By Acer The year 1994 was one where Hasbro was making a few gambles, two of which predicated on the success of two movies based on two popular fighting video game franchises: Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat. Street Fighter, which tied in to the 1994 film starring Jean-Claude Van Damme and Raul Julia (in his final film role), saw Hasbro
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By Twitziller G.I. Joe was the first action figure, a 12” hero introduced in 1964 and supplied with a staggering array of uniforms, weapons, vehicles, and playsets, each sold separately, of course. After over a decade of success, rising plastic costs and competition from smaller and wildly popular 8” superhero figures led to the demise of the 12” Joe figure,
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By YT I had admired the Sideshow line from afar for a while before I picked up my first figure, the Cobra Sniper on clearance. Once I had that figure in hand it was all over for me. The quality and details were amazing! When I saw they were doing a Viper, I was in. This figure did not disappoint,
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By KansasBrawler It may sometimes take a little while, but I have to commend Hasbro for its ability to get popular canceled figures released. This year we’re finally getting the much-demanded Concept Case Gung-Ho and during the Retaliation line, Data-Viper was rescued from the great parts bin in the sky and saw a retail release and I couldn’t have been
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Over the course of the Kre-O GI Joe run, there have been quite a few different variations of the classic “blueshirt” Cobra Trooper. Some were straight copies of the ’82-83 baddies, while others were new adaptations of the familiar helmeted henchmen. At a first glance of photos online, I thought that the figure was based on the 25th Anniversary Cobra
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So is this another instance of Hasbro losing the trademark to a previously used toy character name? Mirage has been the moniker of both an Autobot and a GI Joe. Now it’s also the name of a Lanard CORPS! agent. I wasn’t initially impressed by the revised construction of these figures. Like their 80s predecessors, they aped what was going
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May the Fourth be with you! I know there are other, more direct ways to sneak in some Star Wars references on this day. Sure, I could have talked about the Cobra Mountain/Geonosis Arena shared molds, or the POTF2 figures who shared similar rifle molds with 90s Joes. I could even have discussed the Endor Bunker that donated itself to
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Mutt and Junkyard were favorites of mine back in 1984. With a host of great accessories, a cool uniform and an animal companion, the figure got a lot of play in my Joe adventures. I was surprised to see, upon returning to GI Joe collecting in the early 90s, that Mutt had another release. I was also surprised to catch
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By KansasBrawler I’ve always had a weird relationship with Red Dog. He’s honestly my least favorite Renegade. While Mercer and Taurus had characterizations that interested me, an ex-football star with anger issues just never really spoke to me. Mercer and Taurus always had distinctive personalities when my brother and I were playing with them, but Red Dog was just kind
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With the GI Joe relaunch in 2002, the o-ring style originated in the 80s made a limited comeback. In just the first two years, the classic Viper mold (well, most of it–more on that in a minute) had been revisited five times in the mass market, and once (okay, twice if you count the fuschia fiasco) as a Collectors’ Club
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