Discontinued Halloween Candy: 7 Dearly Departed Candies That Deserve to Rise from the Dead

Taxes and jury duty be darned, no horrors of adulthood broke me quite like the realization that I had not only aged out of receiving free candy, but was now expected to spend my own money to give others that candy? My candy? No thanks.

Of course, I’ll still buy the giant variety bags of trick-or-treat treasures to eat alone in the dark on Halloween. As I ignore the freeloaders attacking my doorbell, I’ll reflect on the candies of the past, and I’ll open my heart just enough to let myself yearn for a moment. If you, too, want to be visited by the candies of Halloweens past, keep scrolling. Here are seven discontinued Halloween candies that I think should be resurrected from the dead.

Butterfinger BBs (RIP: 1992 – 2006): A great “tell me you’re a ‘90s kid without telling me you’re a ‘90s kid” giveaway is immediately pouring one out at the mention of Butterfinger BBs. These pop-em-in-your-mouth BB’s looked like Whoppers but tasted like Butterfingers, and were the best of snacking ease and flavor at the same time. It’s a shame BBs were discontinued. It’s almost like combining sugar and a nod to recreational violence wasn’t the most sustainable marketing play.
Seven Up (RIP: 1930s – 1979): As interesting as a lemon-lime soda chocolate would be, this was not that. Rather, the name came about because this chocolate bar was split into seven different sections, with seven different fillings in one candy bar. The flavors rotated, but popular ones included Brazil nut, butterscotch, coconut, caramel, fudge, buttercream, cherry cream, and orange jelly. For anyone with a sweet tooth and decision fatigue, this was a dream come true. For anyone on this candy’s legal team, it was a nightmare. It was discontinued due to trademark disputes with American Bottling Company (the owner of 7UP soda), leaving us all with the distant memory of the hope that we could have it all. Now we just have to buy the entire Russell Stover’s assortment and eat the whole thing. Darn.
Wonka Shockers/Shock Tarts (RIP: 1962 – mid-2000s): I remember putting one of these into my mouth and immediately feeling like I was pranked by my friend with a handshake buzzer. With so much chocolate around Halloween, only to be interrupted by unapologetically sweet fruity candy, it was really nice to have a proper sour candy to give your palate a little reset as you rifled through your pillowcase of goods. I miss the perfect amount of chewiness. I miss the slight pain that made me feel alive. I miss the proof that sweet and sour could live harmoniously together. I miss you, Shock Tarts.
Wonka Bars (RIP: 1975 – 2010): The Willy Wonka franchise gave us so much: endless hours of entertainment, the reassurance that creativity knows no bounds, the go-ahead to run a successful establishment by tricking and punishing children, and this candy bar. Transcending the boundary between fiction and reality, the iconic Wonka Bar was brought to life as a milk chocolate bar with graham crackers. It was delicious enough to stand on its own independent of its connection to the story, but has since been taken from us, and Chalamet has not been pulling the strings to bring it back. Do I miss the chocolate, or do I miss believing that magic was real? The answer is yes.
Hershey’s S’mores (RIP: 2003 – 2012): S’mores are great, but you’d be hard pressed to find a tribute to s’mores that wasn’t primarily chocolate and marshmallow, with some wimpy nod to graham crackers. It’s criminal, really. Graham crackers deserve more. They deserve the thick layer that these bars granted them, a layer that maybe the world wasn’t ready for. While a run of almost a decade isn’t really short, it wasn’t nearly long enough. A portable combination of the proper ratio of s’mores components, these bars also had a little bit of a nutty, malty flavor that kept me coming back for more.
Chicken Dinner (RIP: 1923 – 1962): I’ll admit I’ve never had these. I put them on this list because I am just so fascinated by the marketing approach. I absolutely would have bought a candy bar that claimed to taste like chicken and potatoes, but that’s not what this was. This was a fairly safe candy bar with nuts inside, with the off-the-wall PR campaign of attaching it to a chicken dinner. I realize that these days, people are doing wild things like foie gras donuts and soup-flavored cough drops, but this was the 1920s. People were still adjusting to women voting, then Sperry Candy hit them with the idea to wrap a chocolate in an irrelevant portrait of a full roast chicken? Bold. Memorable. Iconic. Candy was probably fine, too.
Marathon (RIP: 1973 – 1981): According to internet lore, this was a ‘70s staple. It was an 8-inch chocolate bar (great start) that was filled with caramel (great follow-up). The idea was that it would take consumers a long time to eat it. That seems an odd goal for a company who would presumably want consumers to buy more but, hey, it seems like people had fun gnawing on these lengthy treats.