Steel Crusher and Nitro-Viper

By KansasBrawler

The Rise of Cobra line was a weird line for me, especially when it came to the vehicles. Things I thought would be really awesome (like the Cobra Gunship) kind of disappointed me, but things that I passed on multiple times wound up really impressing me after I weakened and picked them up on clearance. I don’t know how many times I passed on the Steel Crusher before the movie came out. I know it was a pretty early release in the line so I’m sure I saw it a lot. On the shelf, it really just didn’t appeal to me. However, after seeing it in action in the movie, I thought it was really cool. It’s still a bit of an odd Joe vehicle, but Hasbro did a great job of recreating this movie vehicle and it really looks like it rolled right off the screen. Throw in a driver whose name references a popular vehicle driver and whose design references a different popular vehicle driver and you have a surprisingly fun vehicle set. Yes, it’s been built to be extremely kid-friendly but it meshes well enough with the regular Joe line that it’s not that much of a problem.

At its most basic, the Steel Crusher is a large black civilian model Hummer. It’s a great design and I think it really helped that the Hasbro folks were actually able to license the look from Hummer. I never thought my collection would have needed a Cobra-themed black SUV, but here we are and I think it’s a great addition. The design works well and I appreciate all the nice things they were able to work in there. First of all, while the roof is open to help put figures in the vehicle, the front doors also open. I like the added realism of the opening doors and unlike some Joe vehicles with that feature, they actually open far enough that you can have the figure posed to climb in and out of the vehicle the way a normal person would. I do wish there were a way to cover the driver’s compartment when it’s in standard SUV mode, but it doesn’t spend much time in that mode so it’s not that big of a deal. Secondly, the Steel Crusher’s running boards have footpegs, meaning up to four figures can ride on the outside of the vehicle. Finally, it feels like the tires might be made of rubber but if not, they’re at least a different grade of plastic. It’s clear they’re not hard plastic wheels and once again, I like the added realistic touch of tires that sort of feel like tires. As much as a like the realistic look of the Steel Crusher, a black SUV is kind of boring, even if it’s Cobra-themed. Mercifully, the Steel Crusher can transform just like it did in the movie. The back quarter of the roof can slide forward. This allows the pulse cannon in the back end of the Steel Crusher to pop up and creates a little extra figure carrying space. The panel that slides forward covers up the driver’s compartment and a second panel can flip down over the windshield and armors up the front of the vehicle very well. On the rear doors, there’s a small panel that can fold down on each side. Each panel has a small red missile tucked in there, again, just like the movie. Finally, a large iron plow can be plugged into the front end of the Steel Crusher and the plug in point is very inobtrusive so the vehicle doesn’t look like it has a large hole in the front end without it in there. The iron plow really completes the look and makes the Steel Crusher look like it could live up to its name. This is really a much more interesting look and while it’s big and intimidating, you can still clearly tell this is based around a civilian Hummer rather than something fanciful Destro designed from scratch in the lab. It’s a very effective look and it definitely screams Cobra…at least Cobra from the movie universe.

While the design is very effective, the color scheme is just a tad boring. That’s not necessarily a bad thing because it did help me figure out a way to incorporate it into my Joeverse, but at the same time it’s hard to deny that it’s a pretty monochromatic look. The majority of the Steel Crusher is molded out of black plastic. The fenders and running boards are a slightly lighter color—almost a gunmetal gray and it does pop nicely, but it’s still a very dark vehicle overall. The grill is painted silver and that really stands out because the vehicle is so dark. In a surprising amount of attention to detail, the front turn indicators and the rear lights are painted. It’s a nice realistic touch, but at the same time, it would be nice if they’d given the rear windows the same treatment instead of just leaving them all black. The Cobra sigils on the front doors, the rear window and the hood all stand out very nicely against the black body. While I’m a little hard on the Steel Crusher because it’s all black, that did help me decide how to use it. Shortly after I got it, I was trying to figure out what to do with it since it was kind of an impulse buy since I’m pretty sure I picked it up on clearance for at most 15 bucks. The all black reminded me of my recently stored Night Watch set. I figured I’d see how they looked paired with this all black SUV and it worked really well. It may not be loaded with Rise of Cobra figures, but it does make a great ride for the Night Watch squad. I can see them using a black SUV, which is a pretty common sight in government circles, to get themselves into a base they need to sabotage and then triggering the nanoarmor modifications to blast their way out after they’ve completed their mission. It’s nice that the standard and armored mode both work well for the Night Watch.

I’ll admit, it took me a lot longer to be sold on the Steel Crusher itself than it did its driver, the Nitro-Viper. There are a lot of reused parts that make up this character, but Hasbro invested money for new pieces when it counted. The legs are a combination of old and new, with new lower legs and upper legs recycled from the 25th Anniversary Viper. The new lower legs have the same curved boot tops that the original Motor Viper had. While the Viper legs lack the pistol holsters that the Motor Viper had, the large pockets stand in well for them. Nitro-Viper’s torso comes from the 25th Anniversary HISS Driver but you wouldn’t know it because he’s got a great new vest piece over it. Hasbro’s designers really did a great job at replicating the Motor Viper’s original look. The three sets of paired hoses reach around from his back to the front and while I’m still not sure what they do, they still look great and bring back nostalgic memories of the Motor Viper from my brother’s collection. While at face value, the use of 25th Anniversary Flash arms seems like the weakest link of the whole look, Flash’s gloves actually do a great job of referencing Motor Viper’s original bracers. I’d forgotten about that detail until I looked at the vintage Motor Viper while I was writing the review. Nitro-Viper’s other new piece is his great new head. While I would have preferred him having a removable helmet, the piece is still solid and really does a great job of taking the Motor Viper’s original look into the modern era. First of all, I love that the helmet is layered. You can clearly see that the Nitro-Viper is wearing some sort of mask underneath the helmet. It reminds me of how stunt drivers wear neoprene masks under their helmets to protect their faces from fire in the event of a wreck. Over that, he’s wearing a bulky helmet that seems like it would be very
effective at protecting the wearer in the event of a crash. There’s a removable visor that can attach to it to complete the Motor Viper look and I think that’s the one problem he has. There’s a pretty significant gap between the top of the helmet and the visor regardless of which way it’s put on. It throws the overall look off a little. It’s not enough to break the look, but at the same time, I think it just shows that either molding the whole head in one piece or going the removable helmet route would have been more effective.

My biggest gripe with the Nitro-Viper is his color scheme, or lack thereof. I think part of the reason I passed on the Steel Crusher so many times is that both the vehicle and the driver looked pretty uninteresting. The Nitro-Viper is a sea of dark blue and that really obscures all the really great details molded into this figure. I didn’t notice how great the molding was on the figure until I pulled him out of the box the day I bought him. Had Hasbro done something more with the Nitro-Viper’s paint work, I’m quite certain I would have bought him at the original price of $25 instead of waiting until he went on clearance after I saw the movie. As it stands, though, what little paint he has is well-done. The silver Cobra sigil on his chest is well applied and the paintwork around his eyes is crisply done with no slop. Nitro-Viper’s lack of paint work reminds me of some of the figures I remember as a kid from the end of the Joe line that had a lot of intricate molding work done on them, but they suffered because the paint work did nothing to bring it out.

I was slow to bring the Steel Crusher into my collection, but it is a surprisingly good vehicle. It’s a great reproduction of a real world Hummer and the Nitro-Viper is a nice update of a classic vehicle driver, even if he did have to get a name change. I appreciate that Hasbro was able to throw us old-school Joe fans a bone like this in the movie line. While it might be a little odd for a Cobra like the Nitro-Viper to be driving a heavily armored civilian model Hummer, I think it still works. Much like the Night Watch using it in civilian mode to sneak into a base, I can see the Nitro-Viper driving it around in civilian clothes when it’s in regular Hummer mode, but if he needs to throw on the armor, he can throw on his helmet and burn rubber. The vehicle and driver have a justification to them that allows me to incorporate them into my collection even if I didn’t want to see them as part of the Rise of Cobra universe. That’s really the beauty of the Joe line—if something doesn’t fit your idea of the Joe line, you don’t have to incorporate it. However, there are some pieces that may not fit right away but have a way of surprising you when you bring them in with the rest of your collection.