By Past Nastification The fingerprint of Devil’s Due is all over this Zartan, although nothing on the packaging would indicate it. DD might have been denied any credit deserved for this design, but it made for a nice figure. It’s not a direct take on Zartan’s DD appearances, but more of a blending of them with elements of Zartan’s ARAH
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By KansasBrawler Overall, the 25th Anniversary line, while far from perfect, did a great job at referencing just about every facet of the small scale Joe brand’s history. One of the biggest surprises for me was the Cobra Night Watch set. I passed on the original set pretty easily when it first came out during the new sculpt era. I
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By KansasBrawler Copperhead and I go way back, though strangely, my love of the Water Moccasin is fairly recent. That’s because the Copperhead I knew back in the day was KansasBrother’s Python Patrol version. I thought he was really cool but had I known he was first released with an equally cool vehicle, I would have thought he was even
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By Past Nastification Released as “Mercenary Wraith”, this figure is based on a character pulled from the GI Joe comic book while under the direction of Devil’s Due. If I remember correctly, the character was created by Brandon Jerwa, not Josh Blaylock. This might explain why despite the over-the-top super villain costume, the character was handled with more finesse. Although
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By KansasBrawler It may be hard to beat the look of the vintage Alley Viper, but man did Hasbro come close with the Resolute Alley Viper Cobra set. I don’t recall seeing Alley Vipers in the Resolute cartoon. However, it’s also been a really long time since I’ve watched it, so I may just have missed them when I first
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By KansasBrawler Not every figure in a multipack can be a winner. In the Extreme Conditions: Arctic set, the weak figure is the Viper listed as a heavy weapons specialist. The figure itself is decent, however, some of the decisions Hasbro made with it mean it doesn’t work well as an arctic figure. If this were a regular heavy weapons
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By KansasBrawler Hasbro made some pretty great exclusives during the 25th Anniversary line. While I thought it was a bit overpriced considering how much of it was stuff I already had, the Ultimate Battle Pack from Target was pretty impressive. You got six figures, two large vehicles, one small vehicle and a JUMP pack. I couldn’t afford it at its
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By KansasBrawler While I’ve always loved Destro, I never felt the need to track down the original Destro. I thought the 1988 Iron Grenadiers version was perfect. However, it does make sense that when Hasbro started the 25th Anniversary line, they gave us the original Destro first. It’s an iconic look and while it’s not my cup of tea, I
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By KansasBrawler I’ve been a fan of Lady Jaye for as long as I can remember. I thought Flint and Lady Jaye were the best part of the cartoon when I was a kid and I know I had the original Lady Jaye figure for a really long time in my collection. She, Tiger Force Flint and Battle Armor Cobra
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By KansasBrawler I generally like it when Hasbro and the GIJCC do more spiritual updates of characters. I like a lot of figures’ vintage looks, but at the same time, military gear has changed since the 80s, so I don’t mind seeing a little more modern take on a figure’s look. However, I was a little bummed when the first
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