'C.U.T.I.E.,' an acronym for 'Coolest Ultra Tiny Individuals on Earth,' was the name of Mattel's line of little girly action figurines from 1986, meant to capitalize on the success of their other abbreviated midget toyline, 'M.U.S.C.L.E.' The experiment wasn't a huge success, but they had some clear reasons for giving it a go. Between Battle Beasts, Army Ants, and all the other 'small toys' that were then making waves, it made perfect sense to see if a more full-chested cliental would be interested in getting in on the action. The figures are as basic as can be - just a series of 2" one-colored plastic dolls in various poses, representing female rock stars, babies, ballerinas and the like. Not exactly top quality stuff, but they still would've been more successful than they were had Mattel been smart enough to avoid some obvious mistakes.
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To a large degree, the C.U.T.I.E. toys were marketed towards boys. Pretty critical error there - if the bright yellow and pink box wasn't enough of a warning sign, there was just no way a boy was confident enough to actually ask for little figurines featuring long-haired vixens molded in pastel plastic, carrying daises. Worse yet, even the girls started balking at the idea, not wanting to be associated with any tiny toys possibly meant for kids with tiny penises. Essentially killing every potential demographic they could've conquered, Mattel could only take solace in knowing that C.U.T.I.E. figures cost around a fraction of a penny each to create. Throughout this retro reviving decade we're living in, C.U.T.I.E. slipped through the cracks and remains forgotten by all but the fourteen people who ever purchased them. Given that, you might be wondering why I chose to write about 'em today. It's simple - I needed an excuse to break out the pink background for one of my articles. Isn't it pretty?
While there were a great many 'small toys' racking up sales in the mid-80s, make no mistake about it, the C.U.T.I.E. line was a direct result of Mattel's success with M.U.S.C.L.E. -- and you can thank that last sentence as the camel backbreaking straw that's making me disregard the grammatical accuracy of my acronyms for the duration of this tribute. There's just so many periods a person can type. Kids went wild for the MUSCLE figures - so wild in fact, Mattel was actually able to get away with selling the same exact figures over and over again simply by crafting them in different colors. Plus, even though the MUSCLE figures were typically purchased in ultra-cheap four-packs, children were buying those four-packs by the truckloads. The series was an absolute cash cow with minuscule production costs and gargantuan public interest, so Mattel tried to bottle lightning with the damn CUTIE figures. Here's how kids first saw 'em in Aisle 12...
Though the line wasn't popular by any stretch, most interested parties opted for the swank (and extremely cheap) four-packs, looking very much like a package of MUSCLE figures' younger sister. There were fifty different CUTIE figures spread out over five themed 'sets.' In terms of mass-marketed toys, you won't find many with a cheaper overhead - these things were dime store all the way, the sort of toys better suited as Troll Book Club pencil toppers than Mattel's latest chief offering.
Originally retailing for 1-2 bucks, CUTIE quickly lost the half-pint of steam it had, and the four-packs began being liquidated for a quarter. It got to the point where Toys R' Us and Kay-Bee were giving packages of the figures away to anyone within a two-mile radius of their stores. Not until Jibber Jabber was revealed as a lesson in child choking would such a massive clearance take place. If these dolls were a little taller and alive, I'd feel really bad for them.
The ten-packs were slightly more impressive, but only because everything is more impressive when it's in a window box. It's total Can't Lose packaging. The ten-packs were the easiest way to collect all of the CUTIE dolls from a particular set, affording completist collectors the chance to avoid blowing their heads off when they can't find the 8th 'Bitsy Baby' figure. Trust me, some people are weird like that. I recall one occasion during my early teens when a large man in a trenchcoat colored in a hue that could only be described as 'covered in shit,' complaining to the store manager because I had picked up two 'Prune Face' figures from the Dick Tracy line. Yes, someone registered a complaint against a thirteen-year-old over a toy Prune Face. People assume that the toy store old timers are geeks, and that might be true, but some of these geeks get pretty headbashing hardcore when you try to deny them their Prune Face. Thanks to the ten-packs, no CUTIE collector ever had reason to violate your throat.
Here's a breakdown of the five different sets:
1) Gym Dollies: A group of multicolored female muscleheads posed either pumping iron or showing off their womanly physiques. Pretty butchy for the most part, but one of them bears a striking resemblance to a certain Must See TV sitcom actress.
The rest look like playing pieces from Twisted Sister's board game.
2) Lovey Doveys: The most feminine of the sets, Lovey Doveys featured a bunch of ballerinas and women wearing ballroom gowns. Unfortunately, this particular group suffered the sad distinction of having the most mangled and demonesque faces, making them appear as proper and graceful as an ass catheter.
3) Tiny Trendies: Straight outta the Jordache catalog, Tiny Trendies figures were all about style. Skirts, makeup, purses, the works. I got nothin.
4) Rockity Rollers: This set consisted of a bunch of girly musicians, playing instruments that looked like either a saxophone or a severed leg depending on your view. Many of these figures even had mohawks, which kinda goes against the whole 'CUTIE' moniker if we're following society's set standards and ideals. If the most vicious Gremlin that once drank a potion that turned it into an even more vicious Spider-Gremlin is named after your hairstyle, there's a good chance you're not looking too feminine.
The final group takes us to the meat of this previously meatless article, as it's the only one I currently own. Finally, my CUTIE tribute has a prop! The fifth set was a group of small, spirited folk known as the Bitsy Babies...
You know, now that I've actually got the toy in my hands, I've become a little surprised that they didn't do better. The figurines are crap, but I've always subscribed to the theory that kids would rather have ten pieces of crap than one singular uncrappy item. I think there's some unspoken understanding that a certain number of shitty toys thrown together ascend to a level three or four ranks above 'crap.' Crap crap crap, crap. In any event, it's probably the worst of the five sets. There's no mohawks or chicks with arms thicker than their heads - just a bunch of cute widdle baby dolls with bows in their hair and youthful innocence in their hearts. I hate them.
Still, when you see them all packaged up in the same way they were sold in stores, it's hard to argue that the line didn't look like a winner. The box says that they're 'teeny toys to go ga ga over,' and while I don't agree with that, they appear like the kind of thing kids would've gotten tricked into buying. I say this with the full intentions of killing myself right after this article's published on the site, primarily because the thought is the only way I can bring myself to post an article about tiny baby dolls on a pink background without backing out. I'm sure there's better causes to die for than telling the world about 'Bitsy Babies' from 1986, but I'm shooting more for conviction points than actual accomplishments.
The back of the box included a cutout offer for enthusiasts to send away for a free CUTIE poster, showing all the figures from the various sets. They didn't even charge you for shipping, which just proves how inflated the price of poster mailer tubes got once we hit the 90s. Also shown is a portrait of how your CUTIE figures looked in full-color, so you'd be able to figure out which ones were supposed to represent minorities.
Careful, some of them are coconut.
I'm not too sure what to do with the CUTIE figures now that they're here. These aren't exactly the kind of things I want to have laying out in the open when my leather-jacketed buddies come over for Poker Night. Guess I'll put 'em under the bed, next to the pile of my sister's panties that just fit way too well to give back. As for Mattel's C.U.T.I.E. line, they're pretty much forgotten entities these days. If you were a fan, this works in your favor since they're dirt cheap once you're able to find 'em. There certainly won't be any comebacks, though -- C.U.T.I.E. was never immortalized as a cartoon, never extended into other merchandising venues, and even the core figures were in and out of the toy stores faster than a birthday gift-buying grandma with a case of the runs. I like that last sentence enough to make it this article's finale. Course, it's not really the last sentence anymore now that I've added two others. Three others. Four others.
