Popeye Pop! Digital Funko Toy
date: label: date made
content: 2022
notes: label: Description
content: Popeye Pop! Digital Funko toy in original packaging. Figure is Popeye holding Swee'pea; Popeye has pipe in mouth and one arm up with hand in fist; Popeye is wearing sailor's cap, black shirt with yellow buttons, and blue pants. This Funko Pop! toy is officially licensed merchandise, manufactured under contract with King Features Syndicate in a limited edition for collectors released in 2022. Funko is an American toy manufacturer founded in Everett, Washington in 1998. Founders Mike Becker and Claudia Becker originally aspired to create small numbers of low-tech, nostalgic popular culture toys like bobbleheads based on commercial mascots for Bob’s Big Boy, Cap’n Crunch, and Frosted Flakes, but quickly ramped up production when collectors became interested in their offerings. Collectors were especially drawn to the company’s Pop! series of toys, large-headed, highly-stylized vinyl figures modeled on the Japanese chibi caricature style and designed to resemble popular licensed media characters. As of 2024, Funko has over 1,000 licenses with various companies and intellectual property owners and manufactures a variety of Pop! toy lines for the collector’s market, with some limited releases marketed to die hard fans selling for thousands of dollars. In 2021, Funko launched a line of digital collectibles, with some Pop! figures tied to non-fungible token (NFT) releases, granting purchasers ownership of unique digital art that can be traded online through blockchain markets.
label: Description
content: Popeye the Sailor Man is one of the most recognizable and long-lived comic strip characters in American history. The character has been featured in adaptations in a variety of media and used as a notable spokesperson for consumer products, licensed toys and other goods, and political and social causes. Popeye has been a remarkably popular comic character from his first appearance in 1929 to today, loved by his fans for his anti-authoritarian sense of justice, self-reliant courage under fire, and his confident, good-humored authenticity. From his use as a mascot during World War II, through fans’ proud self-identification in purchasing Popeye merchandise, to his use as a spokesperson for social causes, Popeye has become a representation of American values and spirit, both at home and abroad.
label: Description
content: The Popeye character was created by Elzie Crisler Segar, who first wrote him in to a storyline in his King Features comic strip Thimble Theatre on January 17, 1929. Popeye is a sailor, usually depicted with a sailor’s cap, pipe, prominent cleft chin, one squinty eye, and bulging forearms bearing anchor tattoos. He is distinguished by the superhuman strength and combat prowess he gains from eating spinach. Popeye is often depicted as unsophisticated, his working class New Jersey accent peppered with humorous malapropisms, but he possesses a strong moral compass and seeks to right wrongs and defend and champion underdogs from bullies and unjust authority. Popeye courts the lanky, headstrong Olive Oyl, often rescuing her from the brutish sometimes-romantic rival Bluto, and is occasionally shown caring for a child named Swee-Pea said to be either a founding, relative, or son of Olive Oyl.
label: Description
content: Popeye proved to be a fan favorite and breakout star of Thimble Theatre, making the strip one of the most popular in the country by the early 1930s, with Popeye ranked Fortune magazine readers’ second favorite comic character after Little Orphan Annie in a 1937 poll. The strip – renamed Popeye in the 1970s, continued to be published daily until 1992, after which it continued as a Sunday strip to today, making it one of the longest running comic strips in American history.
label: Description
content: Fleischer Studios licensed Popeye and the other Thimble Theatre characters for a series of animated shorts released by Paramount Pictures from the 1930s-1950s, and these popular cartoons expanded the character’s universe and popularity. The shorts introduced Popeye’s theme song (“I'm strong to the ‘finich’, 'cause I eats me spinach! I’m Popeye the sailor man!”) and cemented his reputation as a brave and virtuous brawler; many 1940s entries in the series featured Popeye fighting the Axis Powers on behalf of the United States. The cartoon series was adapted for television as Popeye the Sailor, which aired from 1960-1962, and has been revived several times in the decades since. Popeye has also been the star of a number of comic book series, web comics, radio programs, video games, and a 1980 live action musical film by Director Robert Altman starring Robin Williams as Popeye and Shelley Duval as Olive Oyl.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
topic: label: Subject
content: Toys
setName: label: See more items in
content: Culture and the Arts: Entertainment
label: See more items in
content: Popular Entertainment
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of King Features Syndicate
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 2024.0153.03
label: accession number
content: 2024.0153
label: catalog number
content: 2024.0153.03
objectType: label: Object Name
content: figure
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: vinyl (figure material)
label: Physical Description
content: cardboard (packaging material)
label: Physical Description
content: plastic (packaging material)
label: Physical Description
content: ink (packaging material)
label: Measurements
content: box: 6 3/8 in x 4 1/2 in x 3 1/2 in; 16.1925 cm x 11.43 cm x 8.89 cm