Tickle Me Elmo
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Tickle Me Elmo is a childrens' toy from Tyco, introduced in the United States in 1996, becoming that year's top fad. Bright red in color and based on Elmo, a Muppet character from Sesame Street, when squeezed, Elmo would chortle. When squeezed three times in a row, Elmo would begin to shake and laugh hysterically. On its back is a velcro access slit, inside which the batteries are located. This toy was extremely popular back in 1996, this was called a media frenzy. Some TMX were so limited in stores they rose up the price to $2000.
In 1996, the Tickle Me Elmo was the "Must Have" toy. Many parents literally fought other parents in North American toy stores to purchase one of the toys for Christmas. The short supply of the toy, due to unexpected demand, meant that stores hiked the price on the dolls drastically. Newspaper classifieds even sold the plush toy for hundreds of U.S. dollars. People reports that the US$28.99 toy fetched as much as $1500. Controversy has surrounded Tickle Me Elmo due to the fact that Elmo laughed whenever and wherever he was touched, including his "genitals".[citation needed]
A clerk at the Wal-Mart in Fredericton, New Brunswick was among those injured by "Elmo-mania". A crowd of 300 stampeded into the store on 14 December 1996; spotting him with one of the remaining toys, he "was pulled under, trampled—the crotch was yanked out of [his] brand-new jeans." According to People, the clerk "suffered a pulled hamstring, injuries to his back, jaw and knee, a broken rib and a concussion."
The vibrating laughter produced by the Tickle Me Elmo uses the same motorized device that is used for the vibrate mode found in almost all cellular phones .[1]
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[edit] Further Tickle Me toys
By February 1997, Tickle Me Ernie and Tickle Me Big Bird toys were released, followed by Tickle Me Cookie Monster in May. None of these toys achieved nearly as much fame, or sales.
The "Surprise Edition" of Tickle Me Elmo, issued in the Fall of 2001, was an elaborate contest. Five of the "Surprise Edition" Elmos stopped laughing on 9 January 2002, and instead announced to the people squeezing them that they had won a prize. The grand prize was US$200,000. http://www.wired.com/news/culture/0,1284,47368,00.html
[edit] TMX
The new Elmo doll, announced at the American International Toy Fair 2006, is called TMX (meaning Tickle Me (Elmo) Ten or Tickle Me Extreme). Rather than simply vibrating like the original, the TMX rolls around on the floor laughing and smashing his fist on the ground, begging for the tickler to stop (watch video). The full look of the doll was not revealed until it debuted live on ABC's Good Morning America and arrived on store shelves on September 19, 2006. Even the box it comes in is designed so that the doll can not be seen without purchasing it. A preview flap is included, but upon opening, you see Elmo's eyes. He says "Ah, ah, ah, ah! No peeking!" and giggles. It requires six AA batteries (which are included), and costs approximately US$40. Toy experts say that the delay is unprecedented, with only a few people in the media allowed to preview the product, all signing confidentiality agreements. In a promotional clip, Jim Silver, co-publisher of Toy Wishes magazine says "The first reaction I had was, 'Where are the wires?' Because I didn't think anything like that could move on its own."[2].
Toy analyst Chris Byrne told USA Today, "This is a quantum leap forward, another breakthrough in the preschool plush category." Byrne believes sales will be high, but the reaction will not be as unprecedented. "The culture has moved beyond that, the whole hot-toy phenomenon." He cites the fact there has not been such a craze since Furby in 1998.[2] However, some members of the media are expecting a large response.[3]
Toys R Us stores and Amazon had a pre-sale program for the doll, the first included elaborate in-store displays with a digital countdown to the doll's launch. Amazon took more presale orders than it could fulfill.[4]
As with the original Tickle Me Elmo doll, demand for the new toy has given rise to extreme acts by some people. One person in Tampa, Florida was allegedly threatened with a gun to hand over a TMX toy.[5]
Mattel credits this toy, along with two others, for its performance the six cent share increase from that time, a year earlier. TMX also helped increase sales of other Elmo toys.[6]
[edit] Promotional buzz
In the initial days after TMX was released, hundreds of news articles could be found on the Web and in newspapers and many reports were broadcast on radio and T.V. about Elmo being sold out and how Elmos were selling on eBay for $1,000 or more (which was the asking price, rather than the actual price paid). There were numerous reports that no new Elmos would be available until 2007. Some buyers were indeed caught up in this hype and paid well over $100 for their Elmo on eBay. But as Christmas loomed ever closer, more Elmos began showing up on store shelves. Wal-Mart suddenly had thousands in stock and Toys-R-Us had dozens in stock at each store. The price of Elmo on eBay began to fall. By 12/19 you would be hard pressed to see an Elmo sell for more than $40. Sellers began resorting to charging outragous shipping prices in an attempt to bump up their profit. And while print and broadcast media felt it newsworthy to help hype Elmo, very few reports could be found about the "Elmo Bubble" popping.
[edit] Variations
There are two versions of the TMX doll, one which has the Warning sticker on front (which most TMX dolls have now) and the Top Secret sticker (which was just for launch, making that more rare). Both appear to be identical except for the variation in the text on the front, and Elmo says different things when opening the flap. When the flap is opened on the Top Secret box, Elmo says "Uh uh uh! No peeking! Hahahaha!" When the flap on the Warning box is opened, he says "Elmo feels really ticklish in here! Hahahaha!" However some "Top Secret" boxes in the United Kingdom have been reported to have the latter sound, e.g. "Elmo feels very ticklish in here" et cetera when lifting the flap. There are differences under the flap too. On the Warning box, there are images of the TMX Elmo rolling and giggling, while the Top Secret box only has an image of Elmo peeking out of the box.
Mattel announced versions of the toy featuring Ernie and Cookie Monster.[7]
[edit] Tickle Me Elmo in popular culture
While Elmo has been referenced or seen in three episodes of The Simpsons, the doll version of the character made an appearance in "Moe Baby Blues". Elmo slaps Moe in the episode, after Moe tries to fondle him, yelling "No means no to Elmo!" Another episode features a "Tickle Me Krusty" doll which chuckles and angrily shouts, "Hey kid! Get your finger outta there!"
Tickle Me Elmo was the subject of an art exposition at the Ronald Feldman Gallery, in New York City, in September of 2003. Kelly Heaton, the artist, engineered a vibrating coat out of dissected Tickle Me Elmo dolls. The title of the show was Live Pelt.
Tickle Me Elmo has also appeared in Get Fuzzy. In the first cartoon, we find out Bucky Katt beat the stuffing out of it, causing $40 worth of damage. Bucky explains, "It was laughin at me!"
An episode of Histeria! parodied the concept, as well as the fact that the teddy bear was named after Theodore Roosevelt, with a sketch revolving around a doll in the likeness of Richard Nixon, called "Squeeze Me Nixon".
The 1996 movie Jingle All The Way is similar to the 1996 Tickle Me Elmo craze in that the main character, Howard Langston (played by Arnold Schwarzenegger), has to get a Turboman doll for his son on Christmas Eve, but finds out they are sold out and goes to great lengths to get one.
A sketch from the Canadian satire show Royal Canadian Air Farce portrayed a man walking into a store to return a defective Cabbage Patch Snacktime Kids doll. Parodying the problem of the dolls, the man had the doll literally attached to his head after "snacking" on his hair (which was the problem the mechanical dolls had). After some dialogue the man asks how they can possibly repay him for all the suffering and humilitation he went through. The clerk then pulls out a Tickle Me Elmo and offers it, which the man excitedly accepts.
A short segment of Jhonen Vasquez's Johnny the Homicidal Maniac concerned a doll satirically called Tickle-Me-Hellmo. The segment was a collection of one-panel shots detailing the increasing levels of behavior for the doll; the more it is tickled, the more devilish it becomes, performing acts such as summoning Satan and torturing children.
A sketch from Mad TV did a parody of the doll with "Tickle Me Emo", a doll that has the outward appearance of an emo, with a My Chemical Romance patch on its shirt. It is the "tortured, angst-ridden teen cousin of Elmo from Depress-a-Me street." When its hand is squeezed, however, instead of laughing, it says one of its 13 preprogrammed emo phrases such as "If life is so fair, then how come roses have thorns?" When you upset Tickle Me Emo and leave it alone for too long, it responds by cutting itself with a razor blade. Videos of the skit are viewable on YouTube.
[edit] External links
- Wired: Elmo's Worth More Than a Tickle on the Surprise Edition
- Sesame Street: Tickle Elmo, an online simulation of the toy
- CBS13.com: Elmo Demostration Video demonstration of the new Tickle Me Elmo
