KREAM KRUNCH CEREAL

 

KREAM KRUNCH CEREAL

 

Kellogg’s

            In the early days of space travel, NASA was looking into alternative means of giving astronauts sustenance in a more appetizing form than protein paste in tubes. They turned to the freeze-drying process—a process that removed water from foods after freezing and lowering the air pressure around them. One of the food items they experimented with was ice cream, developed by the Whirlpool Corporation for the Apollo missions. However, freeze-dried ice cream wasn’t popular, being described by astronaut Mike Massimino as “more closely related to a building material than food.” Despite aggressive marketing campaigns declaring it “astronaut food” and feeding into kids’ imaginations of going to space one day, it never actually went to space on any missions. Eventually, actual freezers found their way up, meaning astronauts could enjoy regular ice cream.

            Not one to miss out on a trend, Kellogg’s decided to get in on the freeze-dried ice cream game. In 1965, they introduced Kellogg’s Kream Krunch cereal. The cereal had standard round cereal pieces, but the selling point was that they were mixed in with chunks of freeze-dried ice cream. It came in three varieties: vanilla, orange and strawberry, with the anthropomorphic ice cream cone soda jerk mascot changing colors to match the variety. The cereal barely lasted a year, however. Apparently, the ice cream bits would melt into a gross, sticky goo after being in milk for a few minutes. Kids wouldn’t finish their bowls, let alone the box, and parents complained. There’s also the notion that Kellogg’s infringed on the patent for freeze-drying, resulting in its being discontinued.

SPIDER-MAN MOVIE CEREALS

SPIDER-MAN / SPIDER-MAN 2 / THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN CEREAL

Kellogg’s

            The comic book movie revolution from campy novelty to summer blockbuster may have quietly begun four years prior with Blade and later X-Men, but with 2002’s Spider-Man it was in full (pardon the pun) swing.  Written by David Koepp and directed by Sam Raimi, Spider-Man presented a slightly modified origin for the titular character (Tobey Maguire) and his arch-nemesis, the Green Goblin (Willem Dafoe), as fate and circumstances brought the two to a head in a climactic battle. Released by Sony Pictures on May 3, 2002, it became an instant hit. It was the first film to pass $100 million in its opening weekend and the fastest to surpass that mark. By the end of its run, it had grossed $821.7 million.

The back and side of the Spider-Man cereal box.

            That September, Kellogg’s announced its partnership with Marvel Comics and Sony Pictures to release Spidey-themed food items, including a cereal (which they mistakenly touted as the first, ignoring Ralston’s 1994 offering). The limited-edition Spider-Man cereal featured “web”-shaped cereal pieces with artificial berry flavoring. While some of the webs were naturally colored, others alternated between red and blue coloring. Adorning the boxes was a foil-stamped logo and eyes in Spidey’s mask on the front, a story on the back with some stock drawings of Spidey in various poses, and a trivia game related to the story on the side panel. Later, when the film was released onto home video, the boxes came with a small blurb advertising it and a picture of the DVD set.

            As part of their promotional campaign, other cereals in the Kellogg’s line came with premiums related to the film. Amongst them were glow-in-the-dark stickers, temporary tattoos, and a web-shooter water squirter. They also teamed-up with America’s Dairy Farmers to offer a send-away promotion for a free Spidey CD-ROM game (which was essentially the 2000 Spider-Man video game with the character model altered to resemble the film’s suit and other minor tweaks).

            After such a successful film, there was no doubt that a sequel was in order. Spider-Man 2, written by Alvin Sargent, introduced Doctor Octopus (Alfred Molina); a scientist who became bonded to four-mechanical arms he invented to aid in his scientific experiments and became mad with a desire to see his experiment through at the risk of the city. Released on June 30, 2004, the film was as well-received as the first and shattered its opening day record. However, it ended up grossing about $40 million less with a total of $783.8 million.

The back of the Spider-Man 2 box.

Kellogg’s was once again on board and re-released their Spider-Man cereal. The cereal was essentially the same, except it came in a new yellow orange box with Spidey in a new pose, and only on the back was the Spider-Man 2 title present. For a time, the foil-stamped logo and eyes also made a return before being replaced with standard art later in its run (excluding the international box, which had no foil and came with a blue background). The back of the box this time was adorned with several Spidey-themed games, including a trivia game, crossword puzzle, a maze, a match game, a hidden item search, and a word scramble. This time, tie-in premiums included web-shooter-like laser pointers that projected one of four different designs.

The Raimi film series would gain one more less-welcomed entry in Spider-Man 3, but it was General Mills who made a cereal for that one. Ultimately, Marvel and Sony decided to scrap Raimi’s proposed Spider-Man 4 in favor of rebooting the franchise with a new direction and a new cast. Written by James Vanderbilt and directed by Marc Webb, The Amazing Spider-Man took Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) back to high school as he explored a mystery involving his parents, which took him to Oscorp where, like in the original films, he was bitten by a genetically modified spider and gained his powers. Meanwhile, Dr. Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans) had transformed himself into the monstrous Lizard in an attempt to stop his former boss (Irrfan Khan) from using ins imperfect serum on unknowing test subjects. Ultimately, that led to his wanting to transform all of New York into lizard people like him and forcing Spidey to stop him.

The Amazing Spider-Man cereal back.

The film was released on July 3, 2012 to generally favorable reviews. Like the Raimi series, it managed to pull in a box office of $757.9 million; becoming the 7^th-highest grossing film of the year. As part of the film’s promotion, Kellogg’s also rebooted their Spider-Man cereal as The Amazing Spider-Man cereal. This time, the web pieces were all colored red and two-toned green marshmallows were added to represent the Lizard’s face. The back of the box featured a word, trivia and maze game.

BUZZ BLASTS CEREAL

BUZZ BLASTS CEREAL

Kellogg’s

            Toy Story became the first full-length completely computer-generated animated feature to hit theaters in 1995, pulling in an impressive box office, igniting interest in others studios for computer animation, and beginning the long-standing relationship between Disney and Pixar Studios. The film centered on a world in which toys came to life whenever people weren’t around. Woody (Tom Hanks), the pull-string cowboy doll that was once the favorite in a group of toys, found himself replaced by the newer, electronic talking Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen) action figure. This led to many quarrels fueled by Woody’s jealousy until Woody came to accept Buzz and welcomed him into the group. Toy Story became a media franchise, spawning sequels, specials, books, games and even a Buzz Lightyear animated series.

            In 2002, as part of a multi-year deal with Disney, Kellogg’s released three cereals based on Disney characters. One of them was Buzz Blasts cereal, centered on the Buzz character. The timing of this release was interesting as the animated series was currently in syndicated reruns at this time and the next Toy Story sequel was 8 years away.

            Buzz Blasts featured cereal pieces in the shape of flying saucers, the Little Green Men toys featured in the movies and the cartoon, space ships and Buzz’s face. The pieces were done in Buzz’s purple and green color scheme, with all the pieces being purple and the flying saucers having an extra green ring as well as blue flecks. The cereal actually had a long life, running until 2005. The initial box featured a foil-stamped embossed logo and a game where you had to find the different space ship amongst three different fleets. At one point, a music CD with an exclusive song about Buzz was included as a premium. Another premium involved 3-D glasses to use with a new game on the back panel.  

Original back panel game.

The 3-D Glasses premium box.

DISNEY FROZEN CEREAL

DISNEY FROZEN CEREAL

Kellogg’s

            In 2013, Disney released their 53^rd animated feature film: Frozen, which was based on the fairy tale “The Snow Queen” by Hans Christian Andersen. Written by Jennifer Lee and directed by Lee and Chris Buck, the film centered on the recently-crowned queen of Arendelle, Elsa (Idina Menzel), accidentally exposing her ice powers to the royal court and being branded a monster by the scheming Duke of Weselton (Alan Tudyk). She entered self-imposed exile casting the kingdom into eternal winter. Her sister, Anna (Kristen Bell), sought to find her and bring her back for the good of Arendelle. Along the way she befriended an ice harvester named Kristoff (Jonathan Groff), his reindeer Sven (Frank Welker), and a snowman Elsa accidentally brought to life named Olaf (Josh Gad).

            Frozen opened in theaters on November 22, 2013 and ended up grossing over $1.2 billion, turning it into a massive success. Naturally, it was met with a huge marketing push from Disney, was adapted into a Broadway play, the characters incorporated into other Disney projects and parks, and drove a generation of parents crazy with constant repeated renditions of the film’s signature song, “Let it Go”.

The original back of the American box.

            Interestingly enough, it would take just over a year after the film’s release for a cereal tie-in to come into play. Kellogg’s licensed the use of the characters and crafted Disney Frozen cereal that saw release in December of 2014. Marked as a “collector’s edition”, the cereal featured square cereal pieces with “ice” and “snow” marshmallows (or blue and white). The boxes featured Elsa and Anna on one side, Olaf on the side panel, and they were all joined by Kristoff and Sven on the other side. The backgrounds of the box featured foil enhancements. Eventually, the cereal would become a “regular edition”, losing the foil and the collector branding.

New marshmallow shapes!

In 2016, the cereal received a bit of an upgrade as the marshmallows all became “snowflakes” (although closely resembling stars). They were either plain white or purple and blue with white swirls. While Elsa and Anna were still on one side of the box, Olaf ended up getting the other side by himself.

I'm ready for my close-up, Mr. Disney.

Internationally, a marshmallow-less cereal was released featuring vanilla cereal pieces in the shapes of snowflakes and snowballs. In the United Kingdom, Elsa and Anna adorned one side of the box with Olaf on the other. In other countries, Elsa, Anna, Olaf and Sven were each showcased on their own individual boxes in close-ups.

INCREDIBLES 2 CEREAL

INCREDIBLES 2 CEREAL

Kellogg’s

            Incredibles 2 was the long-awaited follow-up to 2004’s The Incredibles from Pixar. Written and directed again by Brad Bird, the film picked up exactly from where the first left off: with the Parr family suiting up to deal with the threat of the Underminer (John Ratzenberger). However, superheroes were still outlawed—something millionaire businessman Winston Deavor (Bob Odenkirk) wanted to change by sending Elasti-Girl (Holly Hunter) back into the field and recording her exploits. However, a new foe, Screenslaver, intended to keep that from happening using his hypnotic screens to control key people.

            Incredibles 2 was released on June 15, 2018 after trading release dates with the delayed Toy Story 4. Despite the 14 year wait between movies, the film ended up grossing over $1.2 billion; becoming the fastest animated film to do so and the highest-grossing Pixar film. Once again Kellogg’s produced a cereal based on the film as they had for the first one, however this time it was only released internationally. It featured pieces in the shape of Jack-Jack (Eli Fucile); the baby of the Parr family who had a larger role in this film. The box featured Mr. Incredible (Craig T. Nelson) and Jack-Jack on one side, while Elasti-Girl, Dash (Huck Milner) and Violet (Sarah Vowell) were on the other.

The back of the box.

THE INCREDIBLES CEREAL

THE INCREDIBLES CEREAL

Kellogg’s

            The Incredibles is a 2004 Pixar film written and directed by Brad Bird and based on the comics and spy films from his youth. Set in an alternate version of the 1960s where superheroes and supervillains exist, public opinion soon turned against them due to the repeated damage their fighting causes. Superheroes are therefore outlawed and are forced to live ordinary, normal lives unless they end up in jail. Bob Parr, aka the super-strong Mr. Incredible (Craig T. Nelson), was lured back into costume by a mysterious woman named Mirage (Elizabeth Peña). However, it all turned out to be a plot by a genius villain named Syndrome (Jason Lee), who was a fanboy that felt spurned when Mr. Incredible refused to let him become his sidekick. Bob’s family—his wife, the stretchy Elasti-Girl (Holly Hunter), and their kids, the super-fast Dash (Spencer Fox) and the invisibility-casting Violet (Sarah Vowell)—are forced to come rescue him from the clutches of Syndrome.

            The film opened on November 5, 2004. Unlike Bird’s previous film, The Iron Giant, The Incredibles went on to gross over $631 million. It received the highest opening-weekend for a Pixar and non-sequel animated film, as well as the highest November opening for a Disney film. Such was the film’s reception that fans were eagerly awaiting a sequel that wouldn’t arrive for 14 years.

To coincide with the release of the film, Kellogg’s produced a limited-edition cereal based on it. The cereal featured strawberry-flavored pieces in star shapes with red and yellow swirls, based on the colors of the Incredibles’ costumes. The back of the box featured a simple word search game, and there was an offer to send away for an Incredibles-themed race car.

POKEMON CEREAL

POKÉMON CEREAL

Kellogg’s

            Pokémon began as a simple video game for Nintendo’s Game Boy, and ended up becoming a massive media empire. With dozens of games, waves and waves of merchandise, and thousands of episodes of an animated series, it has become the highest-grossing media franchise of all time. It was also credited with increasing the popularity of anime around the world, particularly in North America, leading to the style finding mainstream success. The core concept of the series had players controlling Pokémon trainers who captured various monsters and trained them to do battle with other trainers’ monsters. The goal was to capture all 150 monsters and evolve them into their ultimate forms.

The International version.

            Two years after the anime made its debut on American television, the beginnings of the media juggernaut were evident. Kellogg’s joined in on the licensing bonanza and crafted a cereal based around the franchise. Pokémon Cereal made its debut in May of 2000 as a limited edition. It was comprised of oat cereal pieces with marshmallows in the shape of Pikachu, Oddish, Ditto and Poliwhirl. The international version of the cereal featured a similar design and even used the same commercial with the voices dubbed over by local actors.

The back of the box had several designs. One was covered in a sea of various Pokémon with a challenge from the series’ original protagonist, Ash Ketchum, to help him find repeated versions of select Pokémon. Another version featured a cut-out picture frame. The international version came with an offer to send in “tokens” that could be cut out for chance to win one of 1000 Pokémon Stadium Battle-Top game kit. The offer included the 8 Pokémon tops being offered inside Kellogg’s cereals at the time, as well as a small stadium for them to “battle” in.

The Generation II box.

At the end of 1999, the second generation of Pokémon was introduced in the new games Pokémon Gold and Pokémon Silver, which would be finding their way to North America towards the end of 2000. The games gave 100 new Pokémon and new evolutions for previous Pokémon. To commemorate this, Kellogg’s updated their cereal a few months after its initial release. While the cereal itself remained the same, the marshmallow bits were now shaped as new Pokémon Pichu, Wobbuffet and Cleffa. The foil gimmick was also expanded to encompass the entire box instead of just the logo.

CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR / AVENGERS CEREAL

CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR / AVENGERS CEREAL

Kellogg’s

           

Kicking off Phase 3 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe was the third Captain America film, Captain America: Civil War. Loosely based on the comic story of the same name, the film deals with the fallout from Avengers: Age of Ultron as governments decide to create legislature to regulate how and when the Avengers do their heroing. Captain America (Chris Evans) doesn’t feel they can be as effective while they wait for permission to act, while Iron Man (Robert Downey, Jr.) believes it’s the only way to prevent further disasters. Add to the fact that Cap’s long-believed-deceased sidekick, Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan), was alive and well and seemingly bombed a political conference, and the Avengers became split down the middle in a conflict over whose ideals were right and how Bucky would be brought to justice. Directed by Joe and Anthony Russo off a script by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, Civil War opened on May 6, 2016 and pulled in over $1.1 billion at the box office.

Kellogg’s once again created a limited-edition cereal to tie into the promotion for the film. In fact, they made two different cereals for it. The first, Captain America: Civil War cereal, was actually a repackaged version of their Age of Ultron Cereal from the previous year. However, this time the marshmallow bits were changed to either red or blue with a white star shape in the middle. The most interesting part of this cereal, however, was its box. On one side was Cap, and on the other was Iron Man. When the two sides were put together, they lined up perfectly to create a split image of the two heroes. On the side panel showed the two about to clash over a bowl of their cereal.

 

Meanwhile, outside of North America, there came a cereal called simply Avengers Cereal. It came with “choc reactors” (after the arc reactor technology that powers Iron Man’s suit) and “crunchy shield” pieces. The reactors were a grouping of three chocolate-flavored rings while the shields were reminiscent of Krave Chocolate cereal pieces (and didn’t really represent Cap’s round shield). Once again, Iron Man and Cap were featured on either side of the box, with Hulk and Thor joining them on the side panel. However, this time around instead of using images of the film’s actors, the characters were drawn and shown in representations of their more recent comic costume designs.

AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON CEREAL

AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON CEREAL

Kellogg’s

           

In 2012, Marvel Studios accomplished what until that point seemed to be impossible: they produced a movie starring SEVERAL characters from different film franchises.

2012 saw the release of Marvel’s The Avengers; the culmination of the four-year journey since the release of 2008’s Iron Man. Written and directed by Joss Whedon, the film saw Iron Man (Robert Downey, Jr.), Captain America (Chris Evans), Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) united by Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) to battle the threat of Thor’s half-brother, Loki (Tom Hiddleston), and his army of aliens known as the Chitauri. The ambitious film was a huge gamble as nothing like that had ever been done in cinema before, and it paid off. Avengers earned over $1.5 billion at the box office making it the highest-grossing movie of the year and cementing the tour de force that is the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

Following several more solo hero movies, the second Avengers movie was released on May 1, 2015. Avengers: Age of Ultron followed the Avengers as they retrieved Loki’s scepter and Tony Stark and Bruce Banner discovered an artificial intelligence inhabiting the scepter’s gem. They decided to use it to complete Stark’s Ultron Global Defense Program, designed to protect the world from another invasion threat. However, Ultron (James Spader) gained independent sentience and decided the best way to protect the world was to eliminate all of humanity. Written and directed again by Whedon, the film ended up earning just a few million less than its predecessor but still earned a mostly positive reception.

Kellogg’s, opting not to miss the bandwagon again, decided to produce a limited-edition tie-in cereal for the film. Avengers: Age of Ultron Cereal has largely been compared to Lucky Charms as it had sweetened oat pieces with marshmallow bits. The bits were two-colored round pieces that were meant to replicate the main color schemes of Iron Man, Captain America, Hulk and Thor. Each box came with a special code printed inside that could be put into an indicated website to unlock a free ticket to see the movie. The back of the box featured the instructions for the codes, as well as a hidden message that had to be deciphered using a symbol key. Interestingly enough, the box came labeled as “Hero Edition” for an unspecified reason. There has been no indication or witnesses to a “Villain Edition” having ever been released.

BARBIE CEREAL

BARBIE FAIRYTOPIA CEREAL / BARBIE AS THE ISLAND PRINCESS CEREAL / BARBIE MULTI-GRAIN CEREAL

Kellogg’s

            2005 saw the release of the fifth in a series of direct-to-video computer-animated Barbie films, Barbie: Fairytopia. Barbie, as a wingless flower fairy named Elina (Kelly Sheridan), had to save Fairytopia from an evil fairy named Laverna (Kathleen Barr). It was the first Barbie movie to feature a completely original story written by Elise Allen and Diane Duane, and directed by Walter P. Martishius and William Lau.

            As with the other Barbie movies, Mattel released a wave of merchandise that tied into its setting and themes. They also licensed Barbie out to Kellogg’s to produce a limited-edition cereal based on the film. It was the first cereal for the doll since 1989’s Breakfast with Barbie Cereal. The cereal contained berry-flavored pieces in pink and purple heart shapes and marshmallows in the shape of a mirror, a jewel, a flower, a purse and a butterfly. The back of the box featured a maze game with characters from the film.

            However, that wasn’t the end of the cereal. In 2007, the eighth computer-animated film, Barbie as the Island Princess, was released to video. This was the second musical in the series, and the first produced under Mainframe Entertainment’s new name of Rainmaker Animation. Barbie was Ro (Sheridan), who was shipwrecked on an island as a young girl and raised by the animals there. After she rescued handsome prince Antonio (Alessandro Juliani) when he ended up on her island, he brought her back to his kingdom so that she could try to discover who she was. They fell in love along the way, but the evil Queen Ariana (Andrea Martin) had her sights set on acquiring the throne from Antonio’s parents—by any means necessary. The movie was written by Cliff Ruby and Elana Lesser and directed by Greg Richardson and Jesyca C. Durchin.

The Fairytopia and Island Princess boxes.

Rather than create an entirely new cereal, Kellogg’s simply renamed theirs Barbie as the Island Princess Cereal and changed the box to feature her likeness from the film. Each box featured 5 out of 10 collectible cards depicting various characters and scenes.

Three of the four Multi-Grain boxes.

            The cereal sold well-enough that in 2008 Kellogg’s continued to produce it, but didn’t tie it into the latest Barbie movie. Instead, they renamed it Barbie Multi-Grain Cereal and the artwork featured 2D animated versions of either Barbie, Barbie with a tennis racquet, or Barbie with her best friend, Teresa. The backs of the boxes featured more Barbie-themed games, collectible cut-out trading cards and keepsakes, or a cut-out picture frame.

Back of the Multi-Grain box.

SUPER MARIO CEREAL

SUPER MARIO CEREAL

Kellogg’s

           

Super Mario Odyssey was the first game in the Mario Bros. franchise to be released for the Nintendo Switch. Once again, Mario was tasked with rescuing Princess Peach from the clutches of Bowser. The game, released on October 27, 2017, saw a return to the 3D open worlds from Super Mario 64 and Super Mario Sunshine and a life meter last seen in Super Mario Galaxy. However, the traditional power-up system was replaced by a new ability/sidekick: Cappy. Cappy was a spirit that resembled Mario’s cap and allowed him to possess various beings in the world in order to use their unique abilities to complete objectives and pass obstacles. All the while, Mario had to collect Regional Coins and Power Moons in each level to progress and purchase new hats and costumes needed for certain tasks.

The game was a hit with fans and critics, being called one of the best in the series and taking home numerous awards. By the end of the year, it had sold over nine million copies. To help promote the game, Nintendo partnered with Kellogg’s to release a limited-edition cereal: Super Mario Cereal. This marked the first time Mario had headlined a cereal since Ralston’s Nintendo Cereal System at the end of the 1980s. The cereal was officially released in December of 2017 but didn’t hit store shelves until early 2018.

Back of the box.

Ironically, even though Odyssey doesn’t feature any of the usual power-ups from the franchise, the cereal based on it is full of them. The cereal pieces were shaped like Starmen with a hint of berry flavoring. The cereal also had marshmallows shaped like Question Mark Blocks, 1-Up Mushrooms, and Mario’s hat. On the back of the box, there was a maze game and Mario trivia amongst images of Mario, Bowser, Peach, Yoshi, coins, a goomba, piranha plants, Super Mushrooms and Fire Flowers (the latter two not even featured in the game).

A special feature of the box was that it’s also an amiibo that worked with the game. Amiibo are figurines that could be purchased to add content to various 3DS, Wii U and now Switch games by placing their base on a sensor. Similarly, the box has a chip located in a marked corner of the back of the box that can be held to the Switch’s scanner on the controller. Known as the “delicious amiibo”, it gave the players a number of coins and a heart, and could be used multiple times, and could be used with the in-game character Uncle amiibo for an extra Power Moon finder.

Comparison of the prototype box art and the newly released box.

In March of 2018, it was revealed that new boxes of Super Mario Cereal had begun hitting store shelves. These boxes closely resemble an early prototype, which featured Mario holding a spoon behind the cereal with the Mushroom Kingdom in the background. The official box included Bowser and Peach between Mario and the background. But, the biggest change seems to have been the removal of the amiibo functionality.

PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN CEREAL

PIRATES OF THE CARIBBEAN CEREAL

Kellogg’s

            Pirates of the Caribbean began as an attraction at Disneyland. It was the last attraction whose construction was overseen by Walt Disney as he died three months before it opened in 1967. It’s an enclosed log flume ride that tells the story of a band of pirates and their adventures using a variety of audio-animatronic characters.

Back of the blue box.

            In 2001, Walt Disney Pictures decided to attempt to adapt the ride into a film. Jay Wolpert was hired to write a script based on a story by executives Brigham Taylor, Michael Haynes and Josh Harmon. Debate was had whether to make it a theatrical release or direct-to-video. In 2002, Dick Cook managed to bring producer Jerry Bruckheimer on board and he hired Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio to rewrite the script they had; lessening the straightforward pirate story in favor of featuring the supernatural curse the ride itself made mention of.

            Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl was released on July 9, 2003. It followed the adventure of deposed Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) as he sought to reclaim his ship, The Black Pearl, from his former crew. Unfortunately for Jack, his crew was on a mission of their own: to free themselves from the curse of a treasure they stole that kept them immortal and turned them into skeletons in the moonlight. The film defied expectations (the last ride-themed movie flopped and pirate movies hadn’t been popular in years) and became the fourth-highest grossing film of 2003. It gave birth to a powerful franchise, with sequels and media tie-ins galore.

The red box.

            In preparation for the first sequel, Dead Man’s Chest, Kellogg’s acquired the license to produce a limited-edition cereal based on the film in 2006. The cereal was made with round chocolate pieces, symbolizing a “black pearl.” It also included marshmallows in the shape of daggers, treasure maps, a ship’s wheel, Jack’s hat and compass. There were two versions of the box: a blue one with the basic Pirates title, and a red one with the Chest subtitle. Depp, as Jack, adorned the front and back of both boxes. The back of the blue box featured a maze game inside one of the gold coins from the first movie, as well as a fill-in-the-word game. The red box had a larger maze game featuring elements from the sequel. 

Back of the red box.