Making Fun: The Story of Funko

“Dive into a world of fun.”

Filmology Rating: 2 out of 4

Much to the dismay of my girlfriend, I’m a Pop Funko collector, in fact I have many to my left and right looking down upon me at my desk as I write this review, but I have felt the collecting bug slowly die inside me.  Perhaps it’s the cynical part of brain telling me that I don’t deserve to have that much cuteness in my life, but I’m willing to bet it has more to do with the fact that “adulting” leaves little money for recreational activities like collecting.

I thought it would be interesting to see how a company that I thought was rather new,  that is within the past ten years get off the ground running. Only while watching Making Fun did I realize that the company has been around since 1998 which baffled me.  I have heard many people call Funko the new Ty, Ty being the company which released the Beanie Babies fad onto the world, but it would seem that Funko has already lasted longer as a company than the Beanie Babies lasted.  That’s an interesting bit of information that might help you win a trivia contest sometime, but I still found it to be completely fascinating.

If you are interested in how the company Funko came to be then you will find the first half hour of the film to be the most engaging aspects, but if you are one of those collectors who finds showing off the size of their collection to people to be the highlight of your life, then you will find that the last hour will get your blood pumping.  I found myself wanting to take a nap during the last hour of the film, I don’t care about the size of someone's collection, as long as they are happy with it, then that is what matters at the end of the day. While it’s humbling to know that thousands of people around the world collect the Funko product, I could simply take a look at any Funko message board and I would see many people from all over the world buying and trading goods.  The film is simply trying to talk down to its audience which is always to see in a documentary.

The film is clearly financed by Funko to make it look like they are willing to move mountains to please the fanbase.  While they do make collectables that are affordable, they also make some that are nearly impossible to get because they are either website exclusives or con exclusives that seem to disappear the moment that they are shown by scalpers whose only intention is to sell them on the secondary market.  Funko has done and will do nothing about this since the scalpers are still paying Funko the original sale price but then jacking that price up by sometimes more than 100%. I have never done well with PR campaigns that are trying to decieve people who are either naive or just simply complacent since they aren’t willing to challenge the status quo.  While I only know this because I have been a member of the collecting community, I just find it to be disheartening that Funko has sponsored a documentary where everything is sunshine and rainbows and they refuse to talk about missteps the company could have made or ways that they plan on improving the collecting atmosphere.

I was hoping that watching this film would finally put me over the edge to take the pilgrimage to Funko HQ in Washington, but sadly the film just makes me look at my POP Funkos and remember the good times that I had collecting them,  rather than look to what the future might have in store for the Funko company.

Rating: Skip It

-Jonny G