It’s International Women’s Day, and you don’t have to look far in the GI Joe mythos to find characterizations of strong and capable women. Scarlett, Lady Jaye, Cover Girl, and Jinx were on equal footing with their male teammates, and I’m glad to have been exposed to them as a boy. Yes, I bought all the “girl” figures as a
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Cobra Commander bears little resemblance to the character’s appearance in the Retaliation film, aside from some similarity to the helmet design. But I’m not going to rag on it, because it’s a dang cool toy. Cobra Commander was the first Real American Hero figure of my youth, and he’s always had a special place within my memories of what made
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I know what you might be thinking: Have you finally gone off the deep end, Rob? Are you so burned out from the daily grind that you’re just throwing up whatever toys strike your fancy? No and no, although I do wish I could let loose and write about a broader range of toys. Maybe I’ll start a sister blog
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I’m a silver pads Grand Slam guy. That’s not to say I don’t dig his original red padded self. After all, he’s the man who helmed the HAL, the 80s team’s first big artillery piece. I like to think he’s just super versatile. He graduated top of Special Weapons School class, so I can see his being able to transition
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Amazon offered up a couple of surprise four-packs back in 2012; one focused on Retaliation and the other on Renegades. The Renegades pack struck my fancy as it included three unique figures along with another version of Duke. I’ll admit that I didn’t pay enough attention to Mr. Hauser until recently, and have found the figure to be an interesting
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A year before large scale Joe returned to regular retail with a newly designed highly-articulated body, Target offered up a series of Hall of Fame based interpretations of World War II officers. I had to make a trek to Wichita in order to pick up the set, as my area didn’t get a Target store until the 2000s. At the
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By KansasBrawler Never really knowing much about Battle Force 2000, I’d always assumed Dodger was their commanding officer. After all, he’s the only one that ever showed up on the pegs beyond his original Battle Force 2000 release, so I just assumed that meant he was the most important member of the team. Imagine my surprise when I was reading
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It’s 1984 all over again with this page starring two of my faves from that year. I wasn’t at all embarrassed to buy a Baroness action figure, and I can still recall the trip to Children’s Palace that netted the iconic Cobra ninja. Those endcaps seemed so dang tall! They probably weren’t. Anyway, if I’d had the cash, I would
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By Past Nastification You’re probably shaking your head right now, disgusted that I’m not calling this figure by its proper name, “Cobra Officer”. On paper, you’d be right. Technically, it is simply a Cobra Officer, released by the GI Joe Collectors Club in 2007 as one of the Night Stalkers in its “Tanks for the Memories” set. But this one,
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Spirit is a favorite that goes all the way back to 1984 for me. I can still recall picking up the figure at Children’s Palace. I was enamored with the character from the sight of a tiny version of his card art on a package back, and the specialty, tracker, along with the presence of an eagle companion, placed him
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