1992 T’Jbang

Posted on October 24, 2022 by mwnekoman

1992 T’Jbang

First, to make you feel old, I just realized that T’Jbang is thirty. That means if you’re older than T’Jbang, you’re a really old man now. Unlike you, I’m younger than T’Jbang, which might make you wonder why I run an 80‘s toy blog, but that’s another story for another time. Anyways, T’Jbang is an insane looking figure, and is simultaneously the best GI Joe and the worst GI Joe.

I’ve always been a pretty big fan of the Ninja Force. The gimmicks don’t bother me much, and a lot of them were some of my first GI Joe figures (I was born in ‘94, but my parents bought me Ninja Force and Star Brigade figures that were still floating around into ‘98). They put a bigger focus on the fun-factor, and as a kid, they could play out roles as anything from ordinary soldiers, to wrestlers and Power Rangers. I never read the comics or knew who any of these guys were supposed to be. I just made up my own adventures and had fun.

Recently, I’ve rectified my lack of media knowledge and have finally read through the later Marvel comics. The result of this is a better understanding of why grumpy older people hate Ninja Force. In the comics, they suck. They come out of no where, they’re goofy, and clearly are riffing too much off of the then popular Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Maybe it was something else, but colorful ninjas with attitude is a considerable leap from Storm Shadow or the Night Creepers.

Put that aside, T’Jbang is a fun figure. Although he’s a ninja, he definitely looks more like a wrestler to me, even now. I don’t mind that, he fits in well with Sgt. Slaughter, and it seems like a more appropriately colorful idea to have a ninja commando that moonlights as a masked wrestler. Visually, he comes off a lot stronger than Banzai or Dojo, which probably makes him one of the more memorable figures from the subset. There’s enough detail on him to make him stand out. My favorite part is his rather detailed yellow mask, with tiger print on it. Most of what you see on him is some more standard ninja aesthetics, with big shin-guards and arm gauntlets, but the mask is unique and looks pretty good.

Of course, like all Ninja Force figures, T’Jbang has an action feature. Similar to Dice and Zartan, you can twist him at the torso and he springs back into position, similar to a punch or a sword swing. Although it’s a shame that a ninja of all things loses some articulation, he’s not as harmed by the gimmick as figures like Snake Eyes. Of course, once his o-ring rots away, the figure has to be cracked in half or extensive mods have to be done to fix him. I really hate that, though as a toy it’s not a terrible concept, since most o-rings will outlive the amount of years a kid would spend playing with toys.

For added interest, his accessories are a sword, and a double-bladed hook sword. Hook swords are sometimes called hu tou gou, or tiger head hook, so there’s a tiger connection that goes with the mask. It’s also interesting that this weapon is Chinese in origin, so T’Jbang has learned Wushu to go with his ninja training. Oddly, hook swords are usually used akimbo, but T’Jbang’s is one weapon, combined. Because of that, I’m not sure if it’d really work the same, or all that well at all, but I suppose that’s all apart of his secret style. Sadly, it’s a little hard for him to hold because of it’s design. The other sword is plain and works better, but is also boring. Both parts are powder blue, but this figure already looks nuts, so he’s not any worse for that.

T’Jbang is worth about $5, complete. I’ve warmed up to this figure in a lot of ways, but I’m not blind to the ways he’s also an awful toy. He’s a nobody with a corny character, and his outlandish toy is doomed to eventually fall apart and require a dreadful repair. He’s practically worthless for a good reason, but I can’t find it in myself to hate this figure. He’s still fun in a very innocent, juvenile kind of way.

1992 T’Jbang Links:

Forgotten Figures

3D Joes

Half the Battle

2022 Retro Cobra Officer

Posted on October 17, 2022 by mwnekoman

2022 Retro Cobra Officer

So, it’s time for me to dip my toe into talking about Hasbro’s Retro series, which I’ve yet to do here. Given that others brands have done reissues/semi-reissues to some success, I was a big advocate for something like the Retro line to happen, so far I’m glad that it has. It’s nice to have o-ring GI Joes back in the new decade, especially after the 2010‘s where we didnt’t get hardly a single official figure. For reasons, my first (and so far, only) purchase from this line has been the Cobra Officer and Trooper 2-pack.

My main feeling is that so far this line is horribly botched. It was baffling that we went so many years without classic Joes, while Transformers, Ghost Busters, Star Wars, MOTU and countless other 80‘s brands had some variety of classic line or reissues. Then Hasbro announces the Retro series, and all we get is a trickle? My personal feeling is that they’re holding out to create a greater sense of false-scarcity and perpetuate a consumerist cycle of “PREORDER IMMEDIATELY OR REGRET IT FOREVER ONCE IT’S GONE!”. Sorta like how with the Classified figures, people pay hundreds for the shit while it’s hot, with seemingly no concept that Hasbro will just keep making more of the same characters or just rerelease the more popular ones. It’s all about keeping you in an anxious lull that you’ll lose your one desperate reprieve from your sad and probably overworked life.

I love the original Cobra Officer mold, but it does have a very distinct flaw in the way that he virtually can’t hold a gun. It’s easy enough to give that figure a pass, since even the swivel-arm version is still one of the very first Joe molds. Still, this presented a great opportunity for the new figure, as being made of softer materials gives me a Cobra Officer that can do a little more and pose with his weapon.

Of course, the downside is that they screwed up the sculpt and the figure now can barely bend at the knee. In the era of 3D-printing and rapid prototyping, you really get a sense for how little anyone cared while making this, as a flaw this serious could have easily been fixed early on. I don’t regret the purchase, but I do have a lot of contempt for a premium “collectible” with so little care put into it. This is reinforced by the bazooka bonus-accessory, which is curiously missing it’s sight. Almost like they bought a broken one off eBay and 3D-scanned it without noticing that the sight was gone.

Speaking of premium pricing, the quality of the set relative to it’s price-tag is another picking point. At $40, you’re paying $20 each for the two figures. Pricing on modern Hasbro offerings is becoming an increasingly contentious topic for collectors. To a degree you can’t be too fussy, as infinite money printing has some serious consequences, and unfortunately, toys aren’t the only thing that’s doubling in price compared to just a few years ago. At the same time, Hasbro is a market leader, and a horribly, horribly greedy company. Check out their recent promise to increase their profits by 50% in three years. Makes you wonder how they’re going to pull that off.

A lot of people have had issues with the Cobra Officer having stressed elbows in the package. Fortunately, I wasn’t one of those people, though, my Trooper did have a Funskool-tier paint app on his knee, where the black paints runs from the knee onto the boot. Premium indeed, though for the most part I didn’t have many quality issues with this figure. Hopefully I can preorder another one in ‘24 once this one begins to spontaneously turn green and crack all over.

For accessories, you get the Officer’s classic AK-47, just like with the original. As well, there’s two little paper bags of crap in the bottom of the box. Inside the bags, you’ll find Zap’s Bazooka, Short-Fuze’s mortar, Grunt’s M-16, Rock & Roll’s M-60, Stalker’s M-32, a broken AK-47, and a pair of figure stands, all recreating the gear that the Trooper and Officer had from the obscure Sears/JC Penny 3-pack and a few other odd releases. Superficial, but a nice way to increase the value if nothing else. The parts look nice outside of the broken AK, and I enjoy having these extras to spread around my collection, similar to the great gift we all received when TBM forever saturated the Joe world with reproduction AK’s and Dragunovs.

Also, since I had to pay a premium for it, I’m going to take an extra moment to criticize the packaging. So, I don’t think I’d point to Star Wars fans as people Hasbro treats very well. Though, I have to say I think there’s a stark difference between the care put into The Vintage Collection’s packaging, and what you see on these figures, as well as most other retro-themed GI Joe offerings. A pedantic Star Wars nerd will quickly notice something as minuscule as poor font formatting on a character’s name, and often, Hasbro has rectified such issues before release. For Joe, you see no such attempt to make things right. The first thing you see on the fancy-pants box, is that the Trooper and Officer have their weapons switched. The cards inside are also full of egregious changes. No white border on the outside of the card. The text at the top “fully posable modern army figure” is gone. No text to the side describing the accessories. The card-back and filecard has so many languages on it, that it manages to say nothing in every language of the world. Would’ve been nice if for all of that money, you got a more accurate card, or at least a pre-cut filecard in English as a pack-in.

As of this writing, you can still get this set from Hasbro Pulse for it’s original price of $42.99. For comparison, the Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow set that sold out in about a month in ‘21 has seen scant value accumulate for sealed copies, while the loose figures go for much less. I do not think these will become very expensive any time soon, which is nice, given they are already too expensive. I think it can be reasoned that these are decent things to purchase, but for a brand with a legacy like GI Joe, Hasbro could do better in a lot of ways.

2022 Retro Cobra Officer Links:

Forgotten Figures

HISS Tank

1993 Cross Country (Battle Corps)

Posted on October 10, 2022 by mwnekoman

1993 Cross Country (Battle Corps)

It’s fair to say that ‘86 Cross Country is one of the worst figures in the line. His colors are awful, his head is both gigantic and ugly, and for a lot of people, the Confederate Flag seals the deal. Oddly, they brought him back in ‘93 as a part of Battle Corps, and honestly gave us one of the best updates you could hope for from ARAH. Oddly, he’s become somewhat of an overlooked gem, probably because of the flag thing, though Hasbro tying him to a vehicle that’s arguably worse than the HAVOC probably didn’t do him any favors, either.

Getting it over with right away, Cross Country’s defining characteristic is the Confederate Flag he wears on his jacket and belt buckle. Besides the obvious Dukes of Hazard homage, I always assumed this was done mainly to give the toy a more obvious, regional based personality. Still, it’s a little odd for a brand built on mostly patriotic notions to have a guy running around with Confederate Flags all over him, but back when this toy came out, people didn’t think so much about that. When my imagination runs wild though, I sometimes contemplate him working with Chuckles and Scoop to manufacture rage-porn for psy-ops. They could incite riots to help Destro move around the country more discretely when they’re helping him out… But that’s only in my version of the story where there’s a vaguely more traitorous cell within the GI Joe team.

That aside, this is a really nice toy. His head sculpt is very sharp, the jacket is sharp, nothing’s too busy, and he even has a neat little set of tools sculpted onto his leg. He has one of the more buff chest sculpts, but it’s not as bad as Mace’s, so it works for me. Another thing I really like is the use of marbled plastic to simulate denim for his blue jeans. This feature alone makes him really stand out among his contemporaries. The orange trim is a little obnoxious, but it doesn’t ruin the look of the figure, so I’m fine with it.

Cross Country’s filecard makes him the vehicle driver for both the Battle Wagon and the Mudbuster, both of which were sold separately. I like the Mudbuster well enough, but the Battle Wagon is a hard toy for me to get into. Of course, there’s nothing stopping you from putting him in any vehicle you like, though there’s still something very boring about single-carded vehicle drivers. His only job is driving vehicles, so sometimes I have to wonder what he does with that assortment of weapons that he comes with.

Speaking of weapons, he has a really great set. Included is the same runner of parts from Snowstorm, ‘93 Roadblock and ‘94 Shipwreck. That set features Bullhorn’s Steyr AUG, Hit & Run’s rifle and knife, ‘88 Shockwave’s pistol, a stand and two missiles for his launcher, all in black. Included separately is a teal launcher only shared with Roadblock, and an orange version of ‘91 Dusty’s backpack. It’s a cool set of parts, and back then I’d have loved the extra chance to have a few more Steyr AUGs laying around. The inclusion of a backpack at all was also pretty good, especially since most ‘93 and ‘94 releases didn’t bother with those.

Surprisingly, a complete Cross Country fetches around $25, and even incomplete examples hit between $10 and $15. He’s common, so it still shocks me to see figures like this going for so much. At the same time, he’s vast improvement over the crappy 1986 release, so I imagine there’s a lot of people who would want this version as their only Cross Country figure. It also probably helps that his parts, although reused, are still certainly worth having.