Story and photo by Bryce Lawson
Halloween is on the horizon, bringing horror movie marathons and monster-themed cereal along with it.
The cereal aisles are lined with a zombified Cap’n Crunch, a vampire Tony the Tiger and much more. With these copycat monster cereals emerging, why won’t General Mills just bring back Fruit Brute and Yummy Mummy?
Nothing brings me more joy in life than watching Magilla Gorilla and other Saturday morning cartoons while eating a bowl of my favorite blueberry ghost cereal Boo Berry. The two original monsters were introduced in 1971 as seasonal cereal, with accompanying commercials featuring a cartoon Frankenberry and Count Chocula. To sweeten the deal, boxes included prizes such as posters and vinyl figures.
Over the next couple of years, both monsters would fight over which had the best cereal until 1973, when Boo Berry came on to the scene. Based on the success of the first three monsters, General Mills added two other monsters into the cereal lineup with Fruit Brute – a noisy werewolf offering fruit-flavored marshmallow cereal – in 1974, but it was unfortunately discontinued in 1982. Yummy Mummy was introduced in 1987 as a replacement of Fruit Brute, but it was discontinued in 1992.
It was not until 2013 when General Mills decided to bring back Fruit Brute – now with cherry-flavored marshmallows – and Yummy Mummy, with orange cream flavored marshmallows, as part of the monster cereal rebrand, giving the monsters new, sleek, modern looks. Personally, I am a fan of the original character designs, especially the hazy-eyed Boo Berry, who now looks like a Casper knockoff mixed with a butler.
Fruit Brute and Yummy Mummy only lasted one year after the rebrand, but with childhood nostalgia at the highest its been, Fruit Brute and Yummy Mummy are due for a comeback. The new flavors of cherry and orange cream are more enticing flavors than the ones from the original release. Yummy Mummy actually sounded like it would be my least favorite, but that orange cream flavor sounds pretty dank. It might be time to introduce some new monsters into the lineup. Maybe a “Creature From The Black Lagoon” style monster with cinnamon apple-flavored cereal, or a “Bride Of Frankenberry,” with raspberry flavored marshmallows.
General Mills is passing off its already established cereal brands as Halloween cereals instead of going all out on the monster cereal momentum. As a fan of all things defunct, from football leagues to cereal, I scoured the aisles of Walmart and Winn-Dixie looking for my beloved monster cereal, but all I can find is “spooky marshmallow” Lucky Charms.
Fruit Brute and Yummy Mummy have grown in popularity due to the Funko company making various bobble heads and Funko pops based on the characters. To boost sales of the characters, General Mills should release the two as Funko Cereals, offering a small pop vinyl figure at the bottom of each box. This model could possibly lure people to the cereal, making the comeback a possibility.
It would be nice to curl up with a bowl of Fruit Brute and watch the original “The Wolf Man” next Halloween season.
I know that feeling we have the same problem finding Monster cereals at Kroger’s and Meijers here after Halloween Kroger’s had marked their monster cereals 10/$10 I bought 5 boxes but at times independent markets in the inner city of Detroit might get them in after Halloween selling them cheap