If you grew up in the 1990s, you remember a time before smartphones, social media, and instant Google searches — when late-night infomercials and cable TV basically were the internet.
Some of the stuff we all loved and watched looks pretty bizarre to younger generations.
For example…
Teen Witch
Teen Witch is a 1989 teen fantasy comedy that asked a very important question:
“What if high school was hard… but also magical?”
Directed by Dorian Walker and starring Robyn Lively (plus Zelda Rubinstein, because every 80s mystical movie needed a small but powerful oracle figure), the film follows Louise — your average overlooked teenage girl — who discovers on her 16th birthday that she’s not just awkward.
She’s a witch.
Which, honestly, feels like a pretty solid trade.
The Showtime Rotisserie
The Ronco Showtime Rotisserie wasn’t just a kitchen appliance. It was a promise.
A promise that you, a person who once burned garlic bread, could now cook a 15-pound turkey like you owned a vineyard.
This wasn’t some regular countertop oven. No. This thing rotated. It self-basted. It reduced fat. It made chicken spin slowly like it was contemplating its life choices.
And the slogan?
“Set it… and forget it.”
Which, in the 90s, was basically the culinary equivalent of manifesting abundance.
Great Looking Hair
After Ronco cornered the meat-cooking market, the company set its sights on the bald and the beautiful.
“Great Looking Hair” — or GLH, if you were serious about your follicle situation — was one of the most aggressively confident product names of the 1990s.
Not “Improved Looking Hair.”
Not “Hair Enhancement Mist.”
No.
Great. Looking. Hair.
It was a Ronco aerosol spray that basically said, “What if… we just painted it?”
Miss Cleo
Youree Dell Harris was an actress.
But the world knew her as Miss Cleo — the most confident psychic to ever appear in a 1:30 a.m. commercial sandwiched between a rotisserie oven and hair in a can.
From 1997 to 2003, if you stayed up late enough watching TV, she would find you.
Head wrap. Dramatic jewelry. Caribbean accent. Intense eye contact that somehow pierced through a 27-inch tube television.
And that voice.
“Call me now!”
The Pure Moods CD
Pure Moods — in case you forgot — was not just a CD. It was a lifestyle choice.
Technically speaking, it was the first U.S. release in a series of new-age compilation albums from Virgin Records. In the UK, it started in 1991 under the very serious title Moods – A Contemporary Soundtrack. Then came Moods 2 in 1992, because apparently one mood was not enough.
But in America? It became Pure Moods.
Which is a bold name for a CD that mostly sounded like a dolphin contemplating its life choices.
The Britannica Kid
Computers and smartphones were still a few years away. There was no Google. No “just check your phone.” No arguing with someone and immediately proving them wrong in 3.5 seconds.
Instead of having information at our fingertips, we had a shelf full of books with tons of useless information that only got opened when a homework assignment forced it.
The crown jewel of that shelf? The Encyclopedia Britannica.
What weird stuff from the 90s did I miss? Let me know in the comments.
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Something about arithmetic? Also, hooked on phonics!!
HOOKED ON PHONICS WORKED FOR ME!