Python Patrol Night Viper
The 1989 Night Viper is a fantastic figure, probably one of the best in all of ARAH. Last year The Black Major got around to doing several runs out of the mold with the Alley Viper customs as well, so today I’ll have a look at the Python Patrol take on the mold.
Featuring the Night Viper in the Python Patrol seems oddly natural despite them both coming out in the same year. Almost like a what-if scenario that a second year of Python Patrol toys came out in 1990 and they featured some of the ‘89 Cobras in that subset. For that reason, this seems like a natural and very reasonable repaint.
Across the board, the quality of the Night Viper customs is quite good. They’re easily able to hold their guns, and the joints on mine have all been nice and tight. The paint masks are also very crisp and good looking.
The palette here seems largely based on the one used for Python Copperhead and the Python Troopers. Given, there’s a large focus here on the green and yellow pattern with a handful of details in black and red, in contrast to the others I mentioned featuring more black. I think this was a wise choice, as these are the most eye-catching colors of the sub-group, and they look good here.
Seemingly however, it’s incredibly hard for the factory custom producers to perfectly match the colors of the vintage Python Patrol, and that’s evident on this Night Viper. The yellow is fairly close, but the green is too bright. It’s the opposite of the TBM Python Troopers who had a near perfect green and a yellow that was too dull. With the way these figures are produced, I imagine it’s quite difficult getting exact color matches on so many colors, so this is understandable.
For accessories, you get the standard Night Viper backpack and gun in black, while the visor and scope have been changed to a bright red. A gray gun might’ve been nicer, but overall I like the colors here a good bit. I think the black parts prevent the neons on the figure from looking overbearing, while the visor and scope break up the green and black around the head well.
Price wise, these run about the same $15 to $25 most customs go for. For that same price, there’s hordes of other custom Night Vipers to be had, so it’s really all just about how much appeal you find in the colors of any one example. I think the Python Patrol colors on this one were ambitious, and more visually interesting than some of the other variations out there. But others will be off-put by the lack of compatibility with the vintage Pythons, so it really all comes down to preference.
Not as imaginative as Hasbro’s Python Patrol repaints were, which didn’t just have a base camo and the same paint masks as the originals. They changed a lot of ops.
The grey “Stingers” Python Patrol Night Viper look better. Also keeping in with the ball jointed neck figures getting the grey pattern and swivel necks getting the green, which Estrela broke by making repaint Ripcord with the grey pattern, so it hardly matters.
I never buy these things, though. So what do I know? It’s neat there’s still o-ring appreciation.