Venom Cycle Cobra Viper (2003)

Who hasn’t wished for an army of Vipers at some point? I know I have. While I’d love to build up masses of the 1986 version, I just wasn’t in the troop building game at a time when the guys could be had cheaply. Luckily the 2000s were kind to us, if you didn’t mind a few recolored figures, like this nondescript fellow.

The mold (and slight mold/paint variations of it) had a total of eleven releases in various paint schemes from 1997 through 2006. If my math is off a bit, please forgive me. Suffice to say, there were a poo-load of Vipers available on pegs during the 2000s. As a collector, you could have seen it as an embarrassment of riches, or simply an embarrassment. My feelings fall more toward the former, as I’ve long been a sucker for repaints.

All of these guys suffer from fit and finish issues, from the limited head movement to the weird leg/hip interaction. My particular example of this figure always seems to slip into Saturday Night Fever mode when it’s called upon to assume a cool action figure photography pose. Oh well.