1993 Iceberg

Posted on February 28, 2025 by mwnekoman

Something that always struck me as odd about the 1993 Joe line, is the sheer amount of figures released. At a glance, I’m pretty sure there’s more figures released in this year than any other year of the Joe line. There’s so many figures Hasbro even had room to crank out 3 arctic themed Joes in the Battle Corps line, with Snow Storm, Frostbite and Iceberg. I never really saw these figures as a set until now, as it never really occurred to me they came out at essentially the same time.

V2 Iceberg is a competent update to the original 1986 Iceberg. He has a few warts I’ll get to in a bit, but as a design this isn’t a very extreme looking figure for a 90’s release; in fact, he’s pretty mundane. The biggest issue I could see for him is the choice to give him a bright yellow ski-mask. It’s perfectly realistic (save for the color), but still kind of an odd choice to completely obscure his face. In Brazil they even went as far as to sell Pântano as a Cobra, and it’s a role the figure works as. Some people are obsessed with the idea that covering your face makes you a terrorist. I’m fine with masks to an extent,but it has to suit the character. For Iceberg, it’s kind of odd he would suddenly cover his face up when both of his files explicitly state how much he likes the cold.

There’s some belts of bullets sculpted to him now, which would be a cool touch with his original LMG, if only he still had an LMG. Inconsistencies like this always made me wonder how many last minute swaps Hasbro made with accessories. A few are pretty obvious, like Sonic Fighters (AKA Eco Warriors) Major Bludd having the Air Devil’s gun in his card art. Iceberg has all these bullets, but no gun they would be compatible with.

Otherwise, the sculpt is strong and the colors are well within reason. I like this Iceberg a lot, though I rarely have motive to use him outside of going for something odd on the rare occasion it snows. In a few areas his sculpt is probably a little stronger and sharper than the original figure’s, yet somehow he’s still not really all that exciting. To a certain extent, I think arctic Joes fall into a trap of feeling more samey than others, since ultimately it’s always going to be a mostly white figure in bulky clothes. Even older figures like Sub-Zero and Blizzard feel like they cover old ground.

Speaking of that Brazilian repaint, it looks like he got released over there and then the mold disappeared forever. A shame, since the head on a real Cobra might’ve looked pretty cool. The jacket is vague enough too that I could see the whole figure repainted into darker woodland colors like Big Ben’s and making for a decent figure. This Iceberg’s colors are already decent enough, so it’s not much of a loss though.

Iceberg does include some TOTALLY RAD accessories, like a JET POWERED SNOW BOARD! Yeah, although most of the parts are recycled sculpts, they made sure to toss in a brand new snow board, I guess since extreme-sports were just that popular at the time. His other accessories include a pistol and long-barrel uzi pulled from Blizzard, a machete (Muskrat) and a knife (Hit & Run), as well as the requisite missile launcher. It’s a little flimsy, but by far my favorite part of the figure is the snow board. When I was kid the snow Joes flew around everywhere on that thing, it was like the JUMP, just more radical.

A carded figure is worth about $30 and a loose complete V2 Iceberg will fetch about $13. Fairly standard pricing for a ’93 Battle Corps figure at this point, so it sounds about right. This Iceberg really isn’t a figure essential to a collection, but he’s well done and nice to have around. Though, he also doesn’t feel like he has a life much outside of background fodder in a photo.

1993 Iceberg Links:

Half the Battle

3D Joes

Joe A Day

1993 Snake Eyes

Posted on February 21, 2025 by mwnekoman

Snake Eyes is an odd character to me. I like him, I like thinking about the adventures he goes on. Though, there’s too much of him and honestly, any interpretation of him that disregards the goggles doesn’t appeal to me much. To me, the only real Snake Eyes designs are the original and the ’91 version. So with that out of the way, this Ninja Force version doesn’t have much of a leg to stand on, huh?

I should be sentimental and waxing nostalgia for him, as technically this was my first Snake Eyes and one of my first GI Joe toys. I was born right as GI Joe died, so most of the figures I had that weren’t my brothers were bought in ’96 and ’97 on clearance. Cheap left overs or not, I was delighted to have my own GI Joes as a kid, but the scenario somewhat oddly shaped my views on a few things. For me, almost the entirety of GI Joe was a blank slate, where I only knew a couple of characters, and the basic scenario of GI Joe vs Cobra. Over time an occasional Sunbow re-run, Street Fighter II, or a watching of our GI JOE:THE MOVIE recording would influence my world a bit. For the most part, I made up my own characters based on what figures interested me the most.

1993 Snake Eyes was not one of those figures I liked a lot; in fact, I barely remember playing with Spider-Spawn at all. So despite being baby’s-first Snake Eyes, I don’t really have any great memories of him. The Night Creeper and Bushido were far more captivating to me than this Snake Eyes ever was, probably because their sculpting made it a lot more clear what they were, whereas Ninja Force Snake Eyes doesn’t give someone much to go off of. Looking at him now, there’s a lot of detail here I can appreciate in the design, but as a kid the smooth mask and predominately black color didn’t make him very interesting.

Looking past that, the sculpt actually is fairly strong. There’s some nice texturing on his sweatshirt that highlights the body-armor he wears on top of it, without using paint. The smooth battle-mask is kind of an interesting riff on the original look… Though I still think it makes him look too much like Spawn. At a glance, he appears as though he’s covered in copious amounts of grenades like a stereotypical figure of his era, but most of those are small Nageteppo smoke grenades. His assortment of flares, smoke grenades and explosives seems a lot more natural and interesting, than something like Sonic Fighters Major Bludd. Of course, all of this is stifled by that fact that he has a spring-gimmick in both his hips and his arms. I try to look past these as highlighting them is repetitive, but Snake Eyes suffers a lot for how obtrusive his particular gimmick is.

Snake Eyes comes with three different swords (One from Ninja Force Storm Shadow, one from Dojo and a curved sword, which was new.), a knife (also new), two claws (’88 Stormie’s), nunchucks (from Nunchucks) and a figure stand, all cast in bright, powder blue plastic. Most weapons from the parts-tree era were just reused sculpts, so I find it odd that Snake Eyes came with two that were new. It’s not an amazing allotment of weapons either way; I wish he had a little blue pistol like the one holstered on his leg. The same set in yellow was included with Ninja Force Scarlet.

On a good day, you can still get 1993 Snake Eyes for around $5 loose, and $15 to $20 carded, with the carded examples proving to be the more common ones. “More common carded” is such a funny idiosyncrasy,as you really only see something like that happen with stuff people were hoarding in droves. In some ways this Snake Eyes is kind of an iconic figure, representing his last outfit in ARAH. Yet, he’s also a really bad figure for the action feature, so that’s probably reflected more in his pricing.

1993 Snake Eyes Links:

1993 Beach-Head

Posted on June 19, 2024 by mwnekoman

1993 Beach-Head

I’ve always seen a lot of folks react pretty harshly to Beah-Head V2, and to be honest, I really don’t know why. 90‘s Joe had a lot of drastic redesigns, many of which I’m yet to have fully come around on. So having some disdain for the more outlandish V2 Firefly or Mega Marines Clutch makes some sense, but Beach-Head just seems like the kind of figure that still doesn’t get a fair shake.

The biggest thing the figure has going against it, is that he somehow looks a lot like Beachhead while at the same time, looking nothing that much like Beachhead. I have to use the dreaded i-word, but indeed, 1986 Beach Head is very iconic. There’s something about the masked Joes that seems a bit easier to get behind, perhaps their anonymity makes them a bit easier to identify with. Battle Corps Beach-Head doesn’t really change his look that significantly, but the popularity of his original design leaves people sensitive to change I think.

The figure looks really cool, he has what would’ve been a fairly modern helmet design, which combined with the bulkiness of his chest still resembles a fairly modern military operator. Of course, the lower half of the figure is just pulled from V1 Shockwave, but his legs were already great looking, so that does nothing to hold back this figure. The only thing I don’t like too much is the part of his chest under his vest: it’s really smooth and vague looking, and I was never really sure what the sculptors were going for with it. It’s a shame this sculpt never got any repaints, as I think this figure would look really, really good in some modern camo patterns.

In Brazil, they made the colors more saturated and released him with V2 Alley Viper weapons as Armadilha. This character was a Cobra, so with a little imagination you could feasibly pretend the American one’s a Cobra too. I see him as Beachhead, but if The Black Major made some rainbow colored repaints with Cobra markings all over them, I certainly wouldn’t mind that.

For some odd trivia, his legs are all miss-assembled; the left and right feet are swapped. For a long time, I thought this might’ve been an intentional creative choice to make the figure look a little different, but the card art shows his knife is supposed to be on his inner left leg, not his outer right leg. It’s weird, because the yellow-vest version and Armadilha both keep the assembly error. Then again, there’s a knife in the same spot on ‘86 Beach Head too, so maybe it was intentional and the card-art is wrong? No one probably knows anymore.

His accessories are fairly bland. You get a modified version of the Spearhead & Max rifle, a V1 Shockwave pistol, Recoil’s pistol contraption, a knife, a missile launcher and some missiles, plus a stand. Incredibly, the knife appears to be brand new for the 1993 part trees, though it wasn’t unique to this figure. It’s alright for what it is, though rest of the parts aren’t anything to write home about, especially not in bright yellow. The Spearhead rifle wasn’t reused to my memory outside of this, and completely removes the sling.

You can get a complete V2 Beach-Head for around $11, so by modern standards he’s pretty dang cheap. I usually see pricing as a partial reflection of a figure’s popularity, so I think it’s safe to say this Beach-Head isn’t too popular, though most of the non-repaint 1993 figures are kind of cheap like that. I think he’s an overlooked gem, but perhaps you guys can enlighten me on his flaws.

1993 Beach-Head Links:

Forgotten Figures

Half the Battle

3D Joes

1993 M. Bison

Posted on May 23, 2024 by mwnekoman

1993 M. Bison

I was reflecting on my early childhood with GI Joe a bit ago, trying to actually recall why I like these toys so much. Being born in 1994 means I didn’t crawl this earth until GI Joe was already gone, though, I got many of my own GI Joes from what was available at Toy Liquidators and Big Lots in the years to follow. It was then that I started to recall some favorites from my brother’s collection: The Street Fighter II GI Joes. In an overall sense I think these were some weaker offerings, but I also have to imagine they played a pivotal role in keeping GI Joe relevant, and maybe the toy industry as a whole. We take them for granted now, but video-game based action figures were not so common when these came out.

GI Joe TV reruns were getting harder to find into the late nineties, which is when a lot of these memories are from. I think I caught some Sunbow episodes a handful of times on USA Network, along with Ronin Warriors and Street Fighter. I realized then, that playing my copy of Street Fighter II on my SNES and watching the show prompted me to probably stay more interested in GI Joe. That is to say, that for me as a kid, GI Joe was this weird catch-all brand that was almost like an action figure adaptation of a morning cartoon block. I had the real GI Joes (the ones I could recognize), Street Fighter, some Ronin Warriors (Ninja Force), and even Sentai/Beetle Borgs (the V2 Eel, who was usually good-guy superhero to me). The point being, that Street Fighter stayed relevant in the 90‘s long after Joe was gone. Yet, because GI Joe was also Street Fighter, it acted as another avenue to keep me twice as interested in GI Joe.

An head-swap created with M. Bison’s head, a Shadow Guard’s body and 1993 Cobra Commanders legs.

The main issue the Street Fighter GI Joes run into is that most of them have gigantic heads. Often times, the proportions favor the sculpting seen with 1986 figure more so than anything from the 90‘s. M. Bison’s a middle of the road example of this; his head is nicely sharp and not as big as Ken’s, but it’s still pretty big. One time I got curious to make a lazy approximation of the Joecon Black Major figure by swapping M. Bison’s head into a Shadow Guard body. The result looked really cartoonish, possibly because of the more slender ‘85 body sculpt.

The rest of the figure is constructed from the torso and arms of Hardball, and the legs and waist of ‘92 Destro. The Hardball torso is a little slim, but for something made almost entirely of reused parts, I think the little recipe works. Something that really gets me about this figure, is just how attractive the overall design is: The Hardball half keeps him looking military enough to fit with GI Joe, but the Destro half adds a good bit of flair without infringing on Destro’s look too much. Further, the bright red plastic looks really good, especially with the choice details they picked out to paint blue, black, silver and yellow. When you compare him to something like the HEAT Viper from the same year, it’s actually surprising how much paint is featured on M. Bison.

For both the single-carded M. Bison and the blue one packed with the Crimson Cruiser, there exists variants that have the shoulder pad from Road Pig, colored in silver. To my understanding, these are inconsistently glued in the typical vintage Hasbro fashion, where some examples are not glued at all, and others are glued anywhere from lightly to heavily. I don’t have any like this, but I’ve tried putting Road Pig’s pad on him before. It’s a poor fit, and while it does improve the overall bulk of the figure, the asymmetrical design and fit against his head probably takes more away than it gives.

For another bit of interesting trivia, the blue version with the Crimson Cruiser, is photographed on the back of the box with a General Flagg head. Almost all of the Street Fighter Joes can be found with a reused head pictured on the back of the vehicle boxes, which makes me curious if these were rushed a bit.

For accessories, you get the M-6865 tree, shared with ‘94 Metal Head, the ‘93 HEAT Viper, and the ‘93 T.A.R.G.A.T. (and it’s Funskool version, too). So, you get the Annihilator SMG, the Iron Grenadier pistol, the Rock Viper PSG1, missiles and a stand. In addition to this, you get a green launcher (also from the aforementioned HEAT Viper), and a grappling hook with a string you can place in it. Curiously, the grappling hook was unique to the Street Fighter figures and only included with them. I don’t find his accessories to be all that good or essential, though he’s the only figure that has this particular set in black. There’s examples of most of these guns in this color with the exception of the Iron Grenadier pistol, which gives him something a tad unique to enjoy.

M. Bison’s are fairly cheap still. Street Fighter Joes used to not be all that popular at all, but a strong appreciation for these figures has grown in recent years, probably fueled by softer attitudes on 90‘s Joes, and the enduring popularity of Street Fighter, too. So they’re way more expensive now than they used to be, but a complete M. Bison will only run around $20, which what most Joes from that year cost complete. If you don’t care for the accessories, you can get him for about half of that, which might be wise if you’re not looking for your 40th example of a black Rock Viper rifle.

1993 m bison gi joe party-crashers-part11_6196606029_o

1993 M. Bison Links:

3D Joes

Half the Battle

1993 Detonator

Posted on April 29, 2024 by mwnekoman

1993 Detonator

90‘s vehicles are a weird lot, because you guys probably know by now that I don’t have the best opinion of things made after 1990. ‘91 was probably the bottom of the barrel as far as vehicles go, though the quality seemed to be recovering somewhat in the line’s twilight years, big emphasis on “somewhat”. The Detonator is a pretty good example of what I mean, as it’s a cool and unique vehicle with a lot going on for it, but also fails pretty hard on execution.

The Detonator is basically a huge-ass Cobra ICBM-launcher, equipped with what looks like some nasty biological warheads judging by the stickers. It’s really the perfect vehicle for Cobra’s identity, as the threat of getting poisoned or incinerated by a missile at any given time seems like the epitome of Cold War fears (and modern ones too). From the perspective of a military fantasy, it seems really weird they never made another vehicle like this, especially given the popularity of some similar ideas tried by Chap Mei and some other no name companies years later.

Of course, the thing most are quick to notice and deride is that the ICBM’s are made of foam, so you can launch them from the giant plunger in the back. Hasbro was trying to work in more gimmicks with vehicles like this, and I can’t blame them for that given I always wanted to launch a nuke at the Joes as a kid. Which I never did because of this thing’s biggest problem: it doesn’t work! The missiles fit way too tight on the launcher to ever fly off, and the pump doesn’t really push air through it at all either. From an objective point of view, it’s pretty hard to overlook a gimmick-oriented vehicle where the gimmick doesn’t really work at all.

Spare missiles are held in place by some silver clips. Unfortunately those clips are really fragile now, so don’t be surprised if they shatter from the slightest touch. They have a slight sparkle to them, so I assume these parts suffer from something akin to GPS. Unfortunately, they work by pinching the missiles a little bit, so the plastic parts are always under a little stress as long as the missiles are attached.

It’s second biggest problem is that this vehicle is fudgin’ huge, despite that it doesn’t really do that much. This isn’t too bad because the size is admittedly part of it’s appeal, it’s just frustrating that the back half of the vehicle is entirely occupied with the pump and launcher mechanism. As a kid the Detonator was almost more of a Cobra playset, where whole battles would center around stopping the missile launch. As an adult, I still like how well it does to fill up the frame of a photo, but it should be said the thing takes up a lot of space (it’s roughly the same size as the Night Raven).

Detonator crew gi joe It has seats for five guys up front, one for the rear gun, and foot-pegs for a guy on each side and a few on the front and rear bumpers. It’s a reasonable crew for what it is, as this vehicle really shouldn’t need that many crew members. With that said though, another minor gripe is that the seats are awkwardly arranged. I mildly dislike how the two guys riding in the back have rear-facing seats, I can’t really see the point of what they do back there.

Oddly I really don’t feel like I have much good to say about the Detonator at all, which is weird to me. I say that because in a general sense it’s a favorite vehicle of mine and I have tons of good memories of playing with it. To this day, I daydream enough events that it’s been involved with to say it’s a major part of my Cobra armory. Partly, I think some of that is just because the appeal of Cobra’s big missile is enough to outweigh the vehicle’s failings. Despite that the failings are rather severe and the things it’s good at aren’t so much… So looking at it objectively, I can’t say I think it’s the best toy.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot there’s a Funskool Detonator. It’s a little different, as the orange has been swapped for slightly more reddish plastic, and the missiles are now short, green ones with a totally different design. It’s an interesting novelty, but good luck finding one now.

Detonators have gotten tougher to find. Mind you, they are not so rare or precious, as examples with enough parts to count as a starter barely go for a few bucks, less than the price of shipping. A complete one with the foam missiles is really tough to find though, way harder to find loose than ones that are still MISB. Though, you can get a sealed one on the low-end for around $100, which isn’t much when you consider that you’re getting the Nitro-Viper with it too.

1993 Detonator

Forgotten Figures

A Random HISS Tank Thread

3D Joes

1992 Roadblock

Posted on December 11, 2023 by mwnekoman

1992 Roadblock

Also known as the recall Roadblock, this one’s famous for it’s missile launcher deemed too powerful to be left in the hands of children. What it should be famous for, however, is being the best looking Roadblock toy ever made. For a guy who’s competing to have the most toys released in the vintage line, Roadblock did pretty well with almost every toy of him being a good one.

Roadblock V4 is serious business. The design is very down-to-earth and even somewhat more similar to the modern “operator” look more in the vein of Classified or an FPS game. He looks to be wearing a ribbed sweater vest over a black shirt, which looks a little nerdy, but I’ll let it pass just for the nice texturing provided on the sculpt. The brightest color featured here is the blue on his pants, which really isn’t a weird color for commando slacks (though, it would’ve been slick if they were marbled plastic like Cross Country). For years this was my favorite Roadblock toy, and honestly it might still be despite my love for the ‘84 and ‘86 figures.

The sharpness of the sculpt here is peak ARAH perfection. Everything is rendered with crisp detailing you didn’t see just a few years earlier, and really didn’t see again until roughly 2010 or so. I do like 2000‘s GI Joes, but the Nu-Sculpt era and 25th Anniversary figures still tended to look pretty doughy until the POC line for the most part. It’s something I feel the ‘91 through ‘94 line really doesn’t get enough credit for, as the overall quality here was probably the best Joe would be for at least the next 15 years.

So there’s two sets of accessories for this Roadblock: the original recalled ones, and a new set that came with ones on a Battle Corps card in 1993. For the recall set, you got an extremely large LMG with what looks like a night-scope, a rotor-launching missile launcher and a new knife. For the Battle Corps release, you just got a ho-hum repack of the Cross Country/Snow Storm (and later Shipwreck) parts, which included V1 Hit&Run’s carbine and knife, V1 Shockwave’s pistol, Bullhorn’s Steyr AUG, two missiles and a stand all in black, along with a blue launcher, exactly like Cross Country.

The recall accessories show back up in a few odd places, but not as many or as nice as one would hope. Funskool Roadblock, Blaster and Red Dog have the LMG in black. The knife later would show up with 1993 Guile in black, neon red with Long Arm and in neon yellow-green with LAW. So some options are out there to get the knife. Also be aware that Guile’s knife looks very similar to the recall one, but is shinier.

This mold was brought back for a couple of nice repaints too. There’s a recolor of the figure that came out later in ‘93 in more typical colors, followed by a Funskool release that mimicked the original ‘92 figure. Hasbro seemingly got the mold back around ‘04, and then put out two more in the TRU sets, one in the Anti-Venom Task Force, and a similar one in the Heavy Assault Squad. I feel like there was some untapped potential in this sculpt for a new Crankcase, since the sweater-shirt combo looks kinda similar. Some brighter winter colors might’ve been nice too, since oddly this mold was almost only featured in dark colors.

Roadblock’s with the Battle Corps accessories tend to hit between $15 to $20, while Roadblock’s with the recall accessories trend towards $400! Ultimately, this toy was released to mass retail and shouldn’t really be that rare. Alas, you attach the word “recall” to something and some nerd will wet himself over the idea of having a special Roadblock that’s better-er than someone else’s. If the LMG and knife never showed up again, I could understand the novelty of wanting the see the rare parts, but similar ones were released with common figures. Anyways, paying $400 for a common toy is dumb, but this Roadblock rules so he deserves having a big number next to him.

1992 Roadblock Links:

Forgotten Figures

Forgotten Figures (Rarities Post)

Half the Battle

3D Joes

1993 Dino Hunters Low-Light

Posted on September 11, 2023 by mwnekoman

1993 Dino Hunters Low-Light

Dinosaurs were to the nineties what ninjas were to the eighties. This is mostly caused by Jurassic Park, and in short order you saw Hasbro branch out and make an exclusive set of figures for Toys R” Us: GI Joe’s Dino Hunters. This was to become a new format of GI Joe releases, where you’d get two repaints and a vehicle as some kind of team, it would’ve resurfaced in 1995 with the Arctic Assault set, but instead that was canceled for Sgt. Savage, a toy line well remembered for it’s high-quality and selling out so fast you’d never dream of seeing them stacked to the ceiling at Toy Liquidators…

Anyways, this isn’t April Fools, though I did use that occasion once to remark on the hilariously bad dinosaur included with this set. Of the four items included, it’s easily the worst, but the Dino-Hunter (that’s the vehicle, it could use a better name) and Low-Light might be tied for the best items in the set. At times, the fluorescent yellow has made me wince at this figure a bit, but past that it’s a really nice repaint, and I like it a lot better than Low-Light V3 (who he’s a repaint of) in a few ways. I know a lot of people consider 1991 Low-Light an underrated figure. I see a lot of that release’s quality and I do like it, but he’s still probably my least favorite Low-Light figure. His appearance just changed so much form his ‘86 design that I could never really recognize it as Low-Light.

Dino Hunters Low-Light on the other hand has a really nice color-scheme and deco. Besides the fluorescent yellow (which does compliment his vehicle really well), Low-Light swaps a lot of the black he had featured on his pants for a nice olive green tone similar to what you’d see on plenty of older Joes, the Tiger Force figures especially. He also has a more emerald green color on his undershirt, so the figure has a nice range of complimenting colors, and it does nicely to make the neon seem less jarring (Compare this to Dino-Hunters Ambush’s orange, which seems way more out of place.).

My favorite painted detail on the figure though, would probably be his eye-brows. His eyebrows are black, not blonde like the rest of his hair. It’s a little touch of continuity between the figures, which implies the black-hair of the ‘91 figure is his natural color, while the original figure and this one show him with bleached hair. It’s one of those little things that you wouldn’t have thought anyone would’ve cared enough to do, given this is a random exclusive repaint at the tail-end of the dying toy line.

For accessories, you get ‘91 Low-Light’s customized uzi and helmet with visor, Airwave’s rifle, ‘91 Mercer’s smaller gun, Skydive’s pistol, and Hit & Run’s knife, and a figure stand. Right down to the color, most of these parts look exactly the same as ‘93 Leatherneck’s. His helmet’s visor is not the same as ‘91 Low-Light’s, it has no paint and is entirely black. Despite that, nearly every single “Dino-Hunters” Low-Light helmet you see for sale is just the common retail release. The uzi is also different, the sculpt was simplified and the stock no longer has hollow sections in the middle (Again, the same as Leatherneck.)

The last complete Dino Hunteres Low-Light sold for a whopping $158, which actually out prices some desirable Night Force figures. I find this grating, as this figure isn’t that rare (there’s always at least a few for sale), and while it’s nice, it’s not $158 nice. Also, the one I have pictured here isn’t mine, it my brother’s that he loans me for photos. So I don’t really have this figure in my own collection. I’d like my own, but there’s no way I’d ever pay that much for it, so bleh.

1993 Dino Hunters Low-Light Links:

Forgotten Figures

Half the Battle

3D Joes

1993 Outback (Version 4)

Posted on July 17, 2023 by mwnekoman

1993 Outback

V1 Outback is one of my favorite GI Joe figures. He looks cool, he has great accessories, a great character, and in general, fits the part of the kind of moive-like action hero who can sometimes fight big battles all on his own, if your imagination works that way. All of that together makes for a character we should see more often than we do, but his fourth (kinda third) toy from Battle Corps left a lot to be desired.

So originally Outback V3 would’ve been apart of the Eco Warriors, but that sub line was canceled similar to DEF, and it’s releases were moved over to the Battle Corps lineup of ‘93. The colors on this release are extremely bright, which is fairly similar to the tones you typically saw from Eco Warriors. The figure was then promptly repainted into some new colors more similar to the Battle Corps toys, and that’s where you wind up with version 4.

This Outback has a curious look to him, to say the least. For some reason he’s wearing a hardhat now, which makes him look more like a random lumberjack or construction worker. His shirt and pants are also much more on the plain end, and he doesn’t seem to be wearing anything that would protect him from the dangerous chemicals the Eco Warriors would typically encounter. To make him even better, he’s primarily green and khaki, with bright blue and orange details all over, in addition to some little bits of gold and black. I really can’t think of a figure that had more random colors than this one.

Gotta be honest, I find almost nothing redeeming or fun about this figure. A lot of the ‘93 redesigns were on the controversial end, like with Dr. Mindbender or Law, but those toys at least have some interesting visual elements going on with them. This Outback however, just looks really boring. The design is bland and doesn’t really seem to serve a clear purpose. Even the infamous Fishn’ Trip Bazooka from that year looks a lot more appealing than this figure does. In decent colors this mold might be salvageable, but there’s not much potential that was wasted here.

For accessories you get a tree of bright red parts, featuring Hit&Run’s carbine, Big Ben’s LMG, Ambush’s EM2 rifle, two missiles and a figure stand (as well as a blue missile launcher). It’s weird how almost every other Joe included some kind of knife or machete, but the survivalist just comes with random guns. At the very least, they are good guns, so if you’re another individual who’s developed a fondness for bright parts, you could probably find some uses for them. They don’t really make this Outback a good toy though.

Almost every Battle Corps Outback you will find is MOSC. Carded, he’s worth about $14, and loose he’s worth about $9. It’s really funny how heavily certain ‘93 and ‘94 Joes were hoarded by speculators who expected to get rich off of these; the fact that almost every example of this Outback that you find is carded makes me wonder how many kids ever even played with this guy.

1993 Outback Links:

1993 Law

Posted on June 13, 2023 by mwnekoman

1993 Law

As it turns out, government propaganda isn’t a popular thing. Doubling a toy’s price to include a missile launcher with a light was also not such a popular thing. Because of this, the DEF line wound up getting canceled, and all of it’s 1993 releases incorporated into the Battle Corps. I tend to find that all of these ‘93 DEF guys are odd, but most of them are good none the less, which is the case with Law.

Law is a figure I’ve not paid attention to for the longest time. When I started collecting, I did not have much tolerance for figures in the colors you often found from ‘93. The drastic redesign on this figure was off putting, and it was even more so when I had Sonic Fighters Law to compare him to. Even back then I had a lot of interest in the DEF and Headhunters, but Law was too much to ever really consider. At some point a few years ago though, neon became a fascination of mine, so this Law has some new life in my eyes. He’s especially helped by the fact that I ignored him for so long that now he feels kind of new.

The new design is a drastic change from his ‘87 look, but if you pay attention he actually looks really good. If he were in dark and drab colors this figure really wouldn’t be too far off from the geardo/dark and gritty esthetic that’s been popular since the 2010‘s. He’s wearing a mask with chemical filters on it, which I imagine protects him from both friendly usage of teargas and also exposure to drugs and other chemicals, since some might get aerosolized during a fight. It’s a really cool detail, although I have to admit the idea doesn’t really translate well onto the figure’s sculpt, compared to his card-art (similar to DEF Shockwave and his helmet). He’s fully decked out in body-armor too, which is unique looking and makes for a pretty cool figure, Law might be able to survive a few blasts from a Headhunter’s shotgun.

I think where this figure really falls flat is the coloring. Bright-blue, light-gray and neon-yellow make for a figure with colors that are both bright and not too compelling. If there was ever a year of figures that was neon, it was 1993; despite that, many of his contemporaries had color schemes I felt were a tad more interesting. The Night Creeper Leader with his tiger pants is a fine example. Roadblock, Gung-Ho and a few others also make really good use of colors that contrast better with the neon. Law here mostly features colors at a similarly bright shade, which just makes him look more boring than he should.

You may have noticed that Law’s dog, Order, is no longer present. This was a veiled commentary on America’s decent into becoming a police state, as now you have Law but no Order… Just kidding. Law includes ‘91 Sci-fi’s gun, ‘91 Grunt’s gun, ‘92 Roadblock’s knife, missiles, stand, and a shield for his missile launcher, all in bright yellow plastic. The shield that fits over his missile-launcher was a pretty cool little gimmick. His guns are pretty terrible choices and he doesn’t look swell with either of them. At the very least the Roadblock knife was a cool inclusion seeing as to how it’s a nice and also seldom seen sculpt.

V3 Law’s are still purty cheap, with complete figures weighing in at around $12 and carded figures only going up to $20. Finding carded figures is still pretty easy, since he’s from the point where speculators began hording figures knowing that one day random 90’s GI Joes would make them rich. He’s not a must-have figure for any reason, but if you have a fascination with imagining inner city America as a war-zone brimming with neon-clad commandos, which I do, then he’s pretty cool to have around.

1993 Law Links:

1993 Mutt & Junkyard

Posted on February 14, 2023 by mwnekoman

1993 Mutt & Junkyard

I’ve really come to be fascinated by the 1993 lineup of figures. It’s weird, because I really don’t think this is a very strong year quality-wise, and I’d even go further to say it might even be the worst year of the 90‘s. Garish colors, generic accessories, a deluge of low-quality repaints, those are just some of the problems that reach their peak in this year, while the ‘94 figures seemed to make a return to better quality overall. Still, the ‘93 figures feel interesting to me, I think if nothing else for just how odd so many of them are.

‘93 Mutt & Junkyard is one of those repaint oddities that makes me scratch my head in some ways, but I really like the figure. Mutt doen’t have a bad figure of his four releases in ARAH, though speaking of which, the first thing I find odd is that Mutt (& Junkyard) got four releases! He seems like such an odd character to dedicate two molds and two repaints to for back then, but I suppose dogs are popular, so that’s probably a selling point that warranted his occasional return.

The colors are so-so on this version of the sculpt. The orange doesn’t really bother me, and browns and greens are exactly the same as the DEF release. Still, the orange and blue are just so saturated, it throws off the look of the other parts. Oddly, I think the bright colors look nicer for night-shots with cool and dark colors, as it makes him a little easier to see. It’s a niche reasoning, but for me it matters a lot, since photos are one of the ways I still get to enjoy playing with my toys.

He’s a very bulky sculpt, though it’s not as odd or inhibiting to him as it is for others (Like Mace). According to his filecard, he’s wearing a life vest flak jacket, which I find neat and mildly justifies the aforementioned orange color. It also gives him some added life for your boat and naval crews, which is nice (and likely meant to tie-in with the Shark 9000). He’s also really decked out with shin-guards and elbow-pads, which makes him a few shades of black away from being a POC or Classified figure. Other than that, it’s a modest and simple sculpt that I like a lot.

gi joe mutt & junkyard 1993 vintage toy hasbro battle corps DEF

Note that the G11 here appears to be a bad casting. It’s perfectly smooth on all of the parts where details are missing. I also just realized that one of the childhood G11’s I have is shiny and one is dull, so they are not exactly the same as most sites indicate. If you know which one is Headman’s and which one is Mutt’s, I”d love to hear it.

The pistol connoisseur in me is very glad that DEF Mutt’s pistol made a return for this release, with the addition of Headman’s gear, only with an opaque launcher and no light. Included is his pistol, Junkyard, Headman’s G11, missile launcher and a stand. The pistol is a really nice sculpt worthy of having multiples off. To that end, I think it’s really sad that a nice accessory like this wasn’t used more in favor of something awful like V1 Shockwave’s pistol. The Headman gear is really weird: a drug-kingpin having a tacky, gold G11 made some sense, but why Mutt? It just seems so odd for him to be toting around an experimental prototype gun (With costly, proprietary ammo!), and one that’s in gold no less. Might’ve been cool if we had gotten this sculpt in black, but for now it remains another addition to Saddam Hussein’s armory. Oh, and Junkyard is the same toy dog he was in ‘84, which interestingly makes him quite an old accessory to still be in use by this point.

It’s hard to peg down exactly what a ‘93 Mutt and Junkyard are worth right now. At the very least, you can get a complete one for $20 and a carded one for $30, so he’s not worth too much. Of course many examples are missing his pistol, but even that part is not too hard to come by on it’s own. With a little luck, I think a complete one should really only be worth around $15, since most of his parts are not unique and appear to be fairly common.

1993 Mutt & Junkyard Links:

Half the Battle

3D Joes

Joe a Day

The Viper Pit

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