in his basement during spare evening hours in 1982, this soon-to-be revolution in water-gun culture was, believe it or not, born out of Johnson’s attempts at creating a new kind of heat-pump technology for refrigerators and air-conditioning units. He shopped around the humble prototype – a hodgepodge built out of a two-litre soda bottle, Plexiglas and PVC pipe – for several years, until finally catching a break with promising toy company Larami. When it officially launched in 1990, the Super Soaker line didn’t bare the now-recognisable (and totally radical) moniker, but instead the less-appealing Power…

Let’s be honest, the ’90s was the decade for weird and wonderful board games. Whether you were moving around a board while watching a creepy and faux-interactive VHS tape, or attempting to give a plastic crocodile so much needed dentistry, there were myriad ways to play unusual pastimes with family and friends. So, of course, these were the years when the strange and addictive toy that was Bop It took the world by storm. Made by toy giant Hasbro, and first released in 1996, Bop It is as bizarre as it looks and sounds. The original version included three commands – ‘pull it’, ‘twist it’ and ‘bop it’ – with each one requiring a different action across its musical instrument-esque design. That first iteration only included one voiceover option, but…

With Polly Pocket proving that miniature playsets were a big hit with pre-teen girls, it was only a matter of time before Bluebird Toys expanded on the concept, and introduced a line of matching tiny products aimed squarely at young boys. Sporting the same compact, self-contained design as its successful sister line, Mighty Max hit store shelves in 1992, backed by a simple premise: titular Max finds a magical baseball cap that allows him to open mysterious portals, and these shimmering gateways lead to all manner of sinister otherworlds and supernatural situations. Exciting exploration, close-call battles and near-death escapes ensue. Such a fantastic foundation allowed for edgy, oftentimes gross and ultimately horror-themed aesthetics – snakes, spiders, bats, zombies, dragons, aliens, lava monsters and even rampaging dinosaurs were regular adversaries in…

While electronic toys from Japan would revolutionise the toy market in the mid to late ’90s, the early part of the decade still belonged to more classic board-game designs. One such creation proved to be one of the wackiest ideas ever (and one that’s still a popular choice today), and it just so happened to include a set of pliers and one temperamental crocodile with a sore tooth. Designed by inventor Robert B Fuhrer in the late ’80s, the original version of what came to be known as Crocodile Dentist went through a number of changes. The classic ‘lunging’ motion the game became so well known for was originally removed, as it was thought it might scare young players and put them off the game entirely. Fuhrer was also forced…

It’s hard to imagine life before the iPod, but back in 1992, Sony’s answer to digital data storage for the home market was the MiniDisc. The technology was used in portable players, home stereos and as a file storage medium. With an appearance that resembled a floppy disc and tiny CD combined, the MiniDisc was a magneto-optical, disc-based data storage format. It first launched with a capacity to hold 60 minutes of compressed audio, which was later increased to 74 and then again to 80 minutes. Sony marketed the MiniDisc as a higher-quality alternative to cassette tapes due to its rewriting functionality. What was also great about it was its ability to buffer music for six to ten seconds: it meant that your tunes were far less likely to skip…

Long before teen dramas and teen comedies took over the big screen in the early 2000s, one TV show brought young angst and the transformative time of high school to life like no other. Broadcast from 1990 to 2000, Beverly Hills, 90210 set the blueprint for all the big teen-based shows that followed, from Dawson’s Creek to The OC. It even got a soft reboot in 2008, but this new iteration was a far cry from the trailblazer that was its original. Sure, it did have cast members that were far too old to play students attending high school (those wrinkles and receding hairlines look even more cringe-worthy today), but it really did break the mould when it came to portraying some incredibly taboo subjects on prime-time US TV. It…

The Britpop era did not last very long, but as a musical movement, it beat the drum (and strummed the guitar) so very loud and proud. Some have claimed it was bookended by two albums of wildly differing quality: Blur’s Parklife on 25 April 1994, and Oasis’s Be Here Now in August 1997. But while those two bands were at the pinnacle of this pop-culture phenomenon, a huge explosion of new guitar bands ensured they were far from lonely. ON STANDBY Blur was first off the mark. The group released the single Popscene on 30 March 1992, and while it only peaked at Number 32 in the UK singles chart, it featured frontman Damon Albarn snottily delivering a petulant two-fingered assault on the derivative tradition of contemporary pop. This was…