Bonkers!
Chewy rectangular fruit candies with a tangy center, sold on the back of some of the most surreal commercials of the era — a giant piece of fruit dropping out of the sky to flatten some unsuspecting bystander. 'Bonkers! Bonks you out!'
Bonkers came from Nabisco in the mid-1980s and was still turning up in lunchboxes and corner stores into the 90s. The candy itself was a chewable rectangle with a soft, tangy filling, in flavors like grape, orange, strawberry, watermelon, and chocolate. But almost nobody remembers Bonkers for the taste first — they remember the ads.
The commercials were gloriously weird: an ordinary, often uptight person eats a Bonkers, and out of nowhere a colossal piece of fruit — a giant bunch of grapes, say — falls from the sky and flattens them, sending everyone into hysterics under the tagline 'Bonkers! Bonks you out!' One recurring bit featured a Southern woman insisting, 'Some folks think Bonkers is gum… they know it's candy now.' It was the kind of absurdity that lodged in a kid's brain far longer than the candy stayed in production.
Bonkers faded out by the late 90s and became a rarity. In February 2012, Leaf Brands acquired the trademark and floated a comeback, keeping the name alive for a generation that mostly wanted the falling-fruit commercials back as much as the candy.
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