Oh, England! Why!
From the land of Road Dahl, Paddington, Rupert, and Winnie. These things? Seriously? Spiky cyclopses?
Vancouver did something brilliant in drawing from anime to create their uber-cute mascots, Miga, Quatchi, and Sumi. Anime, because Vancouver has a sizable Asian population, plus anime is futuristic. Vancouver is futuristic! They translated very well to a plushy format, which meant gazillions in sales. I could not get a pair of Quatchi slippers like I wanted. In fact, it was very difficult to get any mascot-emblazoned items by the time the Olympics rolled ’round!
Haven’t you learned anything from Vancouver? Oh right. I forgot. The Brits hated everything they did in Vancouver. Fools!