[Retro Bunker] Underoos™

Dale Cooper

– October 8, 2009Posted in: Pop Culture, Retro Bunker, Spotlight

to the rescue

Ask any young boy what he would wish for if he had one unconditional wish and more often than not his request would be for a superpower or, if of the crafty mind, the request would be to become a superhero with an entire arsenal of superpowers.

At very least young boys (and select, special, wonderful girls) of my generation spent a ridiculous amount of time suspended in childhood morass, fighting against adulthood by channeling the power of their favorite superheros.

Of course every child’s favorite holiday is Christmas. Nothing can compare with time off from school and tons of gifts and food. But, on pure aesthetics, no holiday can compete with Halloween. If this were a Halloween post, I’d go into candy hording and eating, being scared, etc. However, the salient point about Halloween is that children dig is because they can dress up as monsters, aliens, and yes, especially, superheros. It’s a Right of the Passage that comes with that age.

Halloween costumes were mostly tacky affairs where there was little durability. They were made for that one special night of the year and that was it. Try to wear that thin plastic cape or stretch the hair-tangling band on the back of the mask every day and one is courting imminent failure.

For daily wear, a young Clark Kent could count on his own ingenuity for his costumed alter-ego, but the product of such an endeavor could lead to some uneven results as seen below.

That’s me. I’m costumed in a silver ‘Superman: The Movie’ logo shirt and suspenders.

Underoos™

Not me

It seems that all toy tie-in marketing can be traced back to 1977 and the Star Wars phenomena. It comes at no surprise that Underoos™ was a child of the omnipresent child marketing of 1977, sold to Fruit-of-the-loom in 1978, and that it was an avalanche of a success. Initially rolled out in only select markets, demand became so high for Underoos™ that it went wide soon after and changed the landscape of childhood overnight.

The four brands initially licensed to Underoos were: DC Comics, Marvel Comics, Hannah-Barbera, and Archie Comics. Three outta four ain’t bad when anticipating demand. ‘Star Wars’ licensing was added later to complete the domination.

Underoos combined many things that an energetic (Today: ADD) rapscallion with a superhero fetish could want. Those things include 1) Authentic(ish) costumes ’cause you gotta walk the walk and a red dyed pantyhose leg with drawn-on webbing does not really look much like a Spider-Man mask; 2) The ‘ok’ to dress up year round. This is a biggie. As soon as the parentals gave in to the strategic war (including whining, placing the package in the cart ‘by accident,’ etc.) on their unconstitutional withholding of Underoos, then the taboo on dressing up as heroes on a regular (read: daily) basis went out the window; 3) It’s underwear! I know I looked for any excuse to only wear underwear as often as possible (still do). Underoos were perfect for that because what parent in her right mind is going to tell her little hero that he can only wear his costume to bed? Heroes can’t roll like that.

Me again. As one can see, the Underoos costume was quite effective for every day wear. Here I am subduing my future steed on whom I wish to bestow SuperHorsey powers as appropriate for its purpose.