"American Gladiators" became quite the little phenomenon after its 1989 debut. The show lasted nearly ten years (and still airs today in syndication), establishing its musclebound stars as bona fide superheroes and role models to children around the world. Kids at home were especially taken with the sometimes cartoony cast of Gladiators, but nobody could deny that "Nitro," "Zap" and their fellow dreamsmashers had the right tools and neck muscles.
The competitions were fierce, and for those of us watching at home, it was always fun to pretend that we could do better than the contenders du jour. As we watched a bunch of guys rolling around in giant hamster balls and hitting each other with modified Nerf fencing equipment, viewers firmly believed that they could outclass the 250-pound athletes at every turn. A big part of the enjoyment was wondering what it'd be like to compete in these events -- everything was set up like some huge playground with toy guns to shoot, wacky walls to climb and all sorts of things to hit people with. The show was a smash success, and thus, the merchandise poured forth like liquid from a left-all-night-by-huge-buckets-of-water horse's dick. This is exactly, precisely what happened.
 Believe it or not, there was a collection of "American Gladiators" action figures. Really, really ugly and misshapen ones. Each figure's legs were permanently posed in a way that made 'em appear to be steeping aside for the oncoming parade of fire ants heading their way. The molding was just terrible -- they all looked rather like werewolves, and some even had deep gashes all over their monkey faces. Most of the popular Gladiators were available, along with a number of generic "Opponent" figures who served as cannon fodder for that crazy move the "Nitro" figure did with that two-inch plastic green twirly baton accessory of his.
 There were a few playsets and "event toys," too. You could buy the aforementioned giant hamster balls, now ironically the size of any regular hamster ball, for the figures to roll around in aimlessly on the kitchen floor. The figures worked much better than real hamsters in real hamster balls, as they didn't crap all over themselves the second they grew bored rolling around four square feet. The franchise was even immortalized in video game form -- various gladiating titles were available for the Nintendo, Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis and other fine systems. Superfine systems. Eventually, this growing empire expanded even further with trading cards, videos, terrible apparel, kiddy workout sets...and something a whole lot stranger. I didn't come here today to talk about American Gladiators. I'm here to talk about American Gladiators candy bars. This topic change would've been a bigger swerve if it wasn't clearly noted in that giant article logo a few feet up. There I admitted it.
Forgive Us, Father. 
If Ric Flair hadn't already claimed it, I'd insert the theme from 2001 right here.
Manufactured by the Ferrara Food Company (don't worry, I checked it out, they're legit) in 1993, "American Gladiators Bars" were small cubes of "delicious chewy nougat candy." With every phrase I add to the description, your fears will only grow worse. In 1993, the candy likely held its shape quite well. By 2004, the candy had degenerated into what looks like brighter versions of the afterbirth my dog forgot to lick up when it had puppies last year.
Each tiny box contains one piece of nougat safely wrapped in an official American Gladiators Food Pouch. The clumps of evil were hocked for about a quarter a piece, particular store withstanding, and delighted kids with a -- wait, there's no delight here. "Chewy nougat candy" was a term not lost on kids. They knew what it really meant. "Not at all like candy." In an attempt to better tie in with the series it was based on, the rectangles of much rancidity were composed of only the best ingredients. Egg whites, for example. Egg whites, sugar, honey and corn syrup. But mostly egg whites.
Even the most devoted fans of "American Gladiators" were going to have trouble with this one. You don't hear much about the Ferrara Food Company these days, and stupid ideas like marketing chewy nougat to eight-year-olds is a prime reason why. Some of you might consider yourselves veritable nougat fans, but once I tell you which flavors were available, your protests will turn to sheer terror.
Course, since the AG Bars are now over a decade old, they're already fighting an uphill battle. I'm not sure if any of you have seen what happens to fruity nougat bars over the course of ten years, but rest assured, it ain't pretty. Somewhere along the way -- I estimate sometime around Year Seven -- the nougat began its slow descent from something negligibly solid to something negligibly from the demons who invade your dreams and torture you at night. Combining rancid drips of egg whites with goofy caricatures of "Turbo," I cast thee bars at ye and pray for the better best tomorrow.
The virtually odorless nougat bars have lost their shape and surely play host to the ten thousand eggs of tiny parasites, but moreover, they just look gross. I don't need to draw comparisons -- they're staring you right in the face. You know what it looks like. You can name several, absolutely disgusting things that look exactly the same. But you're trying not to, because you're eating cold cuts and you don't want the associations to spoil lunch. But they will, and you cannot stop them. Let go of your hold, be one with the nougat sneeze. It's too late to turn back now, anyway.
The horrendous creatures couldn't have possibly been sales leaders, even when they still maintained their shape. Besides, it's not like "American Gladiators" was that popular. Popular yes, but not that popular. That popular was only reserved for things like Nintendo and the Great Norfin Troll Boom of 1994. If the Gladiators were hoping for that kind of scope, they shoulda had Zap flash a tit.
I'll give them credit for creativity, but this was just a bad, bad idea. I say "bad" twice because it's so much more bad than things I only call bad once. As you can see, I'm stretching and I need somewhere to go with this. Maybe we should discuss and rate each of the five flavors. I'd ask for your opinion, but really, you've never had to write about American Gladiators nougat. Try it, then we'll talk.
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Each flavor has its own special Gladiator mascot. This was a good thing and a bad thing. Good thing, because kids weren't going to buy American Gladiators candy if it didn't have pictures of the Gladiators on the package. Bad thing, because kids who liked "Laser" better than the other Gladiators had to first convince themselves to buy and then force themselves to eat lemon-lime nougat putty.
Here's a look at all the different flavors. Please note that the pictured candies often seem to be the wrong color -- that happens with age. I assume grape was purple and cherry was red at some point in the distant past, but now, it's all here in varied hues of sick. I couldn't bring myself to eat ten-year-old lumps of egg whites, so I just gave each of 'em the Standard Lick Test. It's about as objective as I can make an experiment as personally disgusting as this, and I hope you'll forgive my somewhat skewed findings because I just really really don't want to eat ten-year-old egg whites.
DIAMOND CHERRY:
The box features Diamond in her duel stance, just waiting to smack you upside the head with a whole bunch of bad tasting cherry crap. In consistency as well as taste, this is like letting a gorilla wipe his ass with a piece of saltwater taffy and eating it. A peculiar nutty aftertaste is also noted, but that's probably just the bugs.
ORANGE SABRE:
Sabre's got a soccer ball and a cube full of tangy tarty orange glue. Sort of like eating prop wood from a Citrus Pledge commercial set. Orange Sabre is surprisingly the least offensive of the five, proving once and for all that oranges are the premiere fruit to choose if trapped in a room with nothing to live on but assorted ten-year-old fruits. If memory serves, Gladiator Sabre had a penchant for punching himself in the knees while shouting whenever he won an event. Pretty awesome way to win the crowd over if you think about it. Who wouldn't want to see Sabre yell and punch himself?
LEMON-LIME LASER:
Poor, poor Laser was saddled with the worst flavor of the bunch -- lemon-lime. A combination that knows no middle ground, anything lemon-lime flavored is either going to be pretty great or absolutely awful. The latter in this case, Laser hides his shame with a smile and threatens to change the spelling of his name to "Lazer" if you complain about his nougat, thereby ruining thousands of 8x10 autographs and fold-out posters across the world. Laser plays rough both in and out of the arena.
TURBO GRAPE:
Turbo was the American Gladiator who'd kick the shit out of you but never really look like he wanted to. Always sympathetic to the contenders he mortally wounded, Turbo was something of a gigolo who wasn't above copping a feel whenever one of the less toned women idiotically fell off the wall after scratching their ass. Turbo chose "grape" for his nougat because everyone who eats grapes mistakenly believes that they'll like grape flavored candy, which is of course untrue as not a single person in the world actually likes grape candy. Even if you think you do, you really don't. Even if you write in and swear that you do, I know you really hate the grape. In closing, "Turbo Grape" American Gladiators nougat bars double nicely as plops of novelty fake shit whenever you want to make someone beat up their dog for no reason.
RASPBERRY ZAP:
Sort of the rogue of the bunch, Zap's impressively monstrous physique made her the target of fear and envy by her Gladiator compatriots. Zap never faltered, and to her credit, she never once made any cliche "zap" hand motions after winning an event. A creature of great reserve was this, which explains why the holy huge heroine never put up a fight after being saddled with raspberry -- a flavor that wouldn't come into style for at least another good five years or so. As a nougat flavor, Raspberry Zap tastes little like raspberries and much like liquid detergent. Folks, now you can finally experience what liquid detergent tastes like without dying afterwards. Get your Raspberry Zap before it turns 15.
Overall: I'm glad they existed, but I'm not sure why. I think it's because it provides more hope for a lifelong dream that there somewhere exists a series of edible contraceptives based on Donald Duck. Come on, if they made American Gladiators nougat bars...
-- Matt (3/23/04)
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