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.

1993 Cross Country (Battle Corps) Links:

1992 Headman

Posted on September 26, 2022 by mwnekoman

1992 Headman

There’s a lot you can say about “The War on Drugs” in hindsight. It was a huge propaganda push, and really an old corporate virtue-signal that amounted to good PR for toy companies, cartoons and video games. Though, kind of like with Eco Warriors (GI Joe was really preachy there for a few years), it’s a realistic part of modern warfare, and made for some pretty cool toys. Most of what you see going on with Headman is more on the extremely cool end, and only a little corny.

First, it should be said that Headman’s appearance more so than any other GI Joe villain pulls from an iconic visage that strikes fear into the hearts of many:

The suspicious man from neighborhood watch signs! Jokes aside, the corniest thing about Headman is that he wears a bandit mask and a silly little hat. The head sculpt itself is high-quality and has that late-ARAH sharpness that often goes underappreciated, but it looks super silly. I think they purposely tried to make his head look a little sillier, since if he looked like his DIC design, this would be a pretty drab figure of a guy in a suit (though, that probably would’ve been cooler).

The suit sculpt is really nice too. Hasbro’s later releases of Tomax and Xamot, as well as ‘04 General Flagg show how this mold had a lot of potential in it. A lot of later repaints didn’t look so good with 80‘s figures because of the sculpting changes that occurred between the beginning and end of ARAH, though I feel Headman is subtle enough that he doesn’t look so weird with some sculpts that are a few years older than his.

Headman’s suit is lined with gold pin-stripes that are incredibly delicate. I love how it looks, but sadly getting a mint example is not the easiest thing to do. The figure pictured in this post is my brother’s childhood Headman, whose gold paint is almost entirely gone. I wanted my own figure of this guy for a while, but eBay grief and other purchases always kept that at bay. Other than that, Headman doesn’t have much going on for painted details. The ’02 release shows off the sculpt better, though that comes at the cost of him being orange.

For parts, Headman included a G11 rifle, a free-standing rocket launcher, missile and a figure stand. The rocket launcher lights up like the other DEF launchers, which I always thought was a pretty cool gimmick, though I’m not sure there was really enough here to justify the higher price of DEF figures. Essentially including one launcher and a standard gun is pretty lacking when compared to the normal ARAH releases from the same year.

With that said, the rifle is pretty cool, and actually another great example of how much attention to detail was placed in GI Joe guns. For years I thought it was just some weird sci-fi contraption, but it’s actually H&K’s experimental G11 rifle. That gun has a long and interesting production history, but the point of it is that even in 1992, this would be a very unusual and very, very expensive gun to be toting around. It’s my assumption that it’s meant to reflect his tacky and posh nature as a drug kingpin, though that doesn’t explain why Battle Corps Mutt had it too. Oddly, the barrel area is more open than any G11 prototype I’ve seen, but maybe that’s a change that occurred once it became the filecard’s “mega-blast combat rifle”.

Getting a complete Headman is actually cheap and somewhat easy. Getting a mint Headman is a lot more challenging. A loose complete Headman in good condition tends to run around $20, but it takes a while to find one with even decent paint. Carded figures seem to float more around $50 at the moment. As is the case with much of Hasbro’s vintage gold and silver paint applications, it’s made of fairy-dust, and that’s bad for Headman since you essentially can’t touch the figure without rubbing it. Oddly though, there’s a lot more of Headman on eBay than I see for other figures (especially DEF ones), so I can only assume this guy was actually very popular back in ‘92.

1992 Headman Links:

1993 Clutch (Mega Marines)

Posted on September 19, 2022 by mwnekoman

1993 Clutch (Mega Marines)

It’s often portrayed as a fixture of modern toys that Hasbro hammers the same classic characters from ‘82 to ‘86 over and over without end, though interestingly you really started to see Hasbro fall back on the classic ARAH cast as far back as ‘89. If you were introduced to GI Joe in ‘91, you could have a new toy for 8 of the first 13 Joes by ‘93. Mega Marines Clutch is among those updates, and like many of them, he’s a lot different from the original.

I think it’s not unfair to say Clutch is one of the most popular members of the ‘82 Joe lineup. He’s got a fun, likable personality and a real presence in the comics even after the point his toy was gone from store shelves. Speaking of the comics, I find it curious he was brought back rather prominently for a story arc that introduced us to Rock&Roll in his ‘89 costume. Perhaps Clutch had been on the drawing board at one point too, but didnt’ materialize. Skidmark and Hot Seat seem like they could pass for a new Clutch with a different head, but maybe that’s just me.

A new Clutch wouldn’t show up again until ‘93 in the Mega Marines. One could suppose with how different he looks that the figure became Clutch just as a lazy way for Hasbro to retain a trademark, though it’s pretty well in line with other characters that got redesigned up to that point. The redesign probably also seems a little more exaggerated just for the fact that now Clutch is a totally unique toy, and not some guy made from a small and repetitive library of parts.

Still, it’s a lot to take in. Clutch has gone from a nondescript bearded soldier to a clean-shaven guy in neon orange sci-fi armor. I feel like if he hadn’t been a Mega Marine, he’d have a little more identity of his own, but sadly this is a fairly homogeneous group of toys, so Clutch doesn’t stand out too much. I like his colors and the look of his outfit, but it’s very hard for me to see this as Clutch.

Clutch comes with almost the exact same accessories as Mega-Marines Gung-Ho and several other figures, which includes Muskrat’s shotgun and machete, Tracker’s MP5K, ‘91 Grunt’s rifle, a missile launcher, two missiles, stand and moldable bio-armor (playdoh and a mold for it). As generic parts, it’s an okay runner especially for being in black, but also pretty lame since it was used so much. At the very least, most of these weapons are realistic, easy to hold and look good, so having a surplus of them was a pretty okay thing.

You can get a mint complete Clutch for around $15, and he isn’t too hard to find. Sacrifice the generic accessories and you can save a few bucks, though overall they don’t seem to add much to his value either. As an obscurity this Clutch is a kind of neat figure, but I’m also pretty sure he’s no one’s favorite Clutch. He’s very 90‘s and looks decent in his own way, but also has nothing especially fun or unique going for him. In other words: he’s mediocre.

1993 Clutch (Mega Marines) Links:

Clutch Prototype at Forgotten Figures

JoeADay

3D Joes

Half the Battle

1992 Barbecue

Posted on August 30, 2022 by mwnekoman

1992 Barbecue

Eco-Warriors are a fun subset. Extremely corny, but as a concept they work perfectly in the world of GI Joe, as chemical warfare is a real and scary thing. Of course, the comics and what not usually put the focus on pollution, because that’s a little bit more of a gentle thing than having GI Joe entering an urban wasteland after Cobra attacks with sarin gas or white phosphorous. It was also a great way for Hasbro to bring back older characters like Barbecue, who logically fit somewhat on the team given his prior role as a firefighter (though oddly, Airtight was nowhere to be found).

I like this mold a lot better when it was reused three different ways in Star Brigade as Payload, though that doesn’t mean the original release as Barbecue was bad at all. Him and all of his color variations were prominent in my childhood as various different things, which I think speaks to the strength of the sculpt. Part of what makes this figure fun is that he’s almost creepy in that hazmat suit, especially with the way his face is obscured by the clear plastic visor. Often times as a kid I’d use him and the Payloads as cyborg Cobras akin to BATs, though other times he was just a lonely astronaut who’d typically die some painful death.

Compared to V1 Barbecue, this release seems much less distinct, though I think he’s a little bit cooler overall. Naturally, he loses some of that distinctness from the repaints that came later, though Deep Six also looks a lot like this figure in some ways. Still, Barbecue as an Eco-Warrior seems a little more applicable to a few different situations than the more standard firefighter he was originally. Oddly, it’s a pretty even trade off, as most of what makes this version cool also makes him just another Eco-Warrior, whereas most of what made ‘85 Barbecue cool, also made him very niche.

The red and yellow colors are somewhat pleasing to look at. I do often think of ketchup and mustard when I see him, but that’s tasty, so I don’t mind. The red is a nice shade and isn’t too bright, so he looks pretty reasonable for the role he serves. With that said, imagining this mold in the original’s orange and grey makes me think that was a bit of a missed opportunity for a repaint, but I’m also sure that not too many others would’ve wanted that.

Barbecue’s parts straight up suck. That’s partly because the only parts you get are his squirt gun and a figure stand. While the 1991 Eco-Warriors came with some traditional accessories, Barbecue and the Toxo-Zombie from 1992 only come with the squirt guns. You can find any number of generic black or yellow guns from the same time-period to equip Barbecue with and he’ll look fine, but it does diminish the figure’s appeal a lot when he doesn’t even come with one unique part of his own.

Astoundingly, this has become a fairly expensive figure ranging from $20 to $25 for a decent example. Part of that is probably owed to the fact that his clear visor falls out on some examples, making it a tad rarer and to the fact that the ‘92 Eco-Warriors were produced in smaller numbers. But seriously, complete ‘92 Barbecues now often outprice complete ‘85 Barbecues, and both represent a C-tier character. I hope I live to see the day when 90‘s Joes are worthless again.

1992 Barbecue Links:

1988 Windmill

Posted on July 5, 2022 by mwnekoman

1988 Windmill

In the past, I’ve considered Windmill one of the worst figures in the line. That’s sort of by a loose standard, as if I told you the real “worst GI Joe ever”, it’d be nothing but Shadow Ninjas, since those fail as functional toys. Windmill has no such flaw, but he’s exceedingly ugly to look at, and that’s something that holds him back quite a bit.

His sculpt is surprisingly decent, maybe with the exception of his head. His flight-suit is well detailed, and he even has a little respirator sculpted onto his chest too. His face in unremarkable, but well scaled and reasonably sharp. The only real issue here is his colors. After careful examination, his helmet doesn’t even look that bad by GI Joe standards, it just looks weird and like he has cat-ears because of the bad coloring (there’s a lot of different helmet-mounted displays out there, and some of them look pretty wacky). A lot of real helicopter pilots wear helmets with weird crap all over it, but it doesn’t come across right because of the paint.

Arguably, the worst aspect of Windmill is his colors. The combination of orange and green makes it hard to make out his details, and the black bits on top of it create some harsh tonal crush. For comparison, the similarly obscure Skid-Mark also has similar colors to Windmill, but he’s saved by having a more balanced palette overall, with black used much more sparingly. The Funskool version of this figure does a much better job of showing his details, though it’s red and blue colors aren’t very preferable to me. Maybe someday I’ll custom paint one in V1 Ace’s colors just for something to do.

He includes a single gun, which is a large revolver. In the past, I’ve disliked this gun quite a bit just for how badly out of scale it is, but I’ve grown to see it has some unique merits, and isn’t that badly out of scale by GI Joe standards. In all of ARAH, there’s 4 revolver sculpts (Backstop’s, Downtown’s, ’92 General Hawk’s and this one), which makes it fairly distinct, especially if you’re looking to expand your pistol collection. It also has a nice, skinny handle that makes it possible for figures to hold it well, unlike the terrible Shockwave pistol. It’s size makes me think of something you’d see Yosemite Sam totting around, probably because it’s a revolver, but in actuality, it’s a similar length to most GI Joe pistols (all of the formerly mentioned revolvers are 30mm or longer).

So, I used to hate Windmill. I thought he was a terribly ugly looking figure, with a strange sculpt and a cartoonish looking gun. Now, I find him to be more usable, as the sculpt really isn’t horrible, and the pistol I’ve even developed some fondness for. All of that aside, I still think he looks ugly, which relegates him to a very low-tier as a GI Joe pilot. There’s simply plenty of other figures that fill the niche this guy does, and look far less garish at the same time. Still, he’s a fun toy that can sit and hold his gun without breaking, which makes him factually better than a Shadow Ninja, therefore, he’s no longer a “worst GI Joe” in my eyes.

Windmill is still a dirt-cheap figure, now and presumably forever. You can get a Windmill with his pistol for a measly $5, or less. It’s a common toy and a character of virtually no reference in any GI Joe fiction, so there’s simply no interest in him. That’s sort of a nice thing too, as I highly appreciate figures I can buy cheaply for a spare gun or to have fun painting, which is something current market has made very prohibitive.

1988 Windmill Links:

Forgotten Figures

3D Joes

Custom by Jogunwarrior

Half the Battle

1986 HAVOC

Posted on May 2, 2022 by mwnekoman

1986 HAVOC

When I was a kid, I loved GI Joe: the Movie. It was one of the only pieces of media I had to know GI Joe by, all on a continually degrading VHS recording, probably from before I was born. Among the mostly 1986 and ‘87 cast featured in the film was the HAVOC. I knew the STUN, also prominently featured in the film through the Python STUN, but there was no Sky HAVOC in my house, leaving me to wonder for years what kind of awesome vehicle it might be. Then at some point in the 2010‘s I finally got one, and to this day I’m still not sure what to think about it.

Because of it’s connection to the movie, and those years spent wondering what it might be like, it’s one of the few 80‘s Joe items I have some real sentimental value with. Not a lot, but I’m biased in favor of it just for the fact that I wanted one for so long, and the satisfaction associated with finally getting one. When I try to put that aside, I’m mightily tempted to call the HAVOC a bad vehicle, as it treads a fine line between “fun” and “very stupid”.

The best thing about the HAVOC is that it has a lot of play features. The worst thing about the HAVOC, is that none of them work very well. There’s a lot of oddities with it’s design, where like with many Joe vehicles, you ignore the explicit danger it presents it’s crew in favor of having a fun toy that can do more: it’s a rule of cool kinda thing. The HAVOC’s features include it’s deployable hovercraft, an adjustable turret, turning tracks, and an opening canopy, supporting a grand total of four figures to crew the vehicle (twelve, if you count the foot-pegs on the outside of the vehicle). Seems like some modestly fun gimmicks, but virtually all of them have some flaw or issue.

The thing that bugs me most is by far the turret. The obviously stupid thing about it is that it leaves the gunner in plain sight with no protection whatsoever. Less obvious is that it can not aim left or right without turning the entire vehicle. Even less obvious, is that the turret can not be in it’s lowered position and still allow for the vehicle’s main canopy to be opened. Every time you want to get a figure in and out, you have to jack this ratcheted turret way up, just to get the canopy open. Was it tacked on at the last second? It just feels like an afterthought.

Even the main driver’s area is crummy. Why does the driver and co-pilot operate the thing with their faces planted in a monitor, laying on their bellies? It’s almost as bad as the SHARC, and that vehicle is only the way it is to support Deep Six. I really don’t have any gripes with the large glass canopy, since the vehicle’s meant to be fun, and I get that seeing the toys inside it is a lot more fun than an opaque canister. Still, the whole driving on your belly thing looks lame, and I really wonder who was working on the brand at the time that had such a fascination with this.

The back half of the vehicle is mostly taken up by it’s hovercraft bay. On the outside of it, there’s some guns and orange missiles. Inside, there’s the hovercraft which rests in a specially shaped grove. It could be sort of cool, but really, this is probably the biggest let down about the vehicle. If they had just sculpted the floor boards and inner panels differently, you could have more figures in there or even have it double as a mobile command station, like with the MAGGOT. Instead, it’s just empty, and you can barely fit a few extra figures around the hover craft by balancing them.

The recon craft is alright. It’s got two guns, some nicely sculpted engine details, and pivoting fans on it’s ventral side, which I guess allows it to turn or maneuver. It’s fun, but also somewhat unspectacular. On a side note, when I’m bored and being stupid, I’ve wondered what a GI Joe version of Mario Kart might be like, where Duke can fly in this recon craft in a race against Serpentor on his chariot, Cobra Commander in a Flight Pod, and Destro in his Despoiler. Add in the Chameleon and the Weapon Transport and you have enough for a full game. I can’t really think of anything else when I see this recon vehicle.

All things considered, it’s still a mildly fun vehicle if nothing else just because it does have a few things it can do. I think what’s just so jarring about it though, is that it does so much of it so poorly, when most of the toys released around it are better for less money and space. I like it’s overall shape and the way it looks with the more sci-fi focused ‘86 and ‘87 guys, but after that, it’s a very cumbersome vehicle, and it’s appeal is rather limited.

Prices seem to vary for a HAVOC, but generally you can get a decent one around $20, sometimes more, sometimes less. It’s surprising, but vehicles don’t seem to carry the value of figures, where now a V1 Leatherneck will cost you more than this vehicle will most of the time. Of course, this isn’t a very good vehicle, but when nostalgic tooners are paying $200 for a Cobra Commander, you’d think it’d get a bump just based on the Sunbow association.

1986 HAVOC Links:

Forgotten Figures

3D Joes

Adambobomb

1985 Torch

Posted on April 11, 2022 by mwnekoman

1985 Torch

My opinion on Dreadnoks tends to come and go, as sometimes I find myself greatly appreciative of their place in the line, and sometimes I feel they’re a bit overplayed. Of course, that’s true of most themes you find in GI Joe, as GI Joe rarely had a good idea it doesn’t completely wear out (ninjas, faceless army-builders, ect). Regardless, Dreadnoks are generally a staple of the GI Joe line, and usually the older ones like Torch, tend to be the better ones.

Of the original three Dreadnoks, I didn’t go for Torch until I already had Funskool Buzzer, and an ‘85 Ripper. That generally reflects my views on the three, where Buzzer is the best, closely followed by Ripper, and then Torch is more of an afterthought. Nothing about Torch really makes him a bad figure, on the contrary, he’s actually nicely done in several ways. As a character though, he doesn’t really stand out apart from the other two, and starts to just seem forgettable, over time.

In some ways I’ve grown an appreciation for his lack of uniqueness, along with other bland Dreadnoks like Monkeywrench, after contemplating him less as an individual, and more so as a mook with a backstory. I won’t be army-building Torch (although I do have two), but thinking about him less along the lines of Zartan or even someone like Copperhead, and more as something of a less anonymous Viper, seems to open more doors for him and other Dreadnoks in my head.

Torch is the guy in the lot who wears a leather vest, and surprisingly, that’s a motif Hasbro didn’t really reuse much despite them being a biker-gang. Almost every other Dreadnok is either completely shirtless or wearing some small and insignificant piece of cloth, which makes a lot of them look more like homeless people and less like bikers in my mind (though, Ninja Force Zartan wears a leather vest too). His sculpt is covered in the typical amount of golden-year details that bring him to life, though my favorite thing about his look, is that it’s very apparent what he represents without really having to know anything about him. I would’ve liked a figure like this a lot as a kid because of that.

For parts, you get his signature welding-torch and a backpack in connects to. It’s sort of weird he didn’t have an extra weapon when Buzzer had an ax and Ripper had a rifle, but Torch just comes with two parts. It’s also weird that his torch connects via a plastic cord on the weapon itself, much like the breakage prone gun with Flash and older figures; while Ripper used the black hose that became standard after this point. Makes me wonder if Torch was designed a little earlier than Ripper.

The median price of a Torch right now seems to be around $20, which isn’t bad, but is still a little more than I expected. This guy used to be lot fodder and one of the cheaper Dreadnoks to get, but now a decent one will run you at least that much. Still, he’s a cool enough figure that if I didn’t already have one, I wouldn’t mind paying that much for him.

1985 Torch Links:

1993 Night Creeper Leader

Posted on March 14, 2022 by mwnekoman

1993 Night Creeper Leader

I’ve been on a late-90‘s kick lately, which I think is supported by the fact that there’s simply so many figures from ‘93 and ‘94 to talk about. These are far from the best figures in the vintage line, but for me, they’re both nostalgic and interesting to take photos of, since even to this day, most of the figures are fairly underexposed. This Night Creeper Leader for example, has very few dio-photos.

When it comes to ninjas, I’m pretty picky. I tend to find that it’s easy for ninja plot lines in GI Joe to get out of hand, and when GI Joe gets away from being a military fantasy, that tends to kill my interest. For example, I got pretty bored with the comic issues that featured Jinx and Billy a lot, or issue 91, which stood out to me as being less interesting during a recent reading of the later Marvel issues.

Night Creepers however, really manage to blend things together and capture the cool and fantastic side of the GI Joe franchise. They’re ninjas, but they’re also modern looking assassins who are believably dangerous. It feels like to me they tie ninjas into the military fantasy of GI Joe somewhat better, rather than feeling so much like a martial arts fantasy spinoff of the brand, which is more of what you see with so many Arashikage ninjas.

The Night Creeper Leader reuses the lower half of the ‘90 Night Creeper, and has a new chest, head and arms. This tactic was pretty cheap of Hasbro, as at the point to where half of the toy was recycled as well as all of it’s parts, you weren’t getting very much that was new. At the same time, the designers did a good job with this limitation, and by reusing Night Creeper parts, the Night Creeper Leader has some nice and obvious continuity with his troops. The new parts of his sculpt look super muscular, and he has a pretty solid look for a ninja.

This figure came in orange with black details and tiger stripes, whereas the recolor from the next year used purple, yellow and gold. I’m usually surprised that the purple color scheme seems to be the more popular one, as this orange look is far more pleasing to my eyes. Of course, if you really hate 90‘s colors and want something fun to do, you can just swap the legs on this guy for a Night Creeper and then paint the torso details to match. I’ve thought about doing that, but then my Night Creeper Leader would lose some of his distinguishing features, and I think he needs them.

His accessories include the Night Creeper’s Crossbow, two ‘91 Snake Eyes swords, a Hydro Viper knife, Road Pig’s crossbow and shield, and lastly, the launcher from the ‘93 HEAT Viper, as well as it’s missile and a stand. What’s odd about this part runner, is that these parts were basically never reused, only reappearing for the ‘94 repaint as far as I can remember. I don’t really like the Road Pig parts very much, but it’s cool you can give them to Sonic Fighters Road Pig and they match perfectly. I also think it’s neat they brought back the Night Creeper crossbow, once again, for continuity, and they also gave him some nice swords you didn’t see to much (Not used in Ninja Force!). Interestingly, his crossbow has been retooled to feature a smaller grip.

The 1993 Night Creeper Leader is far from a rare or expensive figure, but like many 90‘s items, a tad bit of a pain to get complete. A 100% complete figure seems to go for about $20, and carded figures only fetch $25. Figures missing a part or two drop down to around $12. It’s a fun figure and even the current market’s failed to make him unaffordable, so I think these will be around for years to come.

1993 Night Creeper Leader Links:

Joe A Day

3D Joes

Half the Battle

1993 Gung-Ho (Mega Marines)

Posted on February 21, 2022 by mwnekoman

1993 Gung-Ho (Mega Marines)

The Mega Marines are a vexing subgoup within what was offered in the 90‘s GI Joe line. Given the fact they were dropped faster than both DEF and certainly Sonic Fighters, I’ll go ahead and assume they probably weren’t a hit, even when they were released. Still, taken for what they are, they’re a cool little group of figures, and I’d go as far as to say this is one of my favorite Gung-Ho figures.

It took me a long time to come around on the Mega Marines, and to be frank, probably too long. For most of my time collecting I’ve had a disdain for silly things and neon colors, both of which the Mega Marines are, heavily. Beyond that, it’s basically an un-licensed crossover with Aliens, and that too, didn’t really appeal to me. They come across as being somewhere in-between Star Brigade and Battle Corps in such a way that it doesn’t really feel like they have a strong niche or identity.

Despite that, this Gung-Ho looks pretty nice. There’s a lot of fluorescent yellow on his armor, but also features some nice dark greens and blacks on the base plastic underneath. If I’m not mistaken, I believe this was Hasbro’s first usage of marbled plastic, which gives the figures a somewhat interesting look. Does anyone know why there’s a sculpted number on every Mega Marine? Gung-Ho’s number 1, while Blast-Off, Clutch and Mirage are number 2, 3, and 4 respectively. It’s sort of distracting.

Oddly, this figure comes across to me as the most combat-ready looking Gung-Ho ever made. He’s packing body armor from head to toe and looks like he could take a few hits. At the same time, he doesn’t look very much like Gung-Ho, but I really don’t mind that, since I was never a big fan of Gung-Ho anyways. The futuristic look is a little hammy, though it fits nicely with the overall esthetic that was being built in ‘93 and ‘94.

The accessories for the Mega Marines are where things got a little more interesting. Included is the same shotgun, MP5K, laser rifle and machete runner seen with several other figures (Duke, Frostbite, Stalker, Ozone, ect) cast in black. Nice parts for filling your armory. He has a unique orange helmet; it’s sorta goofy looking. You also get the standard missile-launcher, missiles and a figure stand, in addition to another gimmick part: moldable bio-armor.

Moldable bio-armor was the core gimmick introduced with the Mega Marines. Included with each figure was a tub of play-doh, and a mold that fit around the figure’s chest and included missiles. While playing, you could tear and damage the figure’s armor, and when you’re done, tear it off and cast it again later. Part of me wants to say it seems kind of cool, but I also realize this really was just a lame and inexpensive way for Hasbro to bloat the price of this assortment. It’s slightly creative, but I won’t give it a pass on that alone. Also, good luck standing a figure up with a heavy-ass mound of play-doh on his chest: that’s too much even with a figure stand!

Dealers will sell complete figures, sometimes with the play-doh, for around $35. At auction though, figures will often go for around $20, though, it’s not so often you see these in a truly complete state. With that said, I think it’s safe to say the Mega Marines are least desirable figures to have complete. There’s really no point in buying the crunchy old play-doh tub, which like wise, renders the included mold useless too. Also, while his guns are nice, they’re also terribly generic. Meaning, the only thing you really need for this guy is his helmet. Pretty astounding, since not too many GI Joes come with parts that irrelevant to the figure.

1993 Gung-Ho (Mega Marines) Links:

Half the Battle

Joe A Day

3D Joes

1993 Dr Mindbender

Posted on February 15, 2022 by mwnekoman

1993 Dr Mindbender

Dr Mindbender amounts to Cobra’s resident mad scientist, and is one of the original crazy Cobra’s before 1987 came along and saturated the line with rejected Spider-man villains. For most of my life, I’ve preferred villains who were drab, boring and mostly devoid of personality, like Scrap Iron, but Mindbender’s different. I’ve always loved the character, and he’s been a central figure among my Cobras almost as much as Destro and Cobra Commander.

For a long time, this was my only Dr Mindbender. I say “mine” but it was another figure that was really my brother’s, I was just allowed to look at it any time I wanted, since as a kid and an adult, I never break stuff. A nice thing about Mindbender, is that he’s a distinct looking character who fills a somewhat obvious role, so even without access to his file card, it was easy to know who he was and what he did. I think there was a big focus on him too, since Cobra robots and Cobra’s monster Blanka, were a major focus of my childhood battles.

As was the trend in 1993, half of Mindbender is reused from an older figure, in this case, the ‘86 Viper. They released this mold in Brazil a few years later, where it was lost, hence why you never again got a whole Viper repaint. Putting that bit of trivia aside, it blends in alright, and the upper half of the figure’s sculpting looks fantastic. One thing I’ve never liked about V1 Dr Mindbender, is that the figure has one of those stereotypical oversized heads from his year, compared to this one, which is cool, tightly sculpted, and proportionate. Besides being slathered in nonsense-tech crap, it’s also nice that the figure looks pretty normal, and doesn’t have grenades popping out of every orifice of his body.

His colors are hideously bright, though I’ve never really minded that, even if I’ve been sensitive to it at times. In fact, I’d go as far to say these colors look pretty good, mixing that dark purple with a vibrant yellow. A few details are black, which balances things out, and the recycled Viper legs do well to tie him back to an existing Cobra uniform. The only thing that’s almost too ugly is the excessive use of yellow on his chest. You lose a lot of the sculpt’s detail in all of that.

His parts! His parts are so awful and wonderful at the same time. It’s an odd runner that as far as I know, was only shared with Lobotomaxx. Included is Dee-Jay’s gun, Voltar’s gun, ‘91 Sci-fi’s gun, ‘89 Snake Eye’s gun, an Iron Grenadier pistol, and the Hydro Viper’s knife, besides the obligatory launcher, missile and figure-stand that this blog usually doesn’t acknowledge. Six normal weapons is actually a bit extra compared to most figures from the time. Obviously, these parts aren’t very good, but I find them to be a guilty pleasure. As a kid, I generally equipped most figures with Voltar guns, though generally, most of these parts wound up getting used by a wide variety of figures. The knife especially became Armor Tech Destro’s trademark weapon, the lightning knife, which he could charge with high-voltage electricity from his fist. Also, I just like giving him Dee-Jay’s awful gun because I’m low-key tasteless.

1993 Dr Mindbender’s are very cheap, running around $9 for a fully complete figure with file card. It’s not too surprising when 1986 Mindbender’s are pretty cheap as well, though it’s still odd given the popularity of the character. If you like 90‘s neon, this is a fun version with a good sculpt. He has most of the problem’s you’ll find with any ‘93 or ‘94 figure, but he’s also the only alternative Mindbender figure, and he’s nice for that reason alone.

1993 Dr Mindbender Links:

The Viper Pit

Tag Archives: ARAH

1993 Cross Country (Battle Corps)

1993 Cross Country (Battle Corps)

1993 Cross Country (Battle Corps) Links:

1992 Headman

1992 Headman

1992 Headman Links:

1993 Clutch (Mega Marines)

1993 Clutch (Mega Marines)

1993 Clutch (Mega Marines) Links:

1992 Barbecue

1992 Barbecue

1992 Barbecue Links:

1988 Windmill

1988 Windmill

1988 Windmill Links:

1986 HAVOC

1986 HAVOC

1986 HAVOC Links:

1985 Torch

1985 Torch

1985 Torch Links:

1993 Night Creeper Leader

1993 Night Creeper Leader

1993 Night Creeper Leader Links:

1993 Gung-Ho (Mega Marines)

1993 Gung-Ho (Mega Marines)

1993 Gung-Ho (Mega Marines) Links:

1993 Dr Mindbender

1993 Dr Mindbender

1993 Dr Mindbender Links: