Besides, Asimov’s company was called U.S. Robots and Mechanical Men, Inc. Ironic, because Asimov coined the term “robotics” from the pre-existing term “robot”.
There’s also an enormous series of mystery novels by Jessica Fletcher (and Donald Bain).
The Red Rider BB gun was introduced in 1938, long before the film “A Christmas Story” was made. Daisy still makes it. It has a wooden stock, a lanyard ring, and the name “Red Ryder” was burned into the stock. It does not and never did, however, have a compass or sundial on the stock. The Daisy “Buck Jones” model did have a compass and a sundial in the stock.
And you can get butter beer at Universal.
Well according to the site usedtobe linked to, Daisy did make a version of the movie weapon for a short period around the time the film came out, and currently offers a 30th anniversary version with the requisite features.
Sometimes the April Fool’s items at ThinkGeek.com get made for real, like the Tauntaun Sleeping Bag.
A fictional product which I’d love to have become real – just because of its wondrous name – is the one in the short story by “Saki”, Filboid Studge– the story title, is the product’s name. A cynical little tale of how public relations and the power of the media, backed by lots of money, succeed in promoting a new breakfast cereal (which in fact tastes nauseating) so that it becomes hugely popular and a great money-spinner. (The genius who thinks up the name and the advertising-poster which does more than anything else to popularise the stuff, comes to a bad end himself.)
The satirical short stories by “Saki”, who almost exactly a hundred years ago was killed in World War I, often surprise me with: what a lot of stupid / lurid / morally-shabby doings of kinds which we tend to think very much, the stuff of present-day society, were going on (with pretty well the identical sorts of shenanigans) a century ago.
Me, I’m still waiting for my Sproing Boots.
You can get Romulan Ale, apparently legally.
You can now buy your own turret. Unfortunately, none of the profit goes to support the Aperture Science Self-Esteem Fund for Girls. You can still donate one or all of your vital organs though.
Eric Idle wrote a Monty Python routine about a rock group where he “was trying to think of a name that would be so silly nobody would ever use it, or dream it could ever be used”. Later, “a song came on the radio, and the DJ said, ‘that was by Toad the Wet Sprocket’, and I nearly drove off the freeway”.
According to the Wikipedia page, there have been legal battles over a number of attempts by companies to produce their own version of Duff beer.
Somebody in Cleveland makes Buzz Beer the way Drew Carey’s character did - mix beer and coffee.
I wonder if anyone in Sweden has tried to make Düff.
I’d still like to have my own Acme anvil.
You can also get butter beer at Wynott’s Wands in Salem, Massachusetts. (Wynott’s itself is modeled after Ollivander’s)
Yeh, I thought of that one too - it turns out that a real “Acme anvil” predates Chuck Jones’ version by several decades.
The word 'Acme" goes back many centuries, just as does ‘Zenith’ or ‘Pinnacle’.
apparently you can buy healing and mana potions
Not sure if this counts since it’s not illegal drugs, I believe Albuquerque has a lot of Blue Ice products now, everything from candy to vodka. There’s even a company called Blue Ice Enterprises.
Based on Breaking Bad.
A few months to a year ago a Pizza Planet restaurant opened up near me. I haven’t been in to see if they have a claw machine with little green plastic aliens. I also haven’t seen a pick-up truck with a rocket on top delivering pizza around town, but I keep my eyes open for it.
Not a consumer product, but I think SKYNET qualifies…