Did You Have a Skip It or a Furby? Kristen Bell Looks Back on the Most Popular Toys of the '90s

Mar. 15, 2025

Kristen Bell (left), stock image of a kid checking out the aisles of a toy store in the 90s.Photo:Chris Polk/FilmMagic; Greg Smith/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty

Chris Polk/FilmMagic; Greg Smith/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty

If you ask a millennial, they’ll tell you they had a childhood that was truly magical. One reason for that? Toys!

In an exclusive clip shared with PEOPLE, clips from catchy commercials for Crossfire and Skip It and flashes of popular toys likeFurbiesand Pokémon cards remind viewers just how prominent toy culture was throughout that time.

“I think that in the ’90s, it was very much about the kid experience and toys,” comedianRiver Butchersays. “I feel like the ’90s was just like the toy explosion.”

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In some ways, toy culture planted the seeds of influencer culture in the generation, says television critic Ashley Ray.

“I remember watching these commercials — toy commercials, clothing commercials — and it wasn’t just, ‘Oh I want that because it’s fun.’ It was, ‘I want that because I’ll be like that girl or I can live that life and have that experience.’ "

Kristen Bell, who narrates the episode, also remembers the children’s television channels that catered content to children continuously for the first time.

Furbies then and now.People / Jaclyn Mastropasqua

People / Jaclyn Mastropasqua

“Every industry and corporation, each thread on the fabric of American life made itCrystal Pepsiclear that our taste, interests and our parents' income were priority No. 1.”

New York Timeseditor Noreen Malone says millennials, who many joke are overly nostalgic for the generation, have a draw to that time for a particular reason.

“Millennials have a reputation for being obsessed with nostalgia for talking about the television shows of our youth and the message board culture of our youth. And I wonder if some of that has to do with the last time there was a monoculture … the last time the world was old-fashioned.”

source: people.com