1994 Alley Viper

I turn 30 this year, which doesn’t mean much to me. Though it did get me to thinking I should round off a few more posts on the Joes that turn 30 this year, which proves to be more and more difficult of a task as I’ve already made posts on a bunch, and there aren’t that many to choose from. So, I’ll finally write about the 1994 Alley Viper I have access to, since that one’s fairly interesting in a kind of meta-sense.

Doing things out of order a bit, I’ll start with the figure’s pricing. 1994 Alley Vipers are somewhat rare (I could say less common, because anything you can find a couple examples of on eBay at any given time probably isn’t truly “rare”) and absolutely insane-expensive. Last auction for a complete striped variant (made in China) hit $136, the more common stripe-less variant (made in Indonesia) still hits around $40 as long as it has the face mask. Of domestic, mass-retail single cards, that makes this version of the Alley Viper one of the most expensive figures in the entire line, probably out-priced by the red Ozone (who is genuinely rare), and roughly tied with Predacon by my best guess.

So is this R@RE GI Joe worth it? Nah, not really. This is another figure that’s still owned by my brother, not me, and although Alley Vipers have always been popular with both of us, I always saw this as a subpar remake of the ‘89 figure. As a kid it was kind of fun to pair them together, as he looked similar enough to the original that it could work. Later in life any money I had for Alley Vipers went off to the 2000’s repaints or to the V1 figure, as this guy was just a little too bland to garner much interest from me.

The colors are similar to the original, but if you compare them in-hand, they’re definitely not the same. The orange and blue colors are both slightly brighter, so even the orange is a slightly more eye-searing tone than the comfy shades seen on the original. Obviously one’s not more realistic than the other, but the ‘89 figure just looks better, especially for the blue color complimenting the orange. I will say I find the gold details on the torso pretty nifty, though it’s not a very strong contrast.

The accessories are similar to the 1993 figure, but you don’t get an Alley Viper backpack because Hasbro loves cutting corners. So included here is a mask, Dial-Tone SMG, Version 2 Alley Viper gun (thick foregrip), a shield and a figure stand in super bright orange, along with a missile launcher in bright blue. I don’t mind some neon weapons, but I do dislike it when they match the figure’s primary color. In this figure’s case, it makes him look like a solid orange blob, when blue or gold would’ve been a lot better.

Oh yeah, I kind of touched on it at the beginning, but I’ll highlight the two variants of the figure again. V3 Alley Vipers were made in both China and in Indonesia, with the Chinese ones featuring an extra paint-application on the legs compared to the Indonesian ones that lack it. It’s similar to other variants from the same year like with Stalker and Dial-Tone and a few others, where seemingly one factory wouldn’t have access to the same paint-masks as the other. It’s actually pretty boring, but nerds are thirsty for anything that could be considered a novel and rare colectibible.

Figures like this that just sort of became expensive suddenly are something I find baffling. It’s very hard to understand and seems to be occurring in more niches than just vintage GI Joe, so it appears to be a bit of a broader social phenomena as opposed to something more inherent to our collecting. Lock-down noobs seem to have mostly blown off in most spaces, particularly last year. Inflation really shouldn’t make old toys more expensive either, though it should be making things harder for all but the upper-class (meaning prices should go down). The only other interesting social anecdote I can think of, is that a lot of guys are dropping out of marriage. It stuck in my head when I read this, because hags and kids tend to eat up a lot of money, that now probably goes to male-dominated hobbies like this one instead. Guys not getting their routine divorces from some gold-digging trophy wife probably also plays an effect, since it seemed like every other eBay auction I won in the 2000‘s would be described along the lines of “Getting divorced and have to sell everything.”. That’s probably not entirely it either, though society finding itself in a bizarre and increasingly dysfunctional state could have some role in it.

1994 Alley Viper Links:

Forgotten Figures

Half the Battle

Joe A Day

3d Joes

1993 Alley Viper

Before the superb Black Major custom Alley Vipers and the plethora of well colored Alley Viper repaints in the 2000‘s, you had one alternative for an Alley Viper who wasn’t orange. That alternative, was the Battle Corps Alley Viper.

Compared to other Battle Corps reimaginings, this Alley Viper has gone through a few spats of collector popularity. It seems strange since you’d imagine the neon yellow would be a buzzkill for most normie collectors, but with the original Alley Viper donning orange and baby blue, it does make sense. In particular, I remember when collectors were going mad to get every figure updated in the modern/25th anniversary style, a lot of folks actually wanted this design over the 1989 version.

And for a figure that does lazily reuse the lower half of the V1 Alley Viper, it’s a pretty solid redesign. Personally I tend to prefer the 2000‘s repaints not only for their colors, but also for the swap to V1 Duke legs, as I feel that balances their proportions a little more and makes the sculpt more unique, but there’s nothing wrong with the legs used here. A lot of the V1 Alley Viper’s design and gear are retained on this version, such as how they both feature a knife and grenade on their vests. In some ways it makes the two figures almost cohesive, which could lend itself to using them as a single unit (especially the V1 and the 1994 repaint of this figure.)

When I was a kid I had access to this figure, the 1994 repaint and the V1 version. Of them, the ‘94 repaint was my favorite, with this guy in a close second. I reasoned that the armored look made him a strong adversary of the Ninja Force. So typically the shield and face mask were for countering ninjas.

One of the popular features of this sculpt is the shield and face mask. The face mask has a feline, beast like aesthetic which is very cool. Personally I prefer the look of the V1 mask, but this one has a lot more personality. Meanwhile his shield is a large Cobra symbol, which depending upon how you look at it is either very cool or somewhat overbearing. The original shield was far more practical and interesting looking to me, but in truth I’ve always had a hard time getting that figure to hold it well. Meanwhile the V2 Alley Viper here has a shield that just clips on his wrist, and as a toy this just functions better.

Other than the mask and shield, he included V1 Dial-Tone’s SMG, a modified version of the V1 Alley Viper’s gun and backpack, and a yellow missile launcher. This is a pretty good assortment of parts, and best yet they’re all in black. For some reason though, they changed the foregrip on the Alley Viper gun to be a solid block that the figure can’t hold. Why? Sure, most of the time I want to pose the figure with his shield and can’t use the grip anyway, but it just doesn’t serve any purpose to change it. For that, I tend to prefer posing him with the Dial-Tone SMG.

Complete V2 Alley Vipers run around $20 now. Carded ones show up more than you might expect and actually run about the same price, which I suppose we can thank vintage scalpers for. I like this figure a lot, but for that much money there’s better and way cheaper alternatives, where this figure strikes me as having more of a novelty appeal.

1993 Alley Viper Links:

Yo Joe

3D Joes