I hadn’t planned on posting Tyler Skate Machine until I made the mistake of digging into it a little. It turns out the Skate Machine, a toy from Sungold meant to be used with their Galaxy Warriors line of toys is pretty much a ripoff of the Cheapskate from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which makes sense since the Galaxy Warriors were set up to be an off-brand version of Masters of the Universe in the first place.

– Thanks to Bobcat for the tip.

Doug Avery made a music video for Hot Lunch‘s song Killer Smile in the style of 90’s videos games with a nod to the 720 and Skate or Die video games, plus a handful of easter egg references to the Bones Brigade Video show, and 70’s wheels brand UFO. It’s really well done, right down to the time appropriate aspect ratio. It’s sure to make you want to skate, play video games or rock out. Maybe even buy a motorcycle…. (Hey Wes!)

Machine Man first appeared in the 1977 series 2001, a Space Odyssey before getting his own short-lived series in 1978 that lasted for 19 issues until it was canceled. It would be resurrected for volume 2 in the 80’s and Volume 3 in the 90’s. He’s the last surviving android unit of a military experiment, and predictably, the military is out to terminate him. He’s able to produce Inspector Gadget type augmentations to his physical body, but you know, in a serious manner. In this first issue he bugs out in a traffic jam and produces a skateboard in two halves from his feet that lock together, allowing him to escape.

Another moment in Alibaba greatness… This skateboard that, according to some of the descriptions and videos, actually dispenses a mist of some kind that is backlit by led lights to make it look like rockets. The descriptions are astonishingly vague on how this works. Nor do they offer any additional info in the listings that say they have a “music speaker.” The same product is listed by different agents, all with a different, amusing name.

The PXL2000 was a camera released in 1987 by the toy company Fisher-Price. These things cost around $200, which is about $590 these days. They were discontinued after about a year, probably because that was a lot of money for a kid’s toy. A verified working camera that isn’t “as-is” will set you back around $500 today. I first became aware of these back in the day because Dan Estabrook of Contort mentioned a skate video being shot on this camera, and this would have been anywhere from 87-89. I never saw that video, but I did keep my eyes peeled (unsuccessfully) to buy a camera of my own. Fisher-Price made a print ad for the camera that featured skateboarding, as well as a TV commercial with incidental skateboard content.

I thought Gashapon was the brand name but it turns out that’s what the Japanese call those little vending machines that you can buy miniature toys from. More or less in the style of what we’d call gumball machines in the US. This is the Little Boarder set, and like the advert says, Anything goes, little boarder! Indeed, these are just tiny skateboard figures attached to mostly unrelated food items.

So far this is only the second appearance of Woody Woodpecker on Skate and Annoy, but it’s a big one. It started how these things usually start, an innocent glance at an auction item or an old forgotten file saved on a hard drive. Instead of just a puzzle, this time we’ve got PVC figures, plastic fast food toys, alarm clocks, animation cells, skateboards, and a comic book.

There’s so much “skateboard art” out there these days that they don’t really warrant their own post anymore. Jeanne Drevas’ work definitely caught my eye when I spotted it in a local gallery. There’s something much more tactile about these that made me want to pick them up and examine them. Somehow they reminded me of some of the funky chunky toy aesthetics of the 70’s. I originally saw these in 2016, and of course, sat on my pics until now. Skateboard-based art was just a phase for Jeanne, a phase that lasted from 2016-17. Leave it to me to wait 10 years to post this. The gallery is gone now, but I think she’s still making art though.

Check out this newspaper advert for Vita-Pakt and Hobie skateboards. At first glance you would be forgiven for thinking this was from the 70’s, but might think this is from the 70’s, but the publication date is actually July 14th of 1968! This ad ran in the comics section of a newspaper. Which newspaper? I don’t know. Ebay sellers don’t like to reveal that because then you could just try to find the whole paper or magazine for less than the selected page they are selling. Check out Surfer Today if you’re interested in how Vita-Pakt and Hobie teamed up to manufacture skateboards in the 60’s. Keep reading if you want to see the advert.

Laugh Comics Volume 2, #6 was published in 1988. There’s no skateeboaridn on the cover, unless you count the teaser: “The mighty Archie Art Players star in the suspense thriller ‘Skateboard Scandal’.” And what is that scandal? Someone is sabotaging all the skateboards in Britain in a James Bond parody starring Archie as James Bland and Betty as Miss Henny Penny. Veronica is the Bond-girl (Bland Girl) Lord Cedric’s daughter Pamela. There’s also an ad for Archie posters (he’s on a skateboard in one of them) and an Olympic Sales Club ad where you can earn a Variflex skateboard.