Last week, Hasbro got some more of their now infamous Target Exclusive Cobra Island figures back up for order/pre-order. At first, it seemed like another shit-show, but over the course of about 48 hours they seemed to fix things. By the end, I managed to get everything I was missing, and it dawned on me that while I scored a Baroness the first time around, I had not yet featured her here, so let’s resolve that today with a look at this magnificent set!

This set is similar to the Deluxe Riders that Hasbro has been putting out in the Marvel Legends line, as most of those included a motorcycle. I’ve gushed on and on about how much I love the Classified packaging, and it looks even better in this bigger format. You get some great character art, a big map on the back panel, and the window shows off the figure, the bike, and all the extra goodies. Let’s start with The Baroness!

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, it seems like Hasbro is taking a page from Sideshow’s book when it comes to designing their Cobra figures. Zartan and Major Bludd both had similarities to those Sixth-Scale figures, and now Baroness does to. And boy, that sure ain’t a bad thing! Like her original vintage figure, Baroness is reinforced with some sleek black armor to protect her in the never ending fight against the JOEs. Her legs are entire encased in the stuff, from her pointed-toe boots to the pointed, scalloped pieces that run up to her thighs. She has a breast plate, arm bracers, and asymmetrical shoulder pieces, with the left one being a serpent head!

In-between all that shiny armor, you can see her textured body suit with reinforced patches in all the high-friction areas. There’s some great Cobra branding on her outfit, consisting of embossed red Cobra emblems on her chest plate, her arm bracers, and her belt buckle. Baroness is sporting a crisscrossed gun belt with holsters on the back to hold her pistols out at angles. I’d like to think that this is a callback to the Sienna Miller Baroness from the Rise of Cobra film, as that Baroness also carried her guns this way. Finally, The Queen of Cobra has a sheath for her combat knife secured to her left thigh.

The head sculpt is quite good, although I’m not sure that I would rank this one as one of Classified’s best, but seeing as how good some of this line’s portraits are, that’s nothing to be ashamed of. The likeness certainly suits the character, and I love the little part in her lips. The printing for her facial features looks great, and I think the glasses here are quite an achievement. It’s got to be so hard to do glasses in this scale, but these turned out great. The lenses are fairly clear and I like the gold accents at the corners of the frames. I think these are supposed to be removable, but mine are stuck pretty good. Unless I score a second Baroness, I’m not about to try to force them out. The hair sculpt is pretty simple, it’s straight and cascades down her back.

As for articulation, everything is fine here, except for the rotating hinges in the elbows, which can’t quite do a 90-degree bend. It’s hard to tell if that’s because of the sculpt or the joints aren’t cut right, but I definitely wanted a better range of motion there. Everything else here is fine, and what you would expect to see in a Hasbro 6-inch figure these days. Baroness is loads of fun to play with, and she’s fairly well balanced, despite her rather small feet.

As for weapons, Baroness comes with a cool little black combat knife with a golden Cobra protruding from the pommel. It’s an exceptional bit of sculpt for such a tiny weapon. Part of me continues to wish Hasbro would paint the blades on these silver, but then having a matte black blade makes sense in a lot of combat situations where stealth is warranted. Despite having only gun-hands, Baroness can hold this little piece of cutlery surprisingly well.

Her matched set of golden pistols are certainly distinctive! No doubt, these were a birthday present from Pimp Daddy Destro. I really dig these, as the designs aren’t too crazy and they basically just look like legit automatic pistols, albeit all blinged out. I could definitely see her fighting her way to a Rattler with these after an operation went sour.

And then there’s this thing. I wouldn’t have any idea what it was if there wasn’t a picture of her on the box firing a laser out of it, so yeah… Laser Snake Gun! I honestly love this thing. Yeah, it’s balls-out weird and totally impractical, but the sculpt and paint on are just so damn good. It coils around her arm and she holds it right at the base of the Cobra’s head. I’m guessing she just squeezes it to fire. I can imagine the scene now. She pulls this thing out and Flash sees it, laughs, and shouts “What the hell are you going to do with that?” right before she uses it to burn a hole through Beachhead’s torso and he screams, “SWEET LASER JESUS!!!” Yeah, I put a lot of thought into it. OK, let’s check out the bike!

The Cobra COIL is a callback to the COBRA Coils, which were Cobra’s elite motorcycle drivers, and this thing is one sexy ride quite befitting its sexy driver. It even outclasses the Deluxe Riders Black Widow motorcycle by a long mile. The red and black bike looks sleek and mean, with it’s aggressively placed front wheel, tinted green windshield, and silver detailed engine. There’s a textured seat, Cobra emblem’s embossed near the handlebars, side mounted machine guns, and a folding kickstand to keep it upright.

You don’t get a whole lot of detail in the instruments, just some green fluorescent paint, but the handlebars are ball jointed to allow them to more easily fit the Baroness’ grip. Oh yeah, and she also comes with a swap out motorcycle helmet head, which is such a wonderful bonus! The colors, build, and overall quality of this bike is excellent for a pack-in vehicle!

And The Baroness rides it pretty well. There are pegs on the foot pedals for Baroness’ feet, but I find it better not to bother with them.

The side-mounted weapons on the motorcycle can also be removed and used as rifles, which is pretty damn cool.

To be honest, at first I thought this was a strange mash-up, as I never really associate Baroness riding a superbike, but Hasbro really sold the idea with this set. She looks simply amazing on the COIL with her bitchin armor and her helmet on, and I would not be opposed to seeing this bike re-released in a more traditional blue and black with a male Cobra COILS update.

As amazing as this figure and bike turned out, it’s obviously been a sore spot for collectors. Maybe if the figure alone got a separate wide release without the motorcycle and helmet, it wouldn’t have been so bad. But making The Baroness a retail exclusive was a terrible idea, and scalpers just poured salt in the wound by buying them all up and asking crazy prices on Ebay. And even after the recent online re-stock, this set is selling for up to $100, which is more than double. I was lucky enough to get mine at cost the first time around, but I probably would have gone $20 over the MSRP, I had to and I’m not proud to admit that, but heck… It really is a fantastic set.