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Do You Remember These Awesome Halloween Boglins?
Halloween hand puppets! Fun for all ages!
One of the most beloved monster toy lines of the 1980s was Mattel’s Boglins, which were created by Timothy Clarke and Maureen Trotto. The Boglins, rubber hand puppets that were housed inside of cage-like boxes, were conceived by Clarke as a way to get kids into puppetry – he himself was fresh off working with the Jim Henson Company on The Dark Crystal at the time – and they were marketed as gross-out pets that you could, well, wear on your hand. Sticking your hand into the Boglins allowed you to open and close their mouths and even, thanks a mechanism inside, move their eyeballs back and forth. At the time, there was nothing else on the market like them, and still to this day, the movie-quality craftsmanship is incredibly impressive.
The original line of Boglins, which included characters like Dwork and Drool, paved the way for all sorts of spin-offs, including Aquatic Boglins, Belching Boglins, Boglins with hair, and even Mini Boglins. But the coolest spin-off line was the Halloween Boglins, which introduced two brand new creatures: Bog-O-Bones, painted like a skeleton, and Blobkin, painted like a pumpkin.
“It was kind of a kitschy thing to do for Halloween,” Tim Clarke told me when I spoke with him a couple years back. “I never thought they’d become so popular. But people really loved them.”
How could you not?!
As he noted on his Instagram account, @TimClarkeToys just whipped up brand new custom versions of both Bog-O-Bones and Blobkin, which will be shown off at the Clutter Gallery’s upcoming Boglins show, running from November 12th through December 2nd. The event celebrates the relaunch of the line, and could lead to the return of the Halloween Boglins.
“We will see what kind of interest there is to decide if I do more,” says Clarke.
Did you ever own a Halloween Boglin? Share your childhood memories below!
Sam Neill, the New Zealand actor best known for his role in 1993’s Jurassic Park, has passed away this week at 78 years old. In a statement shared on Neill’s Instagram page this morning, the actor’s family said that his passing was “sudden and unexpected.”
Neill had been diagnosed with a rare blood cancer in 2022, but stated the following year that he was in remission. The family notes that he “remained cancer free” at the time of his passing.
The family statement reads, “It is with immense sadness that the whānau of Sam Neill share the news of his passing on Monday 13th July, in Sydney Australia. Sam was surrounded by family and passed with the dignity that has characterised his whole life. The loss was sudden and unexpected but blessed by the fact that Sam remained cancer free.
“They would like to express their deepest gratitude to the staff at St Vincent’s Private Hospital for their incredible care. More details will be shared later, but for now, on behalf of the family, we ask that you respect their privacy as they navigate this immeasurable loss.”
In addition to his iconic role as Dr. Alan Grant in the original Jurassic Park and the sequels Jurassic Park III and Jurassic World: Dominion, Sam Neill left an indelible mark on the horror genre with memorable roles in Andrzej Żuławski’s Possession, The Omen: The Final Conflict, John Carpenter’s In the Mouth of Madness, and sci-fi horror favorite Event Horizon.
Sam Neill’s vast resume in film and television began in the early 1970s and also includes the films Sleeping Dogs, Enigma, The Good Wife, A Cry in the Dark, Dead Calm, The Hunt for Red October, Memoirs of an Invisible Man, Hostage, The Jungle Book, Snow White: A Tale of Terror, The Horse Whisperer, Bicentennial Man, Daybreakers, Escape Plan, and Thor: Ragnarok.
Sam Neill is survived by his four children and eight grandchildren.
Steven Spielberg said in a statement to Variety, “I owe a debt of gratitude to Roger Donaldson, Gilliam Armstrong, Graham Baker and Phillip Noyce for casting Sam Neill in the roles in which he was so brilliant that brought him to my attention and led to his playing Dr. Alan Grant in Jurassic Park. Sam was exceptionally collaborative. It was a stretch for him to play a character who acted as though children were messy and smelly because this was the opposite of the loving father he was to his children. I adored making all the Jurassic movies with him.”
Spielberg adds, “Along with Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum, we will always have our Jurassic family and Sam will never be forgotten by us or his many millions of fans around the world.”
Sam Neill in ‘Event Horizon’
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