LOS ANGELES — A bidding war over the rights to an upcoming Slinky movie has revealed that Mattel executives are prioritizing telling more stories about toys over telling more stories about women, sources have confirmed.
“Well, yeah, they’re Mattel, what do you expect them to do, have significant female characters in every movie they produce,” asked local filmgoer Harrison Smith. “Besides, that Polly Pocket movie is gonna be full of chick stuff. I don’t think everything necessarily has to be a feminist screed, you know? Let me and the boys have our Slinky movie, and keep your lousy politics out of it!”
Many female Slinky fans admitted that they felt slighted by the upcoming film’s decidedly male-friendly tone.
“All of the early promotional material just makes me sick,” said Laura Meyer, a female Slinky fan. “The only female character I could spot in that trailer was the nagging wife in the background urging her husband to stop playing with that awful invention of his that was never going to work out. There’s no way it happened like that, right?”
The film, expected to release next summer, is gearing up to potentially be one of the year’s biggest.
“We all saw what happened with Barbie,” said Louis North, an executive with Mattel. “And I think the takeaway was obvious: people want movies about toys. They don’t care who’s in it, or what it’s about, they just want movies based on stuff they liked as kids. That’s why those G.I. Joe movies always do so well. Battleship too, for that matter.
As of press time, Mattel revealed that it was actually Andy Serkis portraying Betty James, wife of slinky inventor Richard, in the film’s trailer.
