Cobra Mortal (2006)

This figure holds the honor of least handled of all my convention exclusives. Why? Because it came with a nice little warning note from the club explaining that the toy had to be created with a more brittle type of plastic in order to achieve a vac-metallized finish. The result was a beautifully rendered reproduction of one of the craziest Argentinian Joes, but one that requires handling with care. I finally busted him out of his foam tray tonight, and tempted fate by placing weapons in his hands. Thankfully, nothing broke.

I’m sorry I hadn’t handled Cobra Mortal much before, because he’s a very cool looking toy to have in-hand. I’m not one to spend big bucks on international releases, so this Mortal was my best chance at getting one. The parts and paint apps aren’t exact matches, but they suffice for a repro. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a sucker for vac-metal and translucent toys, so this guy ranks high on my list of faves.

The club used the original Argentinian file card as a jumping off point to work the character more fully into their Joe mythos. He’s a mysterious assassin who works on an on-again, off-again basis for Cobra, thanks to his hard-to-stomach cruel streak. I find it hard to believe there’s not someone in Cobra who could be paired up with the guy, but okay. The bio does little to explain his outfit, simply referring to it as reflective body armor. Taken as a whole, I think I prefer the original version of his backstory.