Did McDonaldland's Captain Crook steal one too many Filet-O-Fish? Or was it the 1980s makeover into the Captain? Learn about the downfall of Captain Crook.
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00Why did McDonald's decide to ditch the beloved character Captain Crook?
00:05Did he steal one too many fish sandwiches? Did his abrupt 1980s makeover come under fire?
00:11I can't stop! Cookies, burgers to go! I love McDonald's!"
00:16We know you have questions about Captain Crook, and we have answers.
00:19Here's everything we know about his disappearance, so far.
00:24Ronald McDonald became known as the smiling face of McDonald's,
00:28but let's not forget that he was just one member of a wild and colorful cast of characters.
00:33They all lived together in a theoretically magical place called McDonaldland. Aside from
00:39the never-not-smiling Ronald, there was Mayor McCheese, the Hamburglar, Officer Big Mac,
00:44the evil Grimace, and the man who currently concerns us and concerns us greatly,
00:49the nefarious Captain Crook.
00:51Avast! I'll fix the rascal!
00:53Stop! That's not the way!
00:54Hold it! I'll put it under arrest!
00:57The characters were developed in 1970 by advertising gurus Needham, Harper & Steers,
01:02and they were reportedly designed to inspire brand loyalty among children.
01:06They certainly inspired a fair share of nightmares among kids who grew up in the era.
01:11As you can clearly see, Captain Crook was a pirate through and through.
01:15With his puffy shirt and lavish purple hat, he gravitated towards a very classic,
01:20very casual pirate look, and as you can see for yourself, he wore it very well indeed.
01:25Of course, he didn't happen to have a peg leg or wear an eyepatch, but hey, nobody's perfect.
01:30I'll trade you two Big Macs for a Captain Crook! You're not worth it!
01:35Oh yeah?
01:36When your name's Captain Crook,
01:38you're probably not going to grow up to become a beacon of respectability.
01:42Oh my!
01:46He was searching for a great treasure. Oops!
01:49My mistake!
01:51This particular captain had a voracious appetite for mischief,
01:55a hunger only exceeded by his love of the Filet-O-Fish sandwich.
01:58Well, someone out there had to be eating them.
02:01Without a doubt, Captain Crook hung with a rough crowd. First, there was the Hamburglar,
02:05who devoted his life to stealing hamburgers and cheeseburgers. Then there was the evil Grimace,
02:10he of the craven and insatiable thirst for milkshakes. Meanwhile, Captain Crook himself
02:15was a force to be reckoned with, demonstrating with every sly move that one man's fish sandwich
02:21is another man's buried treasure. If Captain Crook looks familiar,
02:25it might be because he looks an awful lot like Captain Hook, the villain in Peter Pan.
02:30You know the one we're talking about.
02:32The similarities are impossible to ignore. They both had a penchant for wearing large,
02:36floppy hats, velvety red jackets with lace popping out of their collars and cuffs,
02:40and of course the obligatory curly mustaches that are always so fashionable among the villainous
02:45pirate set.
02:46He even warped the plank.
02:48Bosh! This looks like a good spot.
02:52However, it's worth noting that Captain Crook wasn't missing a hand,
02:56unlike the iconic villain who liked to give Peter Pan such a hard time.
02:59We can't help but wonder whether Captain Hook would have also enjoyed the Filet-O-Fish had
03:03he been born into a different era. What do you think?
03:07In the 1980s, McDonald's gave Captain Crook quite the makeover.
03:11Let's both work together and get this boat in the water.
03:14Right. But first, a Filet-O-Fish sandwich.
03:17Seemingly overnight, Captain Crook transformed into a far sillier pirate with a much more
03:22bushy mustache. He looked less like a villain and more like someone's cuddly,
03:27vaguely swashbuckling second uncle.
03:29For reasons we'll probably never understand, the powers-that-be at McDonald's decided to drop
03:34Crook from the pirate's name, and he was promptly renamed The Captain.
03:38Instead of being psychotically obsessed with Filet-O-Fish sandwiches, he spent a good chunk
03:43of time enjoying pleasant lunches with Ronald McDonald, or hanging out on his pirate ship's
03:48lifeboat. For a minute back there, it looked like the Captain had finally come into his own.
03:53But fate is some cruel stuff.
03:55Sadly, this revamp wasn't enough to save him from a massive overhaul of the
04:00McDonaldland cast of characters in the 1980s. In the middle of the decade,
04:04many beloved residents of McDonaldland were dropped from the chain's advertising campaigns,
04:09including Officer Big Mac, Mayor McCheese, The Professor, and, yes, Captain Crook.
04:15"'Aye, it's a different kind of sandwich. And a great treasure."
04:19"'How's the story end?'
04:20So why did McDonald's let The Captain go? Perhaps it was a simple and dispassionate
04:25marketing move, or perhaps it was the result of a lawsuit. In the 70s, Sid and Marty Croft,
04:31the creators of the children's television program H.R. Pufnstuf, sued McDonald's.
04:36Allegedly, the ad firm Needham, Harper & Steers had approached them about collaborating on a
04:41McDonald's campaign and then never contacted them again. Well, shortly after that alleged meeting,
04:46McDonaldland debuted with its own wild cast of characters. And this decidedly
04:51ragtag crew bore a rather striking resemblance to the H.R. Pufnstuf creations.
04:56The judge evidently agreed, because the Crofts ultimately won the case.
05:00We can't help but wonder if the lawsuit influenced McDonald's decision to eliminate
05:05several beloved characters from McDonaldland, including a certain Captain Crook. We've reached
05:10out to the pirate for a statement, and we'll update this story as soon as more information
05:14becomes available.
05:16Ahoy! How about a cheeseburger for me?
05:19Oh no, Captain Crook, not till you learn to smile.
05:22Oh, really? Watch this!