Cool Toy

"Why would Andy want you? Look at you! You're a Buzz Lightyear! Any other toy would give up his moving parts just to be you! You've got wings, you glow in the dark! You talk! Your helmet does that...that...that "woosh" thing. You are a Cool Toy!"

—|Woody, giving Buzz Lightyear a much needed pep talk.

This is THE toy. It has movable parts. It talks. It folds. It turns into stuff. It's a kid's wildest dream and no, it's not just a slogan; the Cool Toy is "the real deal".

It might be a one-of-a-kind, custom made, imported or simply the greatest toy ever that has somehow made it to the mass market, but it is the number one in the story, no substitutes.

So, naturally, it will be a major plot point. A Cool Toy that has landed in the hands of the protagonist might give them a sudden boost of popularity or self-confidence, or even turn out to be alive or Phlebotinum in disguise. Naturally it will also regularly get broken, misplaced, or stolen.

As a general rule, "normal" kids are allowed one cool toy, which they will treasure, while rich kids will have a roomful which they barely even touch.

Do not confuse with another type of "cool toy".

Examples of Cool Toy include:

Anime & Manga

• The Heroman figure in the Heroman manga and anime (which, through Applied Phlebotinum in the form of Alien Lightning, becomes real).

Comic Books

• The protagonist of Hollow Fields, Lucy Snow, turns her toy dinosaur into one of these using mad science.

Film

• A Christmas Story: The Limited Edition Red Ryder BB Gun.
• The original Toy Story was largely driven by Woody's fears of being displaced by Buzz Lightyear as Andy's Cool Toy.
• Jingle All the Way revolves around a father trying to obtain one such toy (the Turbo Man action figure) one day before Christmas.

Live Action Television

• On the US version of The Office, Dwight buys up all the Princess Unicorn dolls from stores so he can re-sell them at ridiculous prices to desperate parents.
• In the Jim Henson Company's The Christmas Toy, Rugby the Tiger was this last year, and is convinced that he's going to be again this year.

Music

• "The Marvelous Toy" by Tom Paxton.

Video Games

• The plot of the Interactive Fiction game "Not Just an Ordinary Ballerina" involves obtaining a "Sugar Toes Ballerina" doll on Christmas Eve for the PC's daughter, when the only mall in town that still has one is closed.

Web Comics

• Largo's cool thing.

Western Animation

• The Simpsons:

Terri: [holding stuffed animal] It should be soft and cuddly.
Bart: Yeah, with lots of firepower.
Milhouse: Its eyes should be telescopes! No, periscopes! No, microscopes! ... Can you come back to me?
Nelson: It should be full of surprises.
Milhouse: It should never stop dancing.
Martin: It should need accessories.

• The titular character from Robotboy looks like one in safe mode.
• Fun Haus' toys in the "Invasion of the Secret Santas!" episode of Batman the Brave And The Bold were the "gotta have it" toy in the present day, and the reason li'l Bruce was being a brat was that he didn't get the "gotta have it" toy for Christmas, but a family heirloom.
• In Codename: Kids Next Door they had Rainbow Monkeys that Numbuh 3 was so crazy about. And when there was a release of a new one, it caused something like riots.
• Arthur:
  • The Woggle fad hits Elwood City and everyone "has to" have one. Arthur doesn't want to join in but eventually is sucked in, by which time no woggles are to be had.
  • The girls are into "World Girl" dolls, and rich girl Muffy tries to get one of every one; then she discovers they're making new ones all the time so she'll never be able to.
  • One episode has a Transformers parody robot toy that Buster ends up shoplifting so that (he dreams) he will be cool.
• Fanboy and Chum Chum has a toy so hot that Fanboy trades another kid Chum-Chum for a day of playing with it. Hilarity Ensues.
• In My Life as a Teenage Robot the Cool Toy is the Musique, A Brand X of the iPod, that drives the whole town crazy.
• Scaredy Squirrel parodies this in "Snerd Envy", where the toy everyone in town but Scaredy has is completely plain and useless. And then again when Scaredy convinces the rest of the characters that he has an invisible one. They follow him at first until he fesses up... but then wins them back when he has the cool new "Mr. Handy Hand" (just googly eyes placed on his hand). This episode also leads to a subtle Aesop about using your imagination.

Real Life

• Many holiday seasons there's one of these, the most famous being Cabbage Patch Kids, Tickle Me Elmo, and the Nintendo Wii. These days, it seems as if merchandisers try to manipulate the media into representing their product as the demand-exceeds-supply Cool Toy of the season.
• Defictionalised Buzz Lightyears ended up being this the year after Toy Story was released.