So the short version is this:

GME wanted to get into collectibles in a big way. They had a successful test with ZiNG Pop Culture, an Australian company, and the plan was to acquire ZPC and take them global. 1/ https://twitter.com/mushroomplanet/status/1354894022465236993

But an internal division led a rival group in business development to suggest and pursue buying TG. (This is the loaded gun that goes off in Act III.) 2/

There’s also some drama around holding off Hot Topic and their private equity owner, Sycamore Partners, as well as some inside baseball between dying CEO Paul Raines and TG’s owner at the time, Ken Langone. 3/

Side Bar: Langone is one of the founders of Home Depot and Raines is was an ex-HD executive. No doubt this relationship played a role in the ridiculous price $GME paid for TG. 4/

Anyway... GME buys TG and immediately sets about trying to marry the GME customer file with the things TG has to offer. But before testing they start buying inventory... lots and lots of it. 5/

Lack of testing is bad but what’s worse is that the people they need at GME to help sell this inventory aren’t helping. The group that forced the acquisition has no internal leverage. As a result, they fail and firesale the inventory with insane discounts.
Then they get fired. 6/

This starts a major downward spiral as discounts deepen and product quality dies. Some limited testing also reveals low conversion rates for the GME file which leads the remaining to conclude the GME brand is “stronger.” Instead thinking that maybe the product is crap? 7/

In the end, doubling down on bad ideas combined with warring factions inside GME led to massive losses and the final death of TG. But to be fair, it had died a few times already for other reasons. 8/8