Revenge of the Spy Shark
Following up with yesterday’s post, I thought I’d just go whole hog with the Shark Week concept for this week. Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water…
The Adventure Team series was a perfect opportunity to pit the Joes against the forces of nature, and what more deadly a force lurks in the oceans than sharks. The mind immediately goes to the danger of these predatory creatures, or as Matt Hooper put forth, “…what we are dealing with here is a perfect engine, an eating machine. It’s really a miracle of evolution. All this machine does is swim and eat and make little sharks, and that’s all.”
The shark in this adventure has an added wrinkle. It’s equipped with a camera strapped to its head. Not quite a laser beam, but nonetheless impressive. Good thing Joe’s there (or is that the Gorton’s Fisherman?) to take care of it.
That’s just a toothy minnow on the box, there. 🙂
I really don’t know why Hasbro hasn’t at least tried to revive the adventurer aspect of Joe. You could get fun little playsets like this (which other companies are doing, just more cheaply) and also glom onto whatever pop culture fad comes along. (A zombie hunter would make a lot more sense in this context than just trying to fit them into Cobra.) Maybe there isn’t a huge market. But, I would think you could do an adventure concept with a few established characters and create some toys that could find a marketshare.
I think the reason Hasbro is only doing stuff for the fans as kids just dont care about toys today. The other day, i had to give way to a school bus and all its under 12 passengers had their faces burried in their phones. I guess nothing can compete with mobile and app games these days [sad face]
^Skymate’s point x1000. I ran the pricing department of a Target for years in the mid-2000s, and nothing besides Hot Wheels and Star Wars (they had just gotten a huge toy push) were getting any attention. And that attention came from middle-aged men. Their children were in the carts wondering why they’re looking at this antiquated stuff.
I worked at a Toys R us for a short time, late in 2003. For the holiday season that year, all the kids wanted were Gameboys and yu-gi-oh cards. They used to press the buttons on the spytroops vehicles until the batteries ran flat but none of the ever bought them OR most of the other stuff on the shelves.
I ain’t got no beef with Yu-Gi-Oh!, but kids choosing Yu-Gi-Oh! cards over G.I. Joe vehicles, that is just pathetic. We are really living in strange times. And I ain’t got no beef with video games either. I just think that today’s kids have way more things to choose to entertain themselves than we did back in the old days, but they don’t realize it, so they choose only video games no matter in what format they are in, as long as they are video games. And it seems like that is all that they want. A real shame.
I have been saying the same thing for a while now. They need to make small scale replicas of their 60’s, and 70’s vehicles. It can be done, and it already has been done. Also, there is absolutely no reason why the Adventure Team can not fight Cobra. Specially Dr. Mindbender, and his weird Dr. Moreau like creatures. It’s time to expand the G.I. Joe universe. Just imagine the Adventure Team working together with the Dino Hunters. Or with the Mega Marines, or the Star Brigade, fighting against the Lunartix Empire, or the Manimals. My only regret is that these figures would not be made in the old o-ring scale size. But I’m more interested in the vehicles.
Why’s he messin’ with sharks in a mine field? Joe cray. Maybe Dirk Pitt sent him out there.