RICHARD ORD: Don't tell me Action Man's been cancelled

Found myself in a toy shop this week (don’t ask) scanning aisle upon aisle of kiddies’ goodies.
Old favourites like Action Man and new the Seven Dwarfs are falling out of favour...Old favourites like Action Man and new the Seven Dwarfs are falling out of favour...
Old favourites like Action Man and new the Seven Dwarfs are falling out of favour...

And when I say ‘don’t ask’ it’s not because of some dark secret, but the fact that I have no idea what I was doing in there. That’s the beauty of my feeble mind deteriorating as I get older. It’s keen as mustard to ditch as much information as it can with little notice. The more vital the fact, the more likely my mind will volley it to the dark recesses of my brain.

My conversations are, as a result, dismally detail-free and unnecessarily lengthy as I try to retrieve even the most trivial of memories.

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“I went to that toy shop, you know, erm, thingies. Not Toys R Us, the other one. Anyway, don’t know why I went there but it was Thursday and, oh wait, couldn’t have been Thursday, I was at thingies then…” And so it goes on.

Of course, at the end of the day, when it doesn’t matter since the person has long since gone, the exact details will rush back. I’ll often wake in the middle of the night and shout out a recalled name, just 12 hours too late.

Anyway, while I was in ‘thingies’ toy shop, I thought I’d check out an old favourite of my youth to see how he’d developed.

Action Man was the ultimate boy’s toy. Early doors, however, he was a bit ropy. For those who remember, the original fixed plastic hands were great for gripping absolutely nothing, least of all his weapons. In later years, he got proper grip hands. Rubber fingers that could hold guns with ease. He grew real hair, and even a beard. Later incarnations saw him fitted with swiveling eyes. Brilliant.

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I checked the aisles to see how Action Man of today was developing. Turns out he’s got a new attribute … invisibility!

He was nowhere to be seen. Which got me wondering. Has he been cancelled?

A battle-scarred, machine gun toting mercenary as a child’s gift probably doesn’t go down too well with some parents these days. And maybe they have a point.

I suspect Action Man just ran his course, but other old favourites are also in the firing line.

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The Seven Dwarfs could soon be chased out of town if actor Peter Dinklage has his way. The Game of Thrones actor has criticised Disney for considering a reboot of Snow White featuring Bashful and the gang branding it a ‘backward story of seven dwarfs living in a cave.’

Jeez, leave them be. Disney hit back saying they were going to ‘avoid reinforcing stereotypes from the original animated film.’

But weren’t the dwarfs good guys with a commendable work ethic?

And what stereotypes were they reinforcing? All people with dwarfism are sleepy? The majority are dopey and want to pursue a career in medicine? Ridiculous.

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Too many people find fault because that’s all they’re looking for. And for your information, Mr Dinklage, the dwarfs lived in a house. The cave was where they worked. I’d fire off a strongly-worded email to Mr D, but I guess he’d just find something else to complain about.

Good actor, but at times he can be terribly grumpy.

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