Not only do I miss the days of o-ring figures, but I miss the days of o-ring multi-pack exclusives. I guess I should say o-ring Toys R Us multi-pack exclusives. Maybe I should put it even more succinctly. I miss 2002-2006. It was a time when GI Joe seemed to still be viable, or at least a time when Hasbro
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By KansasBrawler The Kre-O brand is really weird. When it was first announced I thought, “Oh, I’ll just dabble in it a little” but now, two years later, I own all but two of the sets (sorry, I thought the Dragonfly set and the dojo were pretty lame) and have a large collection of the minifigures. The last two waves
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Many of the 90s re-imaginings of older Joe characters don’t get a whole lot of love. Some folks aren’t fond of the bright colors, others don’t care for the gimmick-laden accessories, and still others hate both of the above. Being a toy optimist, I like to look for the positive in anything I pick up. In the case of Mutt’s
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By KansasBrawler The Joe brand can only survive for so long on nostalgia. Sometimes, you need to inject some fresh blood into the line or take characters in a new direction. I think that’s part of why I liked Rise of Cobra so much. Yes, it wasn’t my Joes up there on the screen, but aside from Duke, I did
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Pulling out a lesser known character, who was also the driver of a pricey vehicle was one of the good ideas within the 2003 convention set. Major Storm was a figure I didn’t have in my collection until I began trying to complete a 1982-94 run in the early 2000s. This repaint came along at just the right time for
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Wet-Suit was one of my favorite figures from the 1986 series. Some of the reason goes back to the toy itself and its great accessories, some to the character in the Marvel comic, and some from the package art. Torpedo was one of the first Joes I bought in 1983, and the fact that an underwater Joe looked cool on
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Looking through a present day lens, the early small scale Joe convention exclusives have a sense of being a bit of an afterthought in comparison to their later counterparts. While the set was intriguing in terms of bringing along new factions and reusing interesting troop molds, the storyline around them doesn’t grab one’s attention. In fact, this set is probably
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By KansasBrawler Wave Three of the Retaliation figures, while a juggernaut of a wave, unfortunately suffered from the fact that the other two waves of Retaliation figures didn’t sell that well in stores. I have literally never seen a Wave 3 Retaliation figure out in the wild. Heck, I barely saw anything from Wave 4 either. I’m glad I’ve finally
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I’m a sucker for role-play items,and this is one that I’ve been jonesing for for a long time. I’m also a huge fan of the 1991 Snake Eyes figure, so this set hits all the right spots for me. Since I don’t have the actual item, I can’t speak to the quality of it as a toy, but the package
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By KansasBrawler Kids can be funny sometimes. I don’t mean in the lame Kids Say the Darndest Things way, but it’s interesting to watch how your opinion of a toy changes after seeing a kid’s eyes light up while they’re playing with it. I was talking with a couple of Hasbro design team folks near the “free play” area they’d
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