Tag Archives: bootlegs

1997 Bronze Bombers Scorch

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1997 Bronze Bombers Scorch

The Bronze Bombers have a real interesting history with the Joe line, which has been covered by a few sources at various points. To my knowledge, it went from a novel set of near-bootlegs nobody cared about, to a coveted collectors item, and back to novelty most don’t speak much about, or at least that’s how it seems to me these days.

Originally, the Bronze Bombers were a line of GI Joe competitors similar to The Corps, that came out in the late eighties. After going off shelves for some period, the company that made them, Olmec, tried a half-assed revival as they were going out of business by making a Toys “R” Us exclusive set of figures out of licensed GI Joe molds.

Now, things from here get real short-sighted on Hasbro’s end… These figures came out in 1997. One can assume that the licensing agreement between Olmec and Hasbro may have occurred at some point between ‘95 and ‘96, but by the time this set came out, Hasbro had already brought back ARAH! Better yet, because Olmec was filing for bankruptcy, all of the GI Joe molds were forever lost to red tape. I’d be tempted to assume that decisions like this were the fault of spiteful Kenner employees, but a chronic lack of foresight is such a trademark of Hasbro by this point, I really wouldn’t know.

The good news in all of this, is that most of the molds featured in this set are things Hasbro would’ve certainly let go to waste otherwise. Maybe the Club would’ve gone and made some Dreadnok army-builders from a few of them, but I’m pretty sure that still means we didn’t lose out on anything.

Scorch here is a fairly bizarre figure, which is in line with most of the Bronze Bombers. He’s a repaint of the ‘86 Motor Viper, now entirely rendered in navy-blue with green trim, and a bright blue visor. The coloring is so odd I don’t really feel like this figure blends in so well with a standard collection of Motor Vipers, but that uniqueness is really part of the appeal with oddities such as this. On another note, his waist tooling is swapped with the Strato-Viper repaint also included in the set, and for what reason, I have no clue.

Because of this however, I’ve still not really found a role for this guy in my collection. At the moment, I somewhat like the idea of him simply being Scorch, who is a unique Motor Viper apart from the rest of that division. This works too, in that I won’t have to worry about army-building him if only one exists. But exactly what his rank and role is, I’ve not quite ironed out.

The plastic seems pretty brittle on these Bronze Bombers, from what I can tell. It has a decent feel to it and doesn’t seem as delicate as say, Slaughter’s Marauders, but it’s definitely something where I shy away from giving them accessories. If these were a little easier to get ahold of, I wouldn’t give it much thought, but at this point it’d be pretty unfortunate to break one.

As Scorch came in a box set, the accessories are a generic lot intended to be used interchangeably with any of the figures. So, as a quick run down, the set included the Frag Viper’s SMG and Darklon’s gun in white, the Tele-Viper’s camera and Track Viper’s pistol in brown, and some recolored squirt guns from Eco Warriors. Given that like the figures, all of these sculpts were subsequently lost, you can start to see where a few parts went to. Hasbro made a recasting of the Tele-Viper camera, but without the peg on the grip, which was always a little frustrating.

Bronze Bombers were going for a lot of money a while back, but I’ve noticed that their prices have gone down by a lot in recent years. Complete sets will still run around $400, but the figures by themselves generally hit around the $20 – $30 mark at auction. The catch is, they’re relatively rare. There’s probably a generous amount of these floating around, but they don’t show up too often, so finding a particular figure takes patience.

gi joe bronze bombers scorch 1997 motor viper olmec gi joe bronze bombers scorch 1997 motor viper olmec

1997 Bronze Bombers Scorch Links:

Forgotten Figures

PS: If anyone has some more links about Scorch or Olmec as a whole, feel free to drop them in the comments.

2020 TBM Eels (Copperhead Colors)

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2020 TBM Eels (Copperhead Colors)

So after a good amount of hype, The Black Major’s latest project has finally arrived, and this time it’s the 1985 Eel mold. There’s quite a few interesting color schemes floating around, though a popular one and the one I liked best was this color scheme based on ‘84 Copperhead.

GI Joe TBM The Black Major eels copperhead vintage arah

In general, I’m not someone who was overly excited for Eel repaints, and that’s for a handful of reasons. The Eel was a good figure that serves it’s purpose, and similar to the Snow Serpent, there’s not much need for a repaint of a character so specialized. Because of this, I think a lot of the repaints went in a more novel direction, which doesn’t work for me with this mold. I also just don’t like this mold as much as other people though, so there’s that too.

This color scheme is very good however, and very useful to my collection. As a personal choice, I don’t like imagining that they have much relation to Copperhead (he’s a rogue agent), but rather are just an Eel division in swamp-centric colors. This to me, makes them a little more unique and gives them a more distinct role in my collection. This way it provides some new opportunities, like giving them the Dreadnok Swampfire, or having someone for Muskrat to fight.

The quality of these figures is very good, maybe the best I’ve encountered from factory customs. In general I don’t judge these figures too harshly for quality, as with their third-party origins and small production runs, it’s usually going to be the case that a figure won’t be perfect. With that said, these are simply excellent. The paint, joints, and even the numerous parts have a solid feel to them, which surprised me, as I was expecting the flippers or mouthpiece at least to have some problems. Instead, everything’s very snug and almost on par with vintage quality.

You get the original Eel’s full assortment of gear, including the two-piece backpack, speargun, mouthpiece and flippers. All of the parts are cast in a winter green color, which looks pretty good. Personally I think black parts might’ve contrasted better with the figure itself, but I really like these oddly colored 80‘s accessories, so I’d rather have them like this than be perfectly attuned to my esthetic sense.

It seems like with factory customs, you get about a year or so of seeing the figures float around plentifully before things start to dry up. These particular Eels are the cream of the crop from this set, so I didn’t chose to wait around on them. However, I’m pretty sure a handful of these will be available into next year, at which point I’ll probably dip my hands into a few more color schemes. I expect you’ll see these particular Eels for at least the rest of the year at their normal $15 to $18, which they’re well worth.

2010 TBM Black Cobra Trooper

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2010 TBM Black Cobra Trooper

It seemed like not so long ago that a bunch of mysterious, bootleg Cobra Troopers popped up on eBay and no one really knew what they were or what they’d be like. While the “factory custom” scene has changed a little in the years since then, it’s interesting to take a look back at some of the very first figures. This black Cobra Trooper was the first one I acquired.

When these figures surfaced, I was dead-broke, so I couldn’t get too much of what was available. Because of that, I singled out figures I thought might be more well suited for use in small numbers apart from bigger squads. Given that this guy is mostly just a single black color, I thought he could make decent for a sniper. I believe I stole the idea of using an all-black Cobra as a sniper from the Sideshow Cobra Sniper that came out a little before that, which struck me as an interesting concept.

At the time, for a bootleg that nobody knew much about, the quality of this release was quite impressive. A series of similar Trooper bootlegs had come out roughly a year prior, which were much flimsier by comparison. Since then, I think the subsequent Black Major releases have made this figure seem less nice. It has a few interesting quirks not seen on later releases, namely the backpack hole. On the original run of TBM Troopers, all of the figures had smaller screw-holes/backpack holes. This was done deliberately to further distinguish these figures from their vintage counterparts, but it also means they can’t use a backpack.

For the most part, the figure is solid black with some light gray painted details and a silver Cobra sigil. It’s a simple look that fulfills it’s role in my collection nicely, and also looks good with basically any other early Cobra. The paint is sharp and clean, although interestingly there’s a good amount of excess paint above the belt on the waist. The later Troopers from TBM don’t have this problem, but on all of the 2010 Troopers, everything above the belt is painted, which is a bit quirky.

For accessories, you get only the classic Dragunov sniper riffle like with the original figure. It’s a faithful recreation and at the time, this part was precious and hard to come by. Of course, it’s the only part you get and later releases improved by including the Officer’s AK-47 and a Viper backpack. Still, at the time just getting the black Dragunov was great, and I certainly enjoy having no shortage of them years later.

Pricing Black Major customs can be difficult, as this figure’s gotten much harder to find, as you might expect. Of course, most of the customs including ones from around the same time tend to cap their value around $20 to $30, so it’s fair to say this guy’s probably in the same ballpark. I think Black Major’s second run of Cobra Troopers was better than the first, but this is still a really a cool figure I’m glad to have in my collection.

TBM the black major custom Cobra Trooper black 2010 gi joe vintage hasbro
TBM the black major custom Cobra Trooper black 2010 gi joe vintage hasbro
TBM the black major custom Cobra Trooper black 2010 gi joe vintage hasbro

2010 TBM Black Cobra Trooper Links:

Collection of all 2010 TBM Cobra Troopers

Pre-Black Major Cobra Trooper customs

Later TBM Cobra Troopers

TBM Nocturnal Alley Viper (Night Viper colors)

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TBM Nocturnal Alley Viper

I’ve wrote about a lot of Alley Vipers here, so I was hesitant to keep making post about more of them. However, I’ve noticed how much the majority of my traffic tends to favor factory custom posts. So, despite the repetitive nature of staying on one single topic, it’s justified for the sake of increasing the amount of written information and documentation of these.

One problem that factory customs have run into, is that most GI Joe molds have a pretty finite life-span of straight repaints you can make before a figure gets boring. It’s a bigger problem for some figures more than others, as while I’ll likely purchase a Cobra Trooper in any color scheme conceivable, my interest in things like BATs and Alley Vipers is somewhat more fickle. After the first couple of recolors, I usually can’t justify more.

This particular Alley Viper avoids such a problem in part, because it disregards the standard Alley Viper paint applications, and has it’s own, truly unique deco. It does a surprising amount to highlight the detail of the Alley Viper mold in a way that other releases have yet to do. The contrasting black painted across the pouches on the Alley Viper’s chest really breaks up the look of the figure. The zipper that’s highlighted here is another nice detail that’s easier to miss on the V1 Alley Viper.

Another thing factory customs have been notoriously bad about, is matching the colors of new releases to vintage figures. In the case of TBM, both the Python Cobra Troopers and Python Night Vipers end up not matching so well with the colors on the vintage Python Patrol. This Nocturnal Alley Viper, however, does not suffer from such an ill fate. In fact, the green color of the figure is remarkably close to the V1 Night Viper, which really adds some appeal to this release for that reason. Of course, if you happen to own a Funskool Night Viper, the plastic is a slightly better match to that release.

The parts are the standard set you’d expect for the Alley Viper, including the original gun, backpack, and shield. The shield is a fairly interesting piece, as once again the deco has been creatively changed a bit. Replacing the standard camo is a large Cobra logo, which is distinct and adds something to the figure. My only problem is that the face of the Cobra doesn’t perfectly fit over the shield, but other than that, it looks pretty good.

This Alley Viper trends around $20, like many of the custom Alley Vipers that are still available. Given how much standard vintage Alley Vipers have always gone for, I don’t think this is too much to pay. It’s also appealing that you can integrate this figure with an existing squad of Night Vipers, which makes me feel better about only having one.

2019 TMB Snow Serpents Ghost Squad (Sunbow Colors)

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2019 TMB Snow Serpents Ghost Squad

So the newest wave of factory customs for 2019 is here, and it’s Snow Serpents. The V1 Snow Serpent is a classic mold and one of the highest quality sculpts from the vintage line, but finding things to do with it that are very interesting will be a challenge. So far of the early repaints, I’m pretty big into the Ghost Squad, which is a figure based on the Snow Serpent’s appearance in the cartoon.

The figure is primarily a stark white and not the off-white of the vintage figure. This is pretty nice, in the way that the white now matches with more figures that used a standard white color like the 1991 Snow Serpent or the Ice Viper. Other than that, the web-gear is painted a gray color, while the eye holes in the mask are painted black; there’s some blue for the goggles, and silver for the buckles. The paint applications and color scheme in general is pretty basic, but it conveys a Sunbow accurate Snow Serpent while maintaining enough detail to be interesting, so for that I quite like it.

I’ve yet to figure out exactly what I see these as in my collection, but the colors are interesting enough they could work for a fair bit. As they’re cast in a more standard white, they actually look more natural with most of my arctic Cobras than the V1‘s do. I’m not too big on making new sub-divisions within my standard Cobra ranks, but it is interesting that their colors match almost perfectly with the 1998 Cobra Polar Force set, so maybe the Ghost Squad is a small group of elites who worked with Firefly once. Sound good to me.

In terms of quality, the figures are overall pretty great. On mine, they pose well and the joints are acceptably tight. There’s few blemishes in the paint, and no casting irregularities I could find. All three that I bought seem to have trouble holding a snowshoe on one foot, but that’s easily rectified with some acrylic gloss in the foot hole.

gi joe snow serpent the black major 2019 factory custom bootleg hasbro vintage arah

For parts, you get the full load out of classic Snow Serpent parts including the folding stock AK47, snowshoes, backpack, mortar, and parachute. I was impressed with the quality of the parachute pack in particular, which so far feels durable and works without issue. To match the colors of the figure, all of the parts come in white, which isn’t too bad. My only problem is that the mortar doesn’t stand out very well like this, but there’s plenty of alternatives for that part alone.

These are much less available then past customs, which has some collectors reasonably frustrated. Each color scheme seems to be produced in smaller numbers and some of them are priced closer to the $20 range, unless you buy early or in lots. I figure a lot of it has to do with just how niche many of these Snow Serpent color schemes come across, so the production numbers were probably lowered with lower expected demand. In most cases I’ve not been able to justify the prices for what’s come out so far. Still, it’s an excellent figure and the quality is good, so when you see a color scheme that catches your fancy, I wouldn’t wait around.

gi joe snow serpent the black major 2019 factory custom bootleg hasbro vintage arah

2019 TMB Snow Serpents Links:

Python Patrol Snow Serpent at Forgotten Figures

Factory Custom News Thread at ARAH Gallery

Black Major Desert Scorpion Trooper

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Black Major Desert Scorpion Trooper

For almost an entire decade now, collectors have been bombarded by an entourage of third-party GI Joe figures, mainly produced by the Black Major. After getting more Cobra Troopers than you can shake a stick at, Night Vipers, Alley Vipers, and an endless amount of other creations, keeping up with all of them is getting hard. A few of the oldest customs go mostly forgotten, which brings me to the Desert Scorpion Trooper from the Black Major.

Essentially, this figure is from his earliest production runs around 2010. It’s made from a different mold than all of the Troopers that came after 2014 or so, and it’s reflected somewhat in the quality of the figure. Don’t get me wrong, the quality’s pretty great, especially for what one would’ve expected back then. Though it’s certainly not as nice as later runs of figures. In general, loose arms tended to be a bit more common with these than the later mold. As well, I found that mine had a slight issue with their hips not wanting to sit straight, a problem the later mold also lacked.

The colors and design, to my knowledge are based on an older bootleg made in small numbers by other individuals. TBM’s figure is a much more saturated tan color, compared to the lighter tan of the older figure. The usage of the Desert Scorpion sigil is similar between the two figures. Personally I think TBM’s version of the design is the better appearance, but it can be argued the old figure was closer in color to Hasbro plastic, so there’s room for debate.

I think when these were new, they were largely overshadowed by the camouflage Troopers that came out at the same time. The added realism of the camouflage, coupled with the amount of detail that it provided on the vintage Cobra Trooper mold made for a figure most collectors couldn’t afford to ignore. This guy on the other hand comes off as more of a standard Trooper with a switched up pallete; yet for me this is one of the figure’s main appeals. While the camouflage figures always looked impressive, they don’t blend in well with most of the vintage ARAH figures. The Scorpion Trooper doesn’t look that out of place comparatively.

Like the V1 Cobra Trooper, this figure only included a Dragunov sniper riffle. Newer Trooper customs have gone to add in a Viper backpack and AK47 from the Cobra Officer, but these were more true to the original. I definitely prefer the AK to the Dragunov, but it’s quite a blessing to be able to hoard up tons of spare AKs and Dragunovs when these were so hard to get with vintage Troopers prior. Even if this figure didn’t have the nice extras, I was plenty happy just getting more Dragunovs.

They show up pretty rarely now, so it’s hard to figure out what the Scorpion Troopers go for on average. Most custom Cobra Troopers don’t go for more than $30, and certain figures will still only run around $15. So although it’s a wide estimate, given their rarity I think it’s fair to say you might see them go for anything in between those two numbers.

TBM customs cobra trooper bootleg the black major factory custom gi joe arah desert scorpion
TBM customs cobra trooper bootleg the black major factory custom gi joe arah desert scorpion

Black Major Desert Scorpion Trooper Links:

Early Factory Custom Desert Trooper at Attica Gazette

Display of Black Major Custom Troopers by 00zxcvb