2000 Law & Order

2000 Law & Order

The 2000‘s ARAHC line is pretty boring when taken in as a whole, which I think is part of why contemporary collectors of the time tend to hold it in low regard. I personally like the toys pretty well, but that’s because I got most of them years after the fact for pennies, mixed in with other 2000‘s repaints that gave me better variety. It changes your perspective a lot, as a bunch of grimy brown and grey figures seem more fun when mixed with oddities from 1997 or the Valor vs Venom 6-packs. Still, most of these figures make me strain for words on this blog, so I think that points to them being pretty boring, even if I like them okay.

V1 Law & Order was released three times by Hasbro, and fortunately all three color-schemes are pretty good. At a time, the 1987 figure irritated some people for the orange shirt (which doesn’t seem like it should matter much for an MP), but the subsequent Sonic Fighters figure and ARAHC figure fix that, giving him a totally neutral color-scheme. So if you prefer a Law who’s a little less flashy looking, you have two good options that are also nicely distinct.

Taking a broader perspective, it’s nice that he exists, but these colors are pretty boring. His jacket is navy while his pants are a mahogany brown, but whenever I recall this figure, I just remember him being solid brown (incidentally, the Funskool version is solid brown). The color choices themselves aren’t bad, though if the contrast was a bit stronger I think he would not seem like so much of a blur. If the blue was a closer tone to Sure Fire or the Dusty he came packaged with, it would’ve been better. For that reason, I see the figure as mostly inferior to the nicer ‘90 release, but I appreciate him either way.

Law’s head sculpt is based on Kirk Bozigian, which is an interesting bit of trivia. It’s on the softer end of ‘87 sculpts, but the figure looks pretty good overall. 1987 was a real sweet-spot for sculpts, as we saw the bulbous heads of ‘86 being walked back, and the designers had also moved past the sometimes odd proportions of the ‘85 line. It was also well before the often busy looking designs you saw in ‘89 and later, so figures like Law have a simple, down to earth look like most of the early Joes.

For accessories, you get his helmet, uzi, Law, a leash, and baton, the full Law & Order V1 load-out. The accessories are all similar to the originals, but a wee-bit different: this time the uzi comes in silver, the MP design on the helmet is different, and notably Order has more paint. The last one should be a good thing, but I think Order might by the weakest Joe-dog of them all. Mostly, it’s the expression: it has much more of lip-curled and dejected look than the intense growl seen on Junkyard and Timber. The pose and fur are both nice, though he’s not my favorite pet for his face.

2000 Law & Order is still cheap… When you find one cheap. Practically all of the figures you see for sale are carded examples, and are almost exclusively BiN’s. Still, auctions for the carded set with Dusty (who’s pretty neat, too), only hit around $16, and fair-minded sellers will sometimes only ask for $20 if it isn’t an auction. Since he has the original accessories, it makes this figure a decent option, though just in terms of colors, the last two were probably better.

gi joe arahc law and order 2000 v4gi joe arahc law and order 2000 v4

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1985 Tele-Viper

1985 Tele-Viper

The Tele-Viper is cool figure to me, both because the sculpt was familiar to my childhood and because he’s a classic Cobra from the best year. He goes with the Viper like peanut-butter and jelly, and in general works with a lot of different Cobras. Yet the figure’s not underrated, rather, he’s closer to being one of the worst figures from his release year. There’s some stiff competition in there that makes that a relative statement, though I think it’s fair to say the figure is flawed.

gi joe vintage o-ring tele-viper 1985 hasbro cobra

I really like the Tele-Viper, always have. My first experience with the mold was the Python Patrol version my brother had, and although he also had a Python Guard and Python Trooper, the Tele-Viper is the only one I really ever remember playing with. Someday I’ll get around to writing an incoherent diatribe about the Python Tele-Viper, but at the very least I’ve had an attraction to the sculpt since I was a kid, and I think that’s owed to the design being very good. For a dude lacking a proper weapon, Tele-Vipers tread that perfect blend of sci-fi fantasy mixed with a solid amount of military realism, mostly favoring the later.

In other ways though, the sculpt on this figure sucks. The sculpting is all over the place and feels to me like a “worst of both worlds” situation of problems that are stereotypical to both ’85 and ’86 figures. First, his head is ridiculous. It’s bigger than a Viper’s head despite having most of his face exposed! I always just sit there imagining he must look like Alfred E. Neuman when he takes his helmet off. This a problem I associate more with ‘86 figures, as that seemed to be the year where pumpkin-heads really took over the line.

The rest of the figure’s sculpt is much more typical of a 1985 figure, both in the way of featuring a more modest military fatigue but also for having somewhat janky proportions. I’ve made it no secret that I think ‘85 was the strongest year of figures overall, but something I feel goes somewhat overlooked is the proportional inconsistencies among the body sculpts. In the case of the Tele-Viper, he has a slightly more slender waist in contrast to somewhat bulkier shoulders. It’s a lot different from Footloose or Torch, who have waists so thick relative to their legs it almost looks like they’re wearing diapers. The issue is only apparent with ‘85 figures, as both the ‘84 and ‘86 lineups look far more consistent.

Probably the biggest appeal of this figure is how cohesive he is with a Cobra collection. To me, the Tele-Viper feels like he goes with anything, almost to an extent that I’ve not often felt the need for a huge army of them. I usually just use them to support larger squads of Vipers instead. I think he was clearly meant to look good alongside the Viper, though his simple outfit doesn’t look horrible alongside Troopers and Officers. The early use of Cobra purple lends itself well to later figures like the Techno-Viper once that color became more common, so in some ways he’s a versatile Cobra that looks good with almost anything.

For parts, you get a backpack, a camera gun, and a hose to connect ‘em. Very passive for a terrorist, you’d think he’d have some kind of small gun sculpted onto him somewhere, but no, the Tele-Viper comes with no lethal weapons, usable or otherwise. That said, the camera gun is a lot of fun, and any part that connects with a hose just seemed so much more aesthetically pleasing. He basically has one single thing he does, but it might not be a stretch to say he does it better than Breaker or other similar figures.

There’s not many repaints or variants of the Tele-Viper mold to track down. After the Python Patrol version, the mold went to Brazil and was released by Estrela in colors similar to the 1985 figure. The blue on this version appears really, really bright, and there’s an extra red paint application around the belt buckle. It’s not much, but enough to seem interesting on an underutilized sculpt.

Tele-Vipers still go for very sane prices, between $10 to $15 for a mint, complete figure. For a classic army-builder, I’m a little surprised by that, though I spent plenty of time roasting the figure just now, so maybe those feelings aren’t so unique. Like Tripwire and some others with painted faces, his nose is prone to chipping and revealing the dark plastic underneath, which is something to look out for.

gi joe vintage o-ring tele-viper 1985 hasbro cobragi joe vintage o-ring tele-viper 1985 hasbro cobra

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1988 Sgt. Slaughter

1988 Sgt. Slaughter

I don’t know a lot about wrestling, and generally speaking I don’t like celebrities either. So normally I’d be against anything to do with a celebrity crossover inside my precious military fantasy, but the Sarge is an exception. To me, Sgt. Slaughter is a GI Joe icon; He’s the face of the brand in a way Duke could never be, partly because he encapsulates something of 80‘s culture* that’s lost now. Also, he’s on Twitter and is incredibly nice to GI Joe fans to this day, so it’s hard not to like him. With that said, here’s the less-seen V3 Sgt. Slaughter.

*One of my vague statements that’s probably more amusing left to interpretation. A team of elite American soldiers recruiting a famous wrestler to be their drill sergeant, and help them win fistfights against ancient aliens and terrorist leaders made from the DNA of history’s baddest dudes, is so over-the-top and unashamedly macho. GI Joe seemed a lot less like propaganda for the war machine, but rather a collection of anything cool that would make a boy’s imagination run wild. Ninjas, laser guns, big tanks, killer robots, ninja women in tights, some heavy metal lookin’ dudes; tossing in Sgt. Slaughter kind of gives you the essence of the brand in a nutshell. It’s also something they’ve never recreated in the roughly four decades since.

This Slaughter was the included Driver for the Warthog A.I.F.V., which is a pairing that only makes sense when you think about that fact that Slaughter probably helped move a ton of these vehicles off shelves. With the Triple T, that felt a lot more like an excuse to upcharge for Sgt. Slaughter, but at least with this version he’s actually included with one of the best vehicles ever made. 1988 was a good year for GI Joe in general, but the vehicles especially were better than average.

1988 Sgt. Slaughter stands apart from the first two releases by switching out his more standard outfits for a stereotypical GI Joe design. The result is something that feels well integrated with the line at the time, at the cost of seeming much more generic than the previous two Sgt. Slaughter figures. This version of the Sarge looks like it could easily have been some random Joe just with a head swap, which is a good thing or a bad thing depending upon how you look at it.

It’s a strong figure besides being mildly generic though. The sculpt is nice and sharp, especially around the chest with those bullets and a few other details. The head’s a little large and soft, but it doesn’t bother me too much, since he has a removable hat. Normally I’d prefer a sharper sculpt to a removable piece of headgear, though one of the strengths of this figure is that he’s different enough from the last two Slaughters, so the compromise is worth it in return for something new.

Speaking of the hat, it’s his only accessory, so that’s about it for this paragraph. Kinda weird he’s got an ammo belt sculpted onto him and nothing it goes to, but later vehicle drivers tended to cut corners like that. My introduction to the GI Joe media was an old VHS recording of GI Joe:THE MOVIE, and the Terror Drome infiltration scene was always one of my favorite parts. I think because of that, I tend to pair him with Cobra weapons I imagine he’s stolen while fighting behind enemy lines. That’s how I rationalize the bullets too: He picked them up as spare ammo after raiding a Cobra armory.

1988 Sgt. Slaughters are harder to find than others, and are somewhat pricey at the moment, consistently hitting between $20 to $30 for a good example. Being an ‘88 figure that’s tied to a mid-sized vehicle probably means there’s less of them out there, though the relative scarcity would be offset by the fact that this is the least memorable Sgt. Slaughter figure (I put Slaughter’s Marauder’s ahead of him, since at least he had a sub-team named after him). This is a lot more than I paid for my example years ago, but the seller’s market fades slowly, and Sgt. Slaughter appeals to more than one fandom, so it makes sense.

gi joe sgt. slaughter wwf hasbro vintage 1988 v3 warthog vehicle driver gi joe sgt. slaughter wwf hasbro vintage 1988 v3 warthog vehicle drivergi joe sgt. slaughter wwf hasbro vintage 1988 v3 warthog vehicle driver

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1986 LCV Recon Sled

1986 LCV Recon Sled

Back in the day before eBay was saturated with flippers desperate for small change, you could get good deals on figure lots. Sometimes this made for some acquisitions one would normally not go out of their way to pursue, like large armies of Frag Vipers. Another time I got a good deal on a lot of Mega Marines, which also featured the LCV Recon Sled, a vehicle I normally would have never touched if it wasn’t tossed in for free.

The LCV Recon Sled is horribly awkward. It looks like you should be able to put a figure on in a few different ways, but most of the time they just fall off if their arms aren’t deeply planted in the little holes under the canopy. When a figure is riding it, their legs always tend to spread out in an odd way that looks unnatural. It’s funny too, because it’s hinged body is supposed to allow for “adjustable riding positions” according to the box, but it doesn’t really change much. Also, elevating the hinge makes a horrible snapping sound, and also makes it balance less well. Pretty lame.

The Joes have a very Rambo perspective on what the word “Recon” means, at least with the three guns the LCV Recon Sled’s toting around. Two machine guns are mounted at the front of the vehicle, and there’s a rotating cannon in the back. Amusingly, the cannon only rotates vertically a few degrees, and the machine-guns are fixed onto the front without moving at all! The fact that the weapons can’t be aimed makes them seem chintzy and more tacked-on, but it probably would’ve been too boring without them.

One of the most perplexing oddities of the vehicle is the date-stamp. It’s right up in the front, with big bold text where you can’t miss it when viewed from that angle. I didn’t realize until recently I’m missing the headlight that goes on the vehicle, but with a flaw like that I’m not sure I’m all too fussed about it. There’s room under it’s main body for the date-stamp, so I’m not sure why they put it in such an ugly spot.

All of these problems aside, I can’t really bring myself to hate it, and there’s a few cool aspects to it too. Most notably it’s a nice aesthetic match to the HAVOC; which is a little odd, since the HAVOC already has a hover-craft, so why does it need a recon bike/sled thing? Either way, it’s nice having a little more of that spacey-military thing they were doing in ‘86. The overall shape is distinct and looks kind of cool, which is more than you can say for the Marauder (Though, that’s digging pretty deep to find something worse.).

There’s something else to it, but I have a hard time describing it: The simplicity of 80‘s Joe, maybe? It’s hard to say anything nice about this thing, but scrolling through the worst ARAH vehicles still makes me jealous of that 80‘s kid experience. Keeping things in perspective, it’s a shitty vehicle, but it’s not that shitty, and it’s something that was cheap enough you could’ve had it for a day you got sick or while visiting grandparents. Go to a WalMart now (practically the last toy store…) and you won’t find anything like this anymore. The sled deserves some ridicule, but modern toys and culture has a sobering effect on the scraps from 4 decades ago.

A decent LCV Recon Sled runs in the $10 range, for a few more dollars you can get one with the blueprints or even the box. The periscope is usually what’s missing, though it doesn’t really make the vehicle expensive when it’s intact. It’s a lame little vehicle and the pricing still reflects that, though as a freebie I’ve probably gotten my money’s worth out of it.

GI Joe 1986 LCV Recon Sled Beachhead Bazooka Hasbro vintageGI Joe 1986 LCV Recon Sled Beachhead Bazooka Hasbro vintage

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1989 Muskrat (Night Force)

1989 Muskrat (Night Force)

Collectors really suck the fun out of things, don’t we? The Night Force is one of those subjects: It’s an undeniably cool sub-team, but seeing mass produced children’s toys hit upwards of $200 makes one call so much into question. Are they that rare? Are they that cool? Are they that much better than the normal versions that are barely worth 10% of that? The hype around them makes it hard to really form an objective opinion on the toys, regardless of it’s good or bad.

Muskrat here could be chalked up to one of the more mid-tier Night Force entries. The original ‘88 Muskrat was already an especially strong figure, and this recolor doesn’t change that very much. A major positive is that he now features an extra color, where V1 Muskrat was entirely green with some black details, Night Force Muskrat now has black pants that contrast with his blue vest and various olive details. The olive and black colors are pretty standard fare for the Night-Force, but the dark blue was a more unusual choice, only appearing on Muskrat and Charbroil from the same year. It looks a little Cobra-esque to me, but I like it; it makes the group more interesting for the addition. Also, for whatever it’s worth it’s almost the same color later seen on Battle Corps Muskrat (who I hate).

I think the added color makes him a tiny bit better than V1 Muskrat. Despite that, the difference in quality is negligible, and were it not for the fact that I got this one in a nifty lot, I’d probably never pursue him. He doesn’t really do anything that a normal Muskrat doesn’t already look good enough doing, and I really don’t have a compulsive desire to own everything Night Force like I might feel for Tiger Force or Python Patrol. That’s not to say anything bad about this figure, but he just seems kind of interchangeable with a normal figure, compared to the more theme-heavy sub-teams. I’ve sometimes wondered if Night Force was meant to stand on it’s own a little less, given their limited nature as TRU exclusives and the fact there was barely enough figures to fully crew some of their vehicles.

An oddity about these figures I’ve encountered is that they always have either super-tight joints or broken leg-pins. My Muskrat has a dead knee and Crazylegs had two, but my Tunnel Rat is so tight I get scared posing him. The plastic on the figures feels solid, so it’s not like the Slaughter’s Marauders stuff, it’s just like the plastic tolerances themselves were off. Or maybe I’ve just not been lucky with the four or so figures I own, you guys tell me.

Muskrat includes a Benelli Super 90 shotgun (Some folks call it an M3 or M4, but the M3 wasn’t even produced until ’89.), a machete and a boogie board just like the original, just now all in black. The original had a baby-blue machete, so it’s a bit of an upgrade, though these parts showed up in a lot of places in black. Numerous ‘93 and ‘94 figures had similar accessories, so this one’s not really unique for that. The boogie board is unique, but also not really something I find much value in having, since I never use the green one either.

So the last Night Force Muskrat, with all of his parts, went at auction for $204… Incomplete figures trend between $70 and $50, with the boogie board being the hard part to come by (makes ya wonder about all those machetes and shotguns). The part I find bewildering, is the sort of vacant reasoning for why you’d pay that much for this figure. He’s cool, but for $200 wouldn’t you want an exotic foreign figure, or maybe some odd mail-away? A squad of rarer army-builders? A convention figure? Even with current pricing, there’s a lot of more interesting items you could chase in that price bracket than the Night Force repaint of a relative no-name. The world wonders.

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2004 Cobra Infantry Forces Trooper

2004 Cobra Infantry Forces Trooper

I sometimes have wondered what there is for me to say about the Toys R” Us Cobra Infantry Forces, that hasn’t already been said more cogently by someone with more relation to it as an adult at the time. I was around 10 when this set came out, so perhaps the only thing relatively interesting I could tell you is some oddball kid-gripes that are mostly regurgitated sentiments I’ve shared on other topics regarding 2000‘s Joes. Though I guess other than that, Cobra Troopers are cool as crap aren’t they?

Cobra Troopers Infantry Forces 2004 Toys R Us 6-pack valor vs. venom

I didn’t buy many GI Joes as a kid. Mainly because I only had enough money to go after one or two toy lines, and for me that was mostly Transformers, Gundam, and ZOIDS (If you remember Zoids, bless your heart.). I didn’t dislike GI Joe either, but it’s lack of contemporary media and questionable retail offerings meant that I never felt compelled to buy new ones when for all intents and purposes, my brother’s tub of figures (along with my small collection of clearance figures) was plenty good enough.

That wasn’t to say I was content with the Joes we had per se, rather, just that the average New Sculpt figure had about as much appeal to me as the worst 90‘s redesign. Swapping Grunt V3 for Grunt V5 is a prospect with little appeal, even then. I knew the GI Joe characters only through Sunbow, which I managed to watch a few times though USA, Toonami and a few old VHS tapes. So the only two things I would want from GI Joe would be the characters I knew, and good looking generics that didn’t need a character, stuff exactly like the TRU 6-packs.

Which is how we get back around to the Cobra Infantry Forces, and why I never bought them as a kid: I never knew about them until they were gone! As egregious as half of them were, these 6-packs were exactly what I wanted from Joe back then. It’s just that I seldom ever went to TRU, so I didn’t even know about these until I saw the stagnant remains of the Green Shirts and Cobra Imperial Procession in late ‘05 or possibly ‘06. I really wanted some generic Cobras and Green Shirts to play with back then, since they were just fun soldier toys and a little more plausible looking than what I had. Instead though, these were made blink-and-miss-it collector items while kids were expected to be more concerned with the likes of Hi-Tech, Coil Crusher and Venomous Maximus.

Anyways, the figures are nice. As far as I’m aware more of the figure is newly tooled than not, as the torso and possibly the legs were new castings based on the original Trooper sculpt. There’s not much of a notable difference besides a bit of bulk on the new one. The arms were swapped for Thunder arms, which was a good choice both for looking the part and also for being some old sculpting from ‘84. Of course, the head is a new sculpt, and in the fashion of the Comic Pack figures, it’s way smaller than the original. It looks weird when you pose them with 80‘s figures, but they’re actually not such a bad match for some of the 90‘s sculpting, which provides a lot of novelty to me still.

The Cobras in the set have some new details, like little patches tampographed on the side of their arms. It looks pretty nice, though I wish they hadn’t done these and the Cobra symbol in such an orange tone. They’re also multi-ethnic, which is pretty cool. At one point I had wanted to collect a lopsided amount of black Troopers, to have as region specific troops in Africa. Never got more than one spare, but maybe one day I’ll go back and do that still. The Officer and Squad Leader from the set have more detail and color variety, though I think the Cobra Troopers may have come out best for taking a simple approach.

Infamously, every figure in the set came equipped with a Rock Viper PSG1 and a SAW Viper backpack. Really, that gun’s not even a bad sculpt, but the excessiveness of giving them to every Cobra Trooper in existence is mildly absurd, I think this is partly what gave the sculpt a bad reputation. It was a lot harder to get decent Joe guns back then, so you can probably thank this 6-pack for Marauder’s Gun Runners even existing today. At least there weren’t any Sound Attack tabs on these.

Cobra Troopers Infantry Forces 2004 Toys R Us 6-pack valor vs. venom

Taken from a current eBay auction.

There’s an alternate set of head sculpts for these that would’ve had removable helmets. Sounds like a cool gimmick, but they looked way worse for it. The first heads were noticeably more pencil-necked than the ones that replaced them, and the helmets looked really wide and lame. Here’s a Forgotten Figures post on some loose samples.

A large appeal of these figures is that they’ve always been Cobras for poor people, essentially. You can get carded sets for around $50, and loose figures (usually sans the PSG1) for $12. Twenty years in and these don’t seem to be spontaneously degrading like a lot of figures from the period, so that’s something you might not have to worry about. They cost a little less than a squad of Troops from The Black Major, and imagine his figures have probably helped keep prices relatively low on these.

Cobra Troopers Infantry Forces 2004 Toys R Us 6-pack valor vs. venomCobra Troopers Infantry Forces 2004 Toys R Us 6-pack valor vs. venomCobra Troopers Infantry Forces 2004 Toys R Us 6-pack valor vs. venom

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2002 Roadblock

2002 Roadblock

Mmm, nothin’ I love more than a good ol’ sloppy BJ- …’s exclusive repaint of a classic Joe mold! BJ’s Wholesale, how many of you have ever been to one of those stores?!?! If not for this 8-pack I probably wouldn’t know what that even was, which makes me somewhat glad I was too young to be around for the hassle of getting this crap when it was new. Anyways, here’s an ugly Roadblock toy I’ve photographed at least twice.

Color wise, Roadblock V8 here seems like he could have some promise, being that it is just the full ‘84 Roadblock mold in Cobra blue for the upper half. I’ve always thought the figure seems like it would have some decent custom potential, but really the appeal ends there. Because of the haphazard coloring, his torso is solid blue despite wearing a tank-top, so it looks really weird and there’s no real illusion that’s he’s wearing some kind of body-suit. His bare arms are painted like sleeves, though it doesn’t really bother me as much as his torso. As an added bit of fun, the lower half is made of marbled plastic, which also appears to be randomly yellowing on my copy like with many other figures from around that period.

The BJ’s 8-pack figures generally find their strength in their oddness, with figures like Firefly that don’t really serve a purpose, but also seem like something you’d never logically expect to get made. It’s similar to the weird Funskool releases, where there’s a lot of novelty value in having a purple Tripwire. Coming back around to Roadblock, a big problem with him is that he’s too bland to really have any appeal as an oddity, yet also too cheap and random to fit anywhere else in a collection. Because of this, he might be my least favorite figure from the set.

An alternate coloration was used on some early pre-production versions of this Roadblock, which switched the blue for a bright red. It definitely looks way worse, so I’m glad for the one we wound up with. If I had to guess, I assume someone must have gotten the colors mixed up at the factory, as there seems to be a pretty strong theme of red for the Cobras in the set.

The accessories included with the entire set strike me as somewhat comedic, which is a nice way of saying terrible. Roadblock here is loaded out with a SAW Viper machine gun (now featuring a Sound Attack tab on top), a silver V1 LAW uzi, and the ‘91 Dusty backpack in black, AKA, the most generic repaint-era backpack. The uzi is an alright weapon for tossing in a bin, but none of these parts are really exciting or memorable. Even if the SAW Viper gun wasn’t the Sound Attack version, it’s still a laughably oversized weapon that didn’t look good with the original figure, let alone V1 Roadblock’s sculpt.

So like many 2000‘s Joe items, what you pay for them has a lot more to do with your patience rather than what the figure’s actually worth. Dealers can get $20 for a complete figure with his filecard, but that’s probably a lot more than what the figure should go for at auction. Of course, there’s the aforementioned yellowing to look out for too, though any example you buy may be eventually prone to this. In better times eBay was saturated with all of the figures from this set, both domestically and from Chinese warehouses selling them for pennies.

gi joe bj's exclusive roadblock wetsuit 2002gi joe bj's exclusive roadblock wetsuit 2002

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2009 Surveillance Port

2009 Surveillance Port

As a brief Walmart exclusive during the Rise of Cobra line, Hasbro unexpectedly released a series of Battle Station sets, most of which were previously thought to be “lost” forever. It was a rare example of fans asking for something over and over, finally getting it, and being happy enough for it to sell out in most areas before Christmas. Well, at least it sold out in my nerd-heavy town, there’s always that one guy who got a pile on clearance for a dollar in some state where nobody lives, but whatever.

GI Joe surveillance port cobra 1986 2009 roc walmart

Of course, there was a lot of bittersweetness in all of that: like the fact that the Battle Stations that were “gone forever” for years on end, were suddenly “found” just in time for the big movie push! It’s almost like no one was really trying to get the molds back whenever these were asked about before. I’m always really dubious of the “lost molds” excuse because of things like this, as to me it seems more like the revolving door of nobodies just can’t get invested enough (or stay on Joe for long enough) to bother finding them, but like with these sets, they’re out there. We were also going to get a Mauler release in ROC before the whole line was killed, makes ya’ think doesn’t it?

For the most part, the 2009 Surveillance Port is the exact same toy as the 1986 version. Some new colors might’ve been fun, but releasing it without many changes was also a welcome sight. The foot-pegs were altered to fit the smaller, 25th-style feet, and some new stickers were added. For the most part though, the two toys are practically interchangeable. Of course, the new one seems to be made of some insanely cheap plastic, as there’s odd stress marks all over various parts of the toy. I have two copies of the thing I bought new when they were released and both are like this, which is pretty lame. The decal sheet is probably the only source of any major changes, with new monitor stickers for the inside, and a standard Cobra marking replacing the unique design on the front. The new monitors are okay, but don’t contrast as well since the stickers are too dark now. I also don’t understand why they ditched the “snake binding a globe” decal, as it looks a lot more generic without it. Oh well.

The Surveillance Port itself is a very odd little toy, I’ve never been entirely sure what it does, besides surveil people. It seems a little excessive just for spy equipment, and with the guns it feels a little more like an improvised bunker or fortification of some sort. I somewhat speculate that it was really just meant to be a new Cobra Bunker with more play-value, but at the same time there’s nothing wrong with that, and I don’t know enough to make light of it. Some of the dumbest looking GI Joe items like V2 Mercer’s gun or the RPV were mostly based on real-world equipment, so you really never know.

Random bit of trivia: the smaller machine gun for the Surveillance Port is reused from the Slugger. So if you only have the gun from the Surveillance Port, you can use it as a substitute for the Slugger’s. It stands out a little bit more on the green ones, but it’s a decent match for the grey plastic of the ’97 release.

Like the other Battle Stations, the strength of the Surveillance Port was that it gave you a play environment at a very low price, about at much as a single-card in ‘86. For that much, it’s a very fun piece that interacts with figures nicely and has a solid amount of value for play or just to display. The 2009 release kept this appeal, as it retailed for a mere $14.99 and included two Anniversary-style figures, and a fold-out cardboard display. Since figures retailed for about $8 back then, it was a surprisingly generous offering.

Fair pricing for a 2009 Surveillance Port is similar to a 1986 one, probably because the toys themselves look fairly identical. So with a little hunting you can get one for around $20, even sealed. The Hobby Mafia will charge upwards of $75 for a BiN on this one, but that’s grossly overpriced if you compare it to what an auction tends to run. With that said, this set really doesn’t provide anything that the original doesn’t besides newer plastic, so it’s only worth considering as an alternative.

GI Joe surveillance port cobra 1986 2009 roc walmartGI Joe surveillance port cobra 1986 2009 roc walmart

2009 Surveillance Port Links:

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1992 Dice

1992 Dice

A minor quibble I have with 90‘s GI Joes, is the point where the majority of Cobras became somewhat redundant, faceless mooks. Don’t get me wrong, I like army-builders as much as the next guy, but the distinct personalities tend to stick in my head a bit more compared to some specialty oriented Viper. It’s mostly a ‘90 and ‘91 problem, but 1992 suffers a lot for it too, just because there were fewer figures released that year. Anyways, Dice stands out a lot just for being a unique 90‘s Cobra, at a point when the line needed a little more of that.

In many ways Dice could almost pass for one of the coolest Cobras made since the 80‘s, though he suffers a fatal flaw as a gimmick oriented Ninja Force figure. I’m not averse to gimmicks inherently and I think the designers at the time were being fairly wise to keep with trends and expand their audience a bit. Armor Tech for example, is usually viewed as an abomination to Joe’s classic construction, but as a very small child I actually liked those better, they struck me as something similar to Duplo blocks for their toddler friendly simplicity. So at face value the different construction is mildly respectable, but I think it’s aged poorly in a major way: There’s no way to change this figure’s o-ring besides cutting his torso in half, and thirty-two years later that makes all of these suck pretty hard.

Back to Slice- I mean DICE (Really, I’d never keep them straight if it weren’t for the orange Slice repaint.), he’s a fun character, and one that I find sad to have become an obscurity. His design is really solid, and on that front him and Slice probably are the best Cobra’s of the 90‘s. The dragon mask is interesting for the way that it hides most of his face but still shows a lot of skin around his mouth and exposes a nicely detailed bandana he wears under it. I like that since most of the Cobras by this point didn’t really show much of their faces, which is cool and all, but also makes a lot of them less memorable. His colors are nice too, being mostly dark purple and black with some silver.

It’s also nice that his gimmick doesn’t hamper him too much. He’s one where you twist his torso and then he slings back, like T’Jbang. Because of it, he has no waist joint, but comparatively that’s not so bad when you look at Snake Eyes or Scarlet’s t-crotches, or the Night Creepers who can barely do anything with their arms. The proportions also make it out nicely unscathed by his gimmick, Dice looks bulky and muscular but not exaggeratedly so. I think some people dislike the relative lack of a waist, but I think it looks like a combination of muscle and maybe some bulky protective gear.

For accessories, you get a simple silver axe and halberd (or bo-staff, as the filecard calls it). If you like living risky, you can get some fun two-handed poses with the staff, though I’m personally beyond testing what remaining plasticity his thumbs have left. Naturally, you don’t get any kind of backpack for him since none of the Ninja Force figures had peg-holes for them. It’s odd too, since Armor Tech figures still kinda had them, but I guess for the ninjas there just wan’t enough room. I like his little axe, but forgot to ever take a picture of him using it. His job is “Bo-Staff Ninja”, so it always feels weird to pose him with anything else.

As a random piece of trivia I thought I’d document, I have both a domestic American Dice and a Dice that was released in Mexico if I recall. The Mexican figure is no different as far as I can tell from the American one, and even the card back is the same, just with stickers placed over the English text. The only thing I can say is that figure came to me MOSC with some unusual wear: one elbow is cracked like an ’88 figure, and only one half of one thigh is slightly discolored. So it’s not an interesting foreign figure or something like that, just something that appeared cheap a decade or so ago. I only bother talking about it since I’ve not seen anyone even mention such a figure existing, so now you know.

The price on Dice might make you think twice… or not, just rhyming. Decent examples still go for less than $10, though on bad days he seems to run for a little more than that. It’s not a hard figure to find at all, and one that’s pretty durable with only two large parts to keep up with. Ninja Force lots tend to run pretty cheap too, though that’s probably because most of the lame-o’s like Dojo are just dead weight on a more desirable figure like Dice.

gi joe 1992 1993 ninja force snake eyes dice night creeper

Mexican Dice

gi joe 1992 1993 ninja force snake eyes dice night creeper

American Dice

1992 Dice Links:

Forgotten Figures

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Half the Battle

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1988 Duke (Tiger Force)

1988 Duke (Tiger Force)

Tiger Force Duke is two things I like, being that I like Duke and I like Tiger Force. Yet, strangely enough I don’t know if I feel that much of a connection to the figure besides it being the tiger-pajamas Duke who mostly only comes out once a summer to play with his other tiger-print friends I like more. Which has it’s appeals, given that the original Tiger Force is a very strong set of figures, so just having a Duke to match them isn’t a bad thing.

Objectively, I think there’s a case that can be made that Duke is the third weakest figure of the set. The worst figure is probably Frostbite, just because he’s the one that makes the least sense, and second would be Bazooka, since keeping the football jersey and losing the colors doesn’t really hold much appeal. Duke loses a lot for the scant paint on his head, with V1 Duke making the head work with his painted teeth and a separate color for his hair. Tiger Force Duke changes his hair color to brown, presumably to save on money since it matches with the color on his belts and bandolier. He also has these weird peachy-tan pants that are a shade that doesn’t really match with any of the other Tiger Force Figures. Most of the other figures share a color or two between them that works nicely towards making the Tiger Force look like a cohesive team, but Duke’s pants don’t match with anything. It could look worse, but I’ve always felt he looks a tad bit inferior when you sit him next to Flint.

It’s a good looking figure despite all that though, and I’m probably the odd one for not holding him in such a high regard. The olive green shirt is a nice shade that still perfectly fits with the heavy use of green from early in the line. The brown details and peachy pants also do nicely to make him look less monotonous and show more detail than the original figure, which is a big plus. If he had more orange or yellow on him, he’d probably be a lot less popular, and I don’t know if I’d really like that either. The worst thing he probably has going for him though, is that I always compare him to Flint, and while this is a good figure, that one’s a great figure.

The Duke mold went through a lot of changes up to the Tiger Force release. I’m going to assume something must’ve go awry with the arms early on, since late-release Dukes from Hasbro and Takara both swapped over to V1 Grunt arms (Probably when they sent the Doc mold to Plastirama?). Tiger Force Duke (and later, Chinese Duke) has Hit & Run arms, which works pretty well as a substitute, though I’m not sure I’ve seen a shirt like that with elastic cuffs before. The Tiger Force release also benefits from only using the sharper Duke head, compared to the original which had both this version of the sculpt and a doughy, soft looking version early on.

For parts, you get the same kit of fun gear from V1 Duke: a tan helmet, a green backpack, an M-32 Pulverizer and a pair of binoculars in dark grey. The green backpack is really nice and because it’s a common color, it also pairs decently with a few other figures. The helmet’s the same color as his pants, so it’s also unique to him and not easily mistaken for any other version of the casting.

Tiger Force Duke’s run around $25 for a mint complete figure. You’ll find some examples that swap the gun and binoculars for similar black versions though, so that’s something to look out for (mine’s usually pictured with alternate parts, since my only copy of his gun has a broken barrel). It’s a lot for a figure, but just a year or so ago Tiger Force anything would be hitting north of $70, so it doesn’t seem to bad to me now.

gi joe tiger force flint arah 1988 vintage hasbro cobragi joe tiger force duke roadblock flint tripwire 1988 hasbro

1988 Duke (Tiger Force) Links:

Attica Gazette

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3D Joes

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