The 25 Worst "Must-Have" Christmas Toys Ever

When you were young, you could get yourself so worked up that the tone of your entire Christmas, and maybe even your happiness for the rest of the year, depended on whether or not you got that one special gift.

Did you arrive at this hypothesis about your happiness by careful planning and deduction? No, you wanted it because you were told to want it. And, man, Madison Ave. has made us want some really stupid stuff through the years. Americans have been worked up into teeth-gnashing, hair-rending Black Friday frenzies over pause-worthy dolls that wet themselves, small circular pieces of cardboard, and a product that's major appeal is that is gets smaller when you put it in an oven.

Join your Complex Pop Culture team as we shuffle through our collective attics and basements and pay our respects to those toys that we tried to sell at yard sale years ago, but we couldn't even pay someone to take. These are the 25 Worst Must-Have Christmas Toys Ever.

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Written by Brenden Gallagher (@muddycreekU)

Company: Kenner
Year: 1973

The problem with this toy is pretty obvious. Several of our staffers fondly remember puking up Christmas candy after a go-round on this bad boy. You really shouldn't be puking on Christmas until you're old enough to be crushed under the weight of credit card debt and the unresolved tensions of extended family and the only solace you can find is a fifth of Jack Daniels.

That being said, if you are such a father and you want your kids to be quiet for a while to dull your pounding hangover headache, maybe having them take a few dozen turns on the Sit 'n Spin isn't a bad idea....

Company: Mattel
Year: 1960

Chatty Cathy gets the lifetime achievement award for obnoxious toys. Without the 11 signature phrases (our favorite being "Let's play school," as it is a little bit naughty) that popped off from her low-grade phonograph, we wouldn't have the tons of obnoxious babbling dolls that haunt the dreams of every young mother and father today.

Cathy apparently gets much respect in the toy community for being there first. Here is a fan page that is entirely too in-depth, even providing you directions for shampooing the doll's hair and other creepy, creepy facts and info you never wanted.

Company: Hasbro
Year: 1971

The main selling point of the Weeble, as immortalized in their popular catchphrase, was that "they wobble but they don't fall down." That this is enough to ignite a buying frenzy tells you everything you need to know about the true meaning and complexity of human life.

Hasbro knew they had struck gold with Weebles and proceeded to make accessories that allowed you to do utterly mundane things with your Weebles like taking them camping and having them play on a run-of-the-mill community playground.

Company: Cepia Inc.
Year: 2009

This recession-era toy took the 2009 holiday season by storm for no good reason. While we appreciate that it has two modes—"nurturing" (i.e. doing nothing) and "adventure" (i.e. moving around)—it doesn't seem to offer much else.

The short shelf life on these toys is reflected in how quickly Cepia had to look for gimmicks to boost sales. You have to give them points for creativity, as they have rolled out a line of hamsters named after celebrity children and a "Kung-Fu" line of furry vermin, accompanied with a story line in which the hamsters are involved in a battle between special forces and ninja warriors.

Company: Palmer Paint
Year: 1951

This is the perfect gift for the child of an overbearing, anal retentive father who wants his kid to express himself, but not too much that he won't be able to tell what the hell his kid is painting.

At the height of the popularity of paint-by-number kits, people were astonished that they couldn't tell the difference between the original work and paint by numbers...which, you know, really isn't the point of painting. So, yeah, if the children in your family coloring outside the lines upsets you, you can pick up one of these in order to teach them that shoddily mimicking other people's art is better than making a less than perfect attempt at their own.

Company: Mattel
Year: 1950

We know. We know. We spent countless minutes asking this thing a question and then asking that question again and again until we got the answer we wanted during middle-school sleepovers as well. But, looking back on it, the whole thing amounted to a huge waste of time.

A little life spoiler for you: The secret to the clairvoyant ball is a 20-sided die with 10 positive answers, five negative, and five noncommittal. On average, it will take you 72 tries to get all answers to come up. So in less than an hour you could have gotten every possible answer to your question of whether "Christine likes you back."

Company: Fisher-Price
Year: 1957

Here we have another one of those toys that seems designed explicitly to drive parents insane. This toy is inspired by a lawnmower, both in its design and in the obnoxious noise it makes while in operation. The noises and colors are supposed to encourage children to walk.

Fear not, parents-to-be: Fisher-Price still sells numerous models, so your children will be able to torture you just as you did your parents. As with many modern innovations, the Cornpopper has been released in a new model, which maximizes laziness by allowing children to pop the colored balls while sitting, thus negating the entire point of the toy's invention.

Company: Milton Bradley
Year: 1956

Many toys are designed in order for children to emulate society's role models. This is the idea behind army men and children's size fireman hats. If this is the case, then, perhaps, it is time to take a second look at Yahtzee.

This game potentially prepares you to be a degenerate gambler, tossing dice on the block and then hustling away when the cops roll by. Little Bobby knows he's a behind this week, but you got to give him a month or so to get on a hot streak again before you take his lemonade stand and his baseball cards and start knee-capping him with a Wiffle ball bat.

Company: Hasbro
Year: 1952

Before you Potato Head lovers out there crucify us in the anonymous forum below, hear us out. The original Mr. Potato Head was built for use with an actual potato. Even those of you with ironic T-shirts and earrings featuring Mr. or Mrs. Tater have to agree that is a little ridiculous.

Besides, if you don't agree with us, the American patriots among us will. The toy stirred up controversy during World War II, as food was being rationed and it probably wasn't the best idea to put scarce foodstuffs to use by plunging eyes and mouths into them. T

hough inventor Goerge Lerner overcame this obstacle easily after the war, a new problem arose in the '60s, as the government ordered that Potato Head parts be less pointy. This led to difficulty puncturing the potatoes and the release of the more palatable plastic potato body we know today.

Company: Ideal Toy Corp.
Year: 1977

We are not busting on the invention itself, as you have to respect the elegant complexity of this colored cube. But, let's talk about this thing as a Christmas gift. The kid loves the cube until, oh, about noon on Christmas Day, when the lazy little guy gives up, and the thing becomes a permanent fixture of foot injury on the living room floor.

We're not saying don't get this cube for that special kid in your life. We're just saying make sure that his nerd credentials are up to snuff or the cube will be consigned to a box in the basement along with the unsolved cube your parents bought for your dumb ass back in the day.

Company: Gary Dahl
Year: 1975

Most of the products on this list are the result of monolithic toy companies trying to capture the hearts of children or entrepreneurs trying to get rich quick, but the Pet Rock was invented as little more than a practical joke. Though the fad (understandably) faded out after only six months, it made inventor Gary Dahl a millionaire and allowed him to open his own bar.

It's easy to dismiss the Pet Rock's ridiculousness, but let us note that at the height of the Pet Rock craze, three-quarters of America's daily newspapers had run a piece on the Pet Rock (evidently the death of journalism preceded the Internet).

Company: Tiger Electronics
Year: 1998

These creepy "hamster-owl hybrid" creatures have terrified children since their arrival in the marketplace in 1998. When you first receive a Furby, it speaks only "Furbish," and then gradually learns English. We imagine this drives conservative, Tea Party parents mad, as they prefer their toys speak English from the get-go.

These furry monsters are somewhat troubling, but they do have an ardent fan base. In 2005, a revised version of the Furby was released with emotionally life-like characteristics. This, in turn, gave rise to a number of creepy, creepy subcultures, including Furby Adoption Agencies, and, apparently, Furby Furries.

Company: Worlds of Wonder
Year: 1985

These dolls were incredibly popular throughout the late '80s until Teddy's manufacturer, World of Wonders, went belly-up after issuing junk bonds. Despite Teddy's tendency toward creepy malfunctions, his popularity soared for several years after his initial release.

Now that we have some distance for contemplation, the creepiness factor of the bear really hits home. Here is a video of an art installation from Sean Hathaway, in which a wall of Teddy Ruxpins parrot back random phrases posted on social media sites.

Company: K & B Innovations Inc.
Year: 1973

The Pitch: You put these sheets in the oven and they get smaller...and that's it. Betty Morris and Kathryn Bloomberg, stay-at-home moms turned C.E.O.s of the Shrinky Dinks empire, have become millionaires numerous times over with this invention, which caught fire in the '70s and '80s.

Despite their great success, their website still looks like this. Sugar Ray, the '90s rock band whose success is equally as inexplicable as Shrinky Dinks, was originally named Shrinky Dinx, but was forced to change the name after a lawsuit from then-licensee Hasbro. And we've now run out of all possible interesting statements to be made about Shrinky Dinks.

Company: Kenner
Year: 1963

We recognize that there are fond easy-bake memories from many of your childhoods, but there are undeniably wack aspects to this kids' oven. The oven was without a doubt introduced as a stay-at-home mom prepping tool, and the oven still draws controversy for its steadfast promotion of traditional gender roles today.

Thirteen-year-old McKenna Pope has a petition going to put a boy on the Easy-Bake Oven boxes for the first time and switch up its pink and purple hues, almost 50 years after its introduction into the toy market. You can join McKenna and petition Hasbro (who now produce the over) here.

Company: Heely's Inc
Year: 2000

Whenever we visit our parents' house and walk around our neighborhood for the holidays, we can't help but think to ourselves, "Man, what these asshole kids on the block need are shoes with wheels in them."

Well, in the mid-2000s, our wish was granted. Every precocious, spoiled jerk in the country was given Heelys by their submissive and weak-will parents for Christmas. Luckily, Heelys have an extremely high rate of injury, so perhaps there is some Darwinian component to the rise of those wheeled shoes.

Company: Bandai
Year: 1996

These digital egg pets are the perfect gift for the deeply depressed child on your Christmas list. While Tamagotchi require maintenance or they die, like real pets, they offer none of the joy of a living, breathing furry physical companion.

Apparently, Tamagotchi is a clever portmanteau of the Japanese words for "egg" and "watch," as in, this is an egg that you have to wear like a watch on your wrist at all times like a parolee's anklet or the animal will die a tragic death.

Bandai has only deepened the depths of sadness that can be provided by these creatures in the intervening years since the toy's release. New models allow you to raise your little creature to be a "senior" which should prepare you for the painful sense of helplessness that comes from watching your own parents age.

Company: A.C. Gilbert Co.
Year: 1923

Given the staunch anti-nerd stance of so many children today, it is hard to believe that a chemistry set was ever a must-have Christmas gift. Oh, the set contained potassium permanganate which makes things catch fire, and ammonium nitrate, a known component in bomb-making? Now it all makes sense. The popularity of this set waned in the 1960s, when parents started raising pussies.

Company: MGA Entertainment
Year: 2001

How do you help little girls get past the anatomically correct, Ken-subservient image of Barbie? Make a bitchier, sluttier version of the already problematic doll. Normally, we hold back from throwing about such epithets at toys, but what else can be the intent behind a name like Bratz, a brand that invites little girls to identify with dolls that are "ill-mannered and spoiled" by Merriam-Webster's definition?

As far as the dolls' sexuality is concerned, the American Psychological Assocaition has gone as far as use Bratz as a center-piece in a study of the early sexualization of children. If the brash, sexual nature of these dolls weren't enough to turn you off, don't worry, they also have been manufactured under harsh conditions in Chinese sweatshops. We're getting our nieces a football or something this Christmas, 'cause this doll stuff is depressing.

Company: Passkey Design/BCP Imports
Year: 2008

"Let's me get this straight: it's a bracelet that is in a shape, but when you wear it, you can't see that shape? I'll take all of the Silly Bandz you have!" If a businessman had made a deal like this in 2008, the dude would have been able to retire by early 2009, as these easily lost and broken bracelets swept the nation's classrooms by storm.

They also, apparently caused some serious injury by cutting off circulation to curious kids' upper-arms. Our favorite Silly Bandz pack of all time has to be the "Kardashian Glam Shapes," a further testament to the Kardashian family's ability to sexualize anything that stands for innocence and purity in this cold world.

Company: Tyco
Year: 1996

This toy looks much worse given recent events, but it was still pretty stupid to begin with. Anyone who was too old to be bought a Tickle-Me-Elmo in 1996 remembers the hysteria surrounding the laughing, shaking toy's release. A Wal-Mart employee was legendarily trampled during the '96 holiday season for making the mistake of holding a box of Elmos within reach of ravenous crowds.

Later releases "Tickle Me Extreme" and "LOL Elmo" attempted an updated (kinda pathetic) twist on the doll, but neither spin-off produced the insane demand of the original doll.

Company: Ty Warner Inc.
Year: 1993

We remember Beanie Babies as little more than a strange fad only 20 years after they hit the market, but there was serious money in Ty Warner's beanbag animal brand. Ty Inc. made more than $6 billion during the Beanie Babies heyday, largely thanks to the firm's savvy business acumen. Anything this popular is sure to inspire copycats, but counterfeiting of Beanie Babies got so out of hand that the FBI had to make a concerted effort to crack down on Beanie crime in the late '90s.

Company: Daisy
Year: 1938

In a time when parenting methods are analyzed and researched, it's easy to forget that 60 years ago, parents gave their young children working guns for Christmas. In fact, in their heyday, Daisy believed that firearms for beginners were the ideal gift for the whole family. One of our favorite things about this gun was that it was only accurate up to 10 yards, so even if your child was a good shot and responsible, he might still find a way to shoot someone's eye out.

Company: Ideal Toy Company
Year: 1934

Betsy Wetsy was "one of the most popular drink and wet dolls of the Baby Boomer Era." ONE OF? So, there were numerous toy companies trying to satisfy kids' craving for dolls that pissed themselves?

Look, kids, you're going to have a least one college hook-up or roommate who becomes Betsy (or Bobby) Wetsy after a night of blackout drinking, so there will be plenty of time to clean up after errant urination, even before you have kids. Why start young? How awful must the '30s and '40s have been if this was how kids played?

Company: Canada Games Company/World Pog Federation
Year: 1993

A game that involves kids trying to flip over milk caps sounds like some Great Depression era poor people shit. But, no, kids were actually doing this in the '90s and spending lots of their parents' money in order to do so. It's enough to make you want to put Tony Hawk's face or the Power Rangers on some rocks and twigs and try to sell them to gullible children.

And that's exactly what companies did with Pogs. Corporate warriors, from fast-food companies to television studios to governments, plastered iconography on Pogs, making the milk-caps into a multimillion dollar industry. Just to give you an idea of the various and sundry interests that got into the Pog game, some of the most ridiculous Pog sets include "Ric Flair," "US Environmental Protection Agency," and "Cristal." Sounds like our kind of party.