I’ve talked before about my love of Astrosniks, the odd, Smurf-like figures that are best-known to Americans as toys in McDonald’s Happy Meals from the mid-1980s. For those handful that do remember the Happy Meal toys, it’s usually a surprise for them to discover that Sniks were also sold in stores in typical action figure-style packaging…
But what will really knock their socks off is to find out just how much Astrosniks stuff was available in America. For example, here’s an Astrosniks school bag…
There were also Astrosnik stickers, mugs, bubble bath solution, and the holy grail of all Gen X kids, a sleeping bag…
And there’s a lot more stuff out there, too! I’m currently gathering a collection of Snik merchandise from around the web and hope to compile it into a website one of these days so you can see all the stuff we missed while we were playing with G.I. Joes and My Little Pony.
During my hunt for Snik stuff, I came across an eBay auction that I couldn’t pass up – an unused Astrosniks coloring book called, Astrosniks in Snikville!
The book introduces kids to the Astrosniks and their home planet/town of Snikville, as well as some of the activities these purple and green aliens enjoy. It’s goofy fun with some pretty mid-tier artwork, but that’s ok – a lot of coloring books from that era were goofy and had mid-tier artwork. Take this Star Wars coloring page for example…
Here are a few of the pages to give you a taste of what’s inside…
Like the activity books I’ve posted here before, I wanted to make this coloring book available to everyone. So, I went ahead and scanned in every page. No clean-up was required as the book didn’t have a single mark in it that I could find!
There are two different versions for you to view, depending upon your interest in the book.
If you just want to check out the book, download this PDF (6MB). There are a lot of two-page spreads of artwork that I’ve tried to line up as well as possible and fit on to a single, 8.5″ x 11″ landscape-oriented page. There’s going to be some overlap and some wonky line connections, but I did the best I could scanning it in without taking out the staples and destroying the book.
If you actually want to print your own copy of the book, download this PDF (15MB). It’s just the individual pages scanned in, so each page will print out on 8.5″ x 11″ paper.
I’m pretty happy to have my first piece of non-figure merchandise from the Astrosniks line. It’s just a silly coloring book, but it’s also a glimpse into a larger plan that was clearly in place for the brand. I’m always so fascinated by the idea that there was all of this merchandise available and yet practically none of us remember it outside of the Happy Meal toys.
I’ll continue my hunt for more Snik stuff, but in the meantime, I hope this will satiate your curiosity.
