Yeah, I’ve been letting Marvel Legends start trickling back into the regular rotation around these parts. Obviously, I haven’t stopped collecting entirely, but I’m buying very few figures at full retail anymore, and skipping waves where I’m just not that interested. I’m also trying to win out over my OCD by embracing reviewing figures here and there as it strikes my fancy, and not necessarily caring whether it’s in any order or wave. With that having been said, Namorita from The Void Wave has been kicking around my desk for a long while, I thought I’d throw her some love.
I’ll concede that this Void Wave is a pretty strong assortment and I wouldn’t mind completing the BAF, but I’m not really interested in all of these figures. I already checked out Crystar from this wave, and I was able to track down Power Princess, which wasn’t easy. Justice and Vision look good, but I don’t really need another Black Panther or Namor. Either way, Namorita comes with The Void’s torso, which makes sense as she’s easily the smallest figure in this wave. Maybe someday I’ll make use of it, or maybe I won’t.
Obviously, Namorita has had a lot of changes to her appearance throughout the decades, mostly written off as biological changes from her cloning process… or emotional stress… or maybe both. I tend to lean toward the more classic look for this character, but I can see why Hasbro chose this one. It’s kind of an important version of her… something to do with a bus and a lot of dead kids and a little thing called Marvel’s Civil War. The body uses very little original sculpting and gets by with paint to convey her costume. You do get the sculpted wings on her ankles, some sculpting for her gloves, and I believe the female bare feet are new. Her skin uses a pale matte blue plastic, which looks very nice, especially alongside the high gloss red and white used for her one-piece swimsuit. The gloves are also painted red and she has some sharp white tattoo-like patterns printed on her arms and legs. She’s a colorful and pretty figure, no doubt, but it would have been nice to get some sculpted lines for her suit.
The head sculpt is solid, but pretty dour. She’s got a petite, perfectly sculpted nose and her hair is swept to the side to expose one pointed ear. The eye brows are actually part of the sculpt and not just painted on, and the lips and eyes are both printed very nicely, as are the white markings. You even get a bit of color in her cheeks. The white hair is sculpted separately from the head, making a sharp hairline and it dynamically sweeps to the side, which both favors articulation to the right, but hinders it to the left. I would have liked a more neutral expression or, even better, a second head with more relaxed hair, but I suppose the existing hair does have an appropriate floaty-ness about it like she’s underwater.
Namorita features a fully pinless body, which has been creeping into the line for a while now. But, since I don’t review as many Legends these days, it’s still kind of new to me, especially when we’re still seeing figures turn up with pins. I don’t think I’ll ever grow tired of appreciating seeing the ladies get double-hinged elbows and bicep swivels in these new figures. It’s always a treat, even if Namorita didn’t get swivels in the lower legs. She does come with an extra set of fist hands, but Hasbro couldn’t even bother to make them match the fingerless gloves on her regular hands.
Namorita looks really good for a figure that makes very little use of original sculpting, and I like her a lot. There’s nothing groundbreaking here, but she’s colorful and pretty fun to play around with. Plus, I can add her to my Night Thrasher, Speedball, and Firestar and assemble me some New Warriors, if I can track down which tote those other figures are in. If I get caught up on the other lines that I’m more actively collecting, I’ll try to work Power Princess into one of these weeks soon, and I’ll be keeping an eye on the rest of this wave to get discounted on Amazon.
A couple weeks back I checked out the Walmart Exclusive Night Force Night Pursuit Cycle, a repaint of the RAM Cycle, and Night Force Shockwave. I mentioned that I’m not really collecting the Night Force and Tiger Force variants, but in a moment of weakness I not only grabbed that one, but also preordered Target’s Tiger Force repaint of the Cobra Ferret ATV with Wreckage. I’m hoping that this will be a couple of isolated incidents, but only time will tell! In this case, I was mainly driven by the desire to give the JOEs their own ATV and to get a pretty cool homage to one of those Toys R Us Exclusive 5-packs from the early 00’s.
You get the same style box as we saw with the Cobra Ferret. It’s nearly fully enclosed, but does have a window to show off the figure, as well as the Tiger Force logo, and some fantastic renders of the toy in action. If you have the Cobra Ferret, you know exactly what to expect inside the box in terms of assembly requirements. It all goes together easy and the only thing to watch out for is lining those tread patterns up right. The extra parts and accessories come in tissue bags inside a cardboard footlocker, and it’s neat that we get to keep seeing these every now and then, despite the return to window boxes for the figures. Let’s start with Wreckage!
Dillon Moreno, aka. Wreckage is a demolitions and jungle warfare expert and was first introduced as part of a 2003 TRU Exclusive Tiger Force 5-pack. Back then he was a straight repaint of Firefly and here he looks to be a straight repaint of Classified’s Firefly 2.0. And holy shit is this guy cool looking! I’m not usually a big fan of the Tiger Force decos, but it sure looks awesome here, probably because the tiger stripes aren’t bright yellow and rather subdued. The fatigues are mostly black and the stripes are sort of a copper-brown. Like Firefly, this guy has a ton of gear strapped to him, including a chest harness, belt and two leg rigs, all of which are cast in a coppery-brown similar to the striping. The boots and gloves match the gear, and you get some orange paint applications for his turtleneck as well as some additional hits like the knife sheath on his right arm, pouches on his body rig, and explosive charges on his leg. His left shoulder has a crisp Tiger Force logo printed on it, and there’s some silver for the various zippers.
The head features a full mask with a cutout for the eyes. He’s got some dark shading around his peepers and some pretty creepy graphics to mimic a skull for the rest of his face. When I checked out Night Force Shockwave, I commented about how he looked like some kind of maniac, and that goes double for Wreckage here.
The VAMP/Night Pursuit Cycle helmet makes yet another appearance. It seems like Hasbro really wants to get their money’s worth out of it. Still, it fits in well with his set and the repaint looks cool. I love the sculpt, especially the mounted camera, and we get some nice touches of character here with the angry teeth art on the sides and the kill marks scored out above the visor.
The backpack is the same as Firefly 2.0’s and that includes the mines that peg into the sides and the detonator that plugs into the back. I thought I got short-changed the detonator, which is why it’s not pictured, but I did eventually find it in one of the bags. The backpack still has the tab on the bottom for Firefly’s RC car delivery system, but the car is not included here. I dig the design and sculpt of this backpack a lot, and it certainly makes sense to repurpose it here for Wreckage.
For weapons, you get a combat knife, an automatic pistol, and a sub-machine gun. The magazine can be removed from the SMG and there’s one suppressor to share between the SMG and pistol. There’s a peg on the backpack to stow the SMG, allowing Wreckage to carry all of his weapons and leave both hands free to drive the Tiger Paw… so let’s check out his ride!
As expected, the Tiger Paw is a straight re-deco of the Ferret with all the ostentatious flare of the Tiger Force design. The frame and seat are black, the back half of the body is yellow, gradually becomes orange in the middle, and ends up white at the front. There’s black tiger striping in the middle and a tiger face motif stenciled on the front. The wheels are now bright orange. Some of the lettering carries over, like the Caution on the exhaust pipes and Cobra is replaced with ATV on the wheels, and there’s a Tiger Force logo behind the seat.
The removable cannon has a red receiver and black barrel, the steering column and instrument panel are red with black handlebars, and the front turret is red. All of the red parts are brighter and flashier than what we saw on the Ferret. The side missiles appear to be identical to what we got with the Ferret and they’re still gummy and have a tendency to get knocked off. Still, all in all this is as great a toy as it was the first time. It’s fun to roll into battle and the independent suspension is impressive.
And Wreckage looks damn good driving it, especially with the helmet as it tends to match the ATV deco more than his fatigues does. Obviously there’s still room for two on the Tiger Paw, and conveniently I do own one other Tiger Force figure and that’s Recondo, so at least Wreckage won’t have to go on sorties alone.
If I had my choice, I would have preferred getting a more traditional military green recolor of the Ferret for the JOEs. I’m just not that big a fan of the Tiger Force decos and this ATV hasn’t changed my mind about it. I am, however, still glad I picked it up, particularly because Wreckage turned out so good. It’s awesome to get a Classified version of him and he brings back some nostalgic memories of hunting new GI JOE figures at Toys R Us every Friday after work. Who knows? Maybe if the Tiger Force RAM Cycle drops in price any more, I’ll pick that up to have a matched set.
If you hadn’t noticed, Hasbro Transformers reviews have been drying up here. This is only my second for this year, and there were only about half a dozen or so last year. I still love Transformers, I’m still waiting for Beachcomber and Swoop, but otherwise I’ve got most of what I wanted out of the official Hasbro stuff and I can’t think of much shown at SDCC that interested me. Still, every now and then something comes out that entices me, like this boxed set of updates to two of the four Deluxe Insecticons. These guys were originally rolled out in the 1985 catalog and I was both appalled and obsessed with them. On the one hand, they didn’t look anything like my beloved Insecticons, I think they were recycled Bandai toys, and they never appeared in the cartoon. On the other hand, they looked so unique that I couldn’t help but want them. Although, to be fair, I wanted every Transformers figure when I was a kid! Well, I don’t remember ever seeing them in any stores and so it was not meant to be.
The figures come in a fully enclosed box with a small Weapon Master type guy called Malleus Minotaurus… seriously, WTF Hasbro? I hate this box. The character art looks good, but it feels like the Transformers logo should be running down the opposite side. As it is, it makes the box look like it’s upside down when it’s not. Also, look at all the qualifiers… Transformers Legacy United Doom’N Destruction Collection. The Transformers branding has become a confusing mess to me and I honestly have no idea what line is what anymore. But enough of my old-man griping… Let’s start with Barrage and his bug mode first.
Like his G1 predecessor, Barrage’s alt mode is a rhino beetle. The figure is a repaint and remold of Legacy Bombshell, a figure that I have yet to find so I gave up and dropped a preorder. It’s a decent looking alt mode, but since most of the rework is done around the head, the Bombshell similarities stand out as pretty obvious. On the other hand, I do kind of like how this brings the character more into line with the original Insecticons, making them a little more cohesive when displayed together on the shelf. The head horn comes up from the bottom and I think it should be on top, but I’m no bugologist. And in fairness, I’m pretty sure the original toy did that too. I do like the coloring here. The green and yellow plastic looks great together, and there’s a bit of white and red thrown into for added pop. The sonic rifle can plug into either hole on his pack to give him some extra firepower in bug mode, and it’s a repaint of the weapon that came with Bombshell.
Transformation is very similar to what I’ve seen of Bombshell, but Barrage flips the chest to the back and uses the head horn to fill in the new chest, all while not jutting out as awkwardly far as the chest on the G1 Barrage. And all this sure goes a long way to make this robot mode look new and distinctive. The new bug legs can remain pegged into the arms, and I like to angle them back a bit to keep them out of the way. The coloring here remains pretty similar as the beetle, but now he’s showing more yellow. I dig the way the red bug eyes land just under his chest for an extra splash of color, and he has a Decepticon emblem square in the middle of his chest. The back fills out pretty well, but here’s where it’s really obvious that he’s a close cousin to Bombshell. Either way, this is an excellent homage to the original toy’s robot mode.
The head sculpt is pretty cool, borrowing the general beats of the G1 figure, but giving it a full makeover. The yellow face is angular with a dominant mouth plate, two big red eyes and a red panel on the forehead. That panel kind of looks like a third eye from a distance. He also has the green V-shaped antenna coming up from behind, but refined to be not as exaggerated as the original toy. I’d like to think that this is what the Sunbow design would have looked like if Barrage ever showed up in the cartoon.
As I noted earlier, the weapon is a recolor of Bombshell’s, but we’ll still go ahead and call it his sonic rifle. The side pieces can come off and you can customize it a little bit. It’s not really a good match for the G1 figure’s weapon, but I’m not upset over that. I do wish he had come with a sword, like the original did. Lets’ move on to Chop Shop!
Chop Shop’s bug mode is a stag beetle and while Barrage was a shake up of Legacy Bombshell, Chop Shop makes use of Shrapnel. And I gotta say, I think the homage works really well here. New additions include the extra pair of legs that plug into each side, newly sculpted pincers to match the original toy, and a new head, which can be seen in bug mode as two little antenna like appendages. Like Barrage, the reuse is really obvious here, but with the few changes and the brown and orange recolor, I think he looks great, even if he isn’t quite as striking as the original toy. Chop Shop comes with two guns, which is a recolor of one of the Shrapnel’s, and these can be plugged into his back for a super-bug assault mode!
While Barrage’s transformation changed a few things up over Bombshell, Chop Shop’s transformation is identical to Shrapnel and the resulting figure is a lot more similar too. There’s no clever swap of back for front on the torso, apart from the deco, the only changes here are the bug legs that are pegged into the arms, the pincers, and the head. Now, that’s not to say that this doesn’t look great, because I think it does, but the resulting robot looks a lot less like his G1 predecessor than Barrage does, and the Shrapnel chest is really obvious. The deco remains very close to the bug mode with a little more orange showing.
The new head is excellent, and a perfect update to the G1 toy. The rounded dome and angled red eyes give him a sinister visage. There’s some orange paint on his vocalizer box, as well as the twin antenna that sweep down to form open pipes on the sides of his cheeks.
In addition to the twin guns, which I already showed plugged into his bug mode, Chop Shop also comes with a recolor of Shrapnel’s gun. None of these are a great fit for the G1 toy’s weapon, but once again, I’m OK with that. He also doesn’t come with a sword. I would have been fine with Hasbro tossing in recolors of the same sword mold for either, especially compared to what I’m going to look at next.
It’s Malleus Minotaurus, and he feels like the design team was sitting around saying, “What else we got to throw in this box to get it to the right price point?” He’s a re-color of the Battle Master Smashdown, and that’s being generous because he’s just gray plastic with a little blue for his eyes and forehead emblem. As his name suggests, his robot mode is minotaur-themed with a bull-like head. He transforms into a hammer, hence the malleus part of his name. Hey, at least Hasbro is teaching kids The Latin! As a kid, I probably would have loved this concept, but as an adult collector, I don’t have much use for him and the idea of a robot transforming into something that robots hit other robots with is just a bit too goofy for me. He does come with two semi-translucent blue energy effect pieces to attach to the front and back of the hammer’s head.
Both Barrage and Chop Shop turned out great, although Barrage gets the nod for being the more reworked of the two. I love how they managed to flip the torso to give him a new chest, and it makes me wonder if that was planned from the start or just a really clever retrofit. And while Chop Shop doesn’t get any new engineering, I’m happy with how much they re-sculpted for this figure. In either case, I wouldn’t have guessed that the regular Insecticon molds could be tweaked to work this well as the Deluxes. Will we get a second set with Venom and Ransack? Well, I guess we did get a Kickback repaint as Ransack in one of those Buzzworthy sets, but I’d like to see Hasbro try again and give us Venom too. And wouldn’t you know it… My Bombshell arrived just in time to miss getting in the group picture, but I’ll probably get around to giving him a proper review in the near future and we’ll get them all together then!
I drew the line a little while ago and pledged that I wouldn’t be picking up any Night Force or Tiger Force stuff. Classified is extensive enough without buying a lot of repaints. Also, I’m generally not a fan of the Tiger Force deco, while the Night Force stuff is more appealing to me. Well, I kind of reneged on that pledge twice now, as I preordered both this Night Force set, and the Tiger Force version of the Ferret. Yup, my willpower ain’t that strong! This set includes a repaint of the RAM Cycle as well as a repaint of Jason Faria, aka. Shockwave with some mix and match accessories. It’s also a Walmart Exclusive, which I was able to get online, because that’s the only way I get any store exclusives these days.
The packaging is simple, yet impressive. The toys come in a big window box with everything laid out in the tray. The accessory count looks to be pretty high, and while I don’t recognize everything, I’m willing to bet that there is nothing in this box that isn’t recycled from a previous release. Everything is collector friendly, and this may be one of those sets that I choose to display in the box, rather than have two RAM Cycles on the shelf. But we’ll see. Let’s start with Shockwave, and I’ll spend more time with him than I will the bike, because he’s totally new to me.
Shockwave is one of a very small number of mainline release Classified figures that I skipped when he went up for preorder. I have nothing against the SWAT specialist, but the original Real American Hero figure was released in 1989 when I was long out of my kid phase of buying GI JOEs and about ten years away from entering my adult phase of buying GI JOEs. I also think the Classified figure was part of a rather large flurry of releases, and I wanted to make some responsible decisions and maybe pick him up later. That never happened, and so here we are. This version is a straight repaint of that first release with a lot of gray, black and some green in place of the blue. His cargo trousers are printed with digital urban camo and he has a rather robust tactical vest with a quilted chest, angled knife sheath, a brace of what I think are shotgun shells, and lots and lots of pouches. The regular release had two submachine gun holsters, whereas this one has a single holster on his right thigh for a pistol. He does, however, retain the second knife sheath on his lower left leg. The coloring is a lot more subdued here than the original blue, but I dig it. The only thing I’m not crazy about is how the vest prevents him from putting his arms down all the way. As a result he can look a little silly trying to adopt natural standing poses.
The head features the balaclava repainted to all black and the removable cap is redone in gray digital camo to match his trousers. I’m not a fan of the eye printing here, he looks like some kind of coked-out maniac and I think it’s more suited to a Cobra figure than a JOE.
You also get a recycled helmet, which I believe we last saw released with the VAMP. I didn’t have much use for this with Clutch, but I do really like it on Shocker when he’s on the Night Pursuit Cycle.
Shockwave borrows from some of Firefly 1.0’s kit, namely his backpack and drone. I don’t mind this too much, since I retired that figure after Firefly 2.0 came along. The backpack is a great sculpt, here cast in gray instead of black. There are all sorts of pouches holding sculpted tools, many of which are painted silver. The drone can nest on top of the backpack and inside the pack is a compartment that stores the drone’s remote control unit, which I thought was a really cool idea. The drone has some articulation in the legs, the VTOL fans are static, and there’s some red paint for his large camera eye. I think this is some worthwhile recycling, but there is a tab and a socket on the backpack, which doesn’t work with any of Shockwave’s gear, and that’s awkward. I may actually give those accessories to Shockwave, since Firefly 1.0 won’t be needing them at the bottom of that tote he lives in. Let’s move on to weapon role call!
For the cutlery, Shockwave comes with two knives, which fit in the previously mentioned sheaths. These have black handles and silver blades. The one that fits in his chest sheath is a fairly standard combat style knife while the boot knife has a gut-hook. Maybe, I don’t want to know why he carries that. The gut-hook knife is one of the few accessories here that came with the first release of Shockwave. These are fine, but the boot sheath doesn’t stay on his leg very well and slides down.
As for the smaller guns, Shockwave has an automatic pistol that he stows in the holster on his right leg and a submachine gun, which I believe is the same that came with regular Shockwave, who actually had a pair of these. Both weapons are cast in black plastic and have some excellent sculpted detail. The submachine gun has an extended magazine, which is not removable, however, the suppressor can be removed.
Next up on the pew-pew chain is the double barreled AR, which sounds batshit crazy, but I believe it’s based on an Israeli design. I love the detail in this sculpt and the green magazine is removable. There’s also a hinged foregrip, and it too is cast in green plastic. As someone who has to slum it with my boring old single-barrel AR, I’d love to give one of these a whirl just for the experience.
Onto the biggest gun, or at least the biggest that isn’t meant to mount on the cycle. This looks like the JOEs answer to the SIG 338 Light Machine Gun and it is a beautifully sculpted accessory. This rifle has a detachable box magazine, cast in green plastic and a grab bar on the top. The exposed rounds feeding from the mag into the receiver are individually painted in gold and banded with green. Hasbro really put together an interesting arsenal for this guy and I love it all. Unfortunately, he has nowhere to carry most of it, which is partly due to him recycling the old backpack. It’s a shame, because I really like my JOEs to be able to carry all their gear. OK, let’s move on to the Night Pursuit Cycle!
Wow! For what could have been a quick-and-dirty repaint, Hasbro poured some serious love into this new deco. The dark matte gray plastic replaces the green of the original, and there are lots of new tampos all over the place, including the Night Force logo, the eagle on the gas tank, and “Covert Special Task Force” printed on the chain gun’s casing. You get some tan paint added to the seat, handle bar wraps, and to the sculpted wrap on the exhaust pipes, which is pretty damn cool, because I don’t think I even noticed that detail on the original, where it was left black. Finally, there are some gorgeous copper highlights to the vents, shocks, and wheels, which may not be ideal for a stealthy night vehicle, but they look so nice, it’s easy for me to not nitpick the logic there. Of course, as with the first release, the chaingun can be removed from the housing and wielded by a figure, and there’s a drop down kickstand to stabilize the bike with the weapon sidecar detached.
I think Shockwave pairs really well with the bike, and with the helmet on, he looks totally bad-ass. The colors of his fatigues compliment the Night Pursuit Cycles deco very well. For me, nothing will ever replace how iconic the Classified RAM looks as an homage to the vintage toy, but I have to admit, that the deco here is quite striking and most certainly holds its own.
I’ll admit, I didn’t think I’d be nearly as excited with this set as I wound up being. Shockwave is a cool figure, even with his odd mix-and-match assortment of accessories. I also think that there’s enough changes here to make him work as a Night Force strike team army builder, if you already own the regular Shockwave. The helmet and fairly generic fatigues goes a long way to giving him that troop builder vibe. And because of that, I may still pick up the regular version. As for the bike, Hasbro went above and beyond kitting out the deco with new markings and making it feel like just another quick-and-easy cash grab on an existing mold. And while the nostalgia of the regular RAM Cycle will always win out for me, I could easily see collectors preferring this snazzy new bike. This set retailed for $55, which seems to be the going price for these smaller vehicle and figure combos, but at the time I’m writing this, the set is discounted to $42, and that seems like a real steal!
What’s this? A Star Wars figure review on FFZ? Will wonders never cease! I’ve been pretty vocal about how I’ve all but stopped collecting Star Wars figures. I have no interest in the current stream of content Disney is producing, and instead of giving us the figures we’re missing from the Original Trilogy, they seem all-in on the new stuff peppered by Prequel stuff here and there. It seems like a bad business move to me, but then again it may all be baked into the licensing agreement. I haven’t looked at any Hasbro Star Wars figures this year, and only two last year, and that’s literally all I’ve been buying. The Endor Rebel Commando looked really good, but Hasbro released him at a ludicrous $35 and I wasn’t willing to bite at that price. Luckily he went on sale as part of Amazon’s Prime Days and I finally picked up a couple.
This figure was part of Hasbro’s woefully disappointing 40th Anniversary offerings for Return of the Jedi, which featured just a few new figures and a whole bunch of repacks on vintage style cards. And much to my amazement, not a single one of Jabba’s Skiff Guards among them. I think the figures look great on the oversized vintage-style cards, but Amazon mangled both of mine pretty badly. Not a problem, since I always planned on opening them anyway. I’d say it’s about a 50-50 chance as to whether or not I get a carded figure from Amazon in good shape or not, and I always take that into account when buying from them. Anyway, the card has the familiar photo of the Rebel Commando crouched and ready for action beside the Imperial Bunker and the back of the card has the usual cross-sell promotion showing other figures in the assortment.
The Rebel’s commando strike team had some variations in their gear, with many wearing camo ponchos or jackets. Based on the outfit here, this figure seems to be referencing Nik Sant as he lacks the extra layer of camo. The figure sports a sculpted gray long sleeve shirt with a soft plastic vest worn over it and very short sleeves sculpted as part of the arms and matching up quite well. The legs are sculpted with cargo-style trousers featuring a camo finish and the high boots have sculpted laces. The belt is cast in soft plastic and worn by the figure. It includes a number of sculpted pouches and a tube, maybe for a scope? There’s also a bandoleer hanging off the right shoulder with some sculpted bits of gear on it, all of which is painted in a very nice silver metal finish. This figure looks amazing, especially for a troop builder, and I love how layered all the gear looks. The DNA here feels more akin to the GI JOE Classified line than Star Wars Black, and I mean that as the highest of compliments.
The backpack is worn by the figure with actual shoulder straps, and it’s something that’s pretty unusual for any of Hasbro’s 6-inch lines. The straps fit the figure well with the pack hanging low on the back. It’s cast in brown plastic and has lots of sculpted rumples and wrinkles, as well as stitching and fasteners for the flaps. There’s a crinkled hose running up the one side and some painted fixtures as well. It would have been cool to also get the hard pack that some of the Commandos wore, especially considering the price point on this figure. The figure’s articulation is overall pretty good with the downside being rotating hinges in the elbows and knees, instead of double hinges. Also, the ankle hinge doesn’t allow for the foot to bend up very far. I also wish they had painted that camo further up the knee joint.
Like the Hoth Trooper, the Commando comes with two interchangeable face plates, but the Endor faces are not compatible with the Hoth figure, as the design is slightly different. The faces pull out and plug in similar to what we tend to see on a Figma or Figuart. The sculpt of the helmet and chin strap does a beautiful job of concealing the feature and if I didn’t know, I probably couldn’t tell that the face was designed to come off at all. They are, however, extremely difficult to get off and I had to resort to getting a jeweler’s screwdriver into the gap and popping it out. But since I have one figure for each face, I doubt I’ll ever swap them again. Unlike the Hoth figure, there is no storage in the backpack for the extra face.
The sculpting on these heads is superb, and I think these portraits are among some of the best we’ve had tout of the Black Series. The facial features are crisp and well defined, the paint for Sant’s beard is sharp and even, and the printing on the younger portrait’s blue eyes is beautiful. There’s also some wonderful, and very subtle shading for the hair growth on his chin. The helmets look great and include silver brushing for weathering. This is better work than Hasbro has done on portraits for some of the main characters.
The trooper comes with two weapons: A DH-17 Blaster and what I believe was the A280C rifle. The DH-17 is an extremely detailed sculpt and cast all in black plastic. It fits perfectly in the right trigger hand, and while it can still be held easily in the left, there’s no trigger finger on that hand. Sadly, there’s no holster for the weapon, which may have been by design to remain screen accurate, but it’s still a shame, because I like my soldiers to be able to carry all their weapons and gear.
The A280C rifle is also a fantastic sculpt that’s just packed with detail, including a rather complex scope. The barrel is quite thin and probably susceptible to bending if not stored right. Nonetheless, both arrived in the tray as straight as an arrow. It’s a shame that Hasbro didn’t give this rifle a carry strap, as it would have at least allowed these guys to sling the rifles and carry their blasters. I mean, even the vintage Kenner figure’s rifle had a shoulder strap!
The Rebel Commando is an absolutely fantastic figure, but this is exactly the kind of figure we should be getting from Black Series at the regular $25 price point, and not as an inflated special releases. And the fact that he’s a troop builder makes the higher price tag all the more vexing. Between a lot of sub-par figures, the focus on the releases from the newer series, and my general malaise about Star Wars these days, I was compelled to send a message and take a pass. But, when Prime had him at $15, I was happy to get two for less than the price of one. At the time I’m writing this, he’s gone up to $20, but I think that’s still a pretty good price for the figure, and it’s even tempting me to pick up one more.
While I have picked up a newly released figure here and there, I mostly continue to play the cheapskate with Marvel Legends, and bottom feed the sales and clearance. Most of the times it pays off, and when it doesn’t, I’m not too worried about missing a figure or even an entire wave here and there. I have boxes and boxes of these figures and I’m happy to pull back on adding to them. Nonetheless, I definitely wanted this classic Hawkeye with Sky-Cycle when it was first released, but most of the figure and vehicle combos have lingered on the shelves, and this one was no different. It has since turned up at Ollie’s for really cheap, but that place is filthy and disgusting and I hate going there, so I was willing to pay $4 more online and have it shipped to me for free.
Hawkeye and his ride come in a fully enclosed box with a mostly white deco. Until now, the closest thing I have to a classic Hawkeye in this line is the one way back in 2015 in The Allfather Wave, and that was a modern look based loosely on his classic costume. We did get a retro-carded one back in 2018, which I feel was closer, but I never did pick that one up, so this one definitely fills a hole in my Avengers line up. There’s some nice shots of the figure and vehicle on the box and everything here is collector friendly.
Straightaway, I absolutely love the colors here. The purple and bright blue look smashing together, especially when you add the metallic finish to the shoulder piece. The sleeveless bodysuit is achieved mostly with colored plastic, but you do get cuts in the chest to allow the straps to lie almost flush in the channels, which is really cool. The buccaneer boots are cast in purple and are left smooth with just a bit of rumpling, as opposed to the textured finish of the previously mentioned releases. The bicep bands and wrist bracers appear to be recolored and lifted from the retro-carded figure, but the belt and chest harness are new, with the scale-mail shoulder piece reaching all the way up his neck. There’s a shoulder strap with painted buckle across his chest and his sash is made up of a printed cloth piece that hangs down below the belt, front and back. I feel as if this is the first time we’ve had softgoods on a Marvel Legends, so that’s certainly something. I don’t expect it to be the start of a trend, though, as it was likely just implemented here so he could ride the Sky-Cycle.
The head sculpt is good, and I’m pretty sure this is brand new. It has the pointy extensions to the eye mask, which the previous versions did not have. The raised “H” is still present on his forehead. The sculpted lines around the eye mask are well done, making it look like something actually worn by the figure. His ears are exposed and you get a strong jaw and a pretty pronounced chin and nose. The printing for the eyes and lip shading are on point.
Hawkeye is built on a pinless body with pretty standard articulation, and the slighter build definitely fits him well. There are lateral crunches in the shoulders and you get leg swivels in both the thighs and above the boots. Unfortunately, the jointing on my figure is a tad gummy, particularly in the elbows and knees. It’s not enough to ruin the figure for me, but it is disappointing. The figure includes both fists and accessory holding hands.
As for accessories, Hawkeye comes with his bow, quiver, and a single loose arrow. The quiver is the same one we got with the previous Hawkeyes I’ve mentioned, and I’m sure we’ve seen it at least one time before that. It’s a complex and modern design and I wish we got something more simple and traditional. The bow, on the other hand, is very simple, lending itself more to his classic look. It’s yellow with a black painted grip and a terrible, chonky plastic string. The arrow is mostly gray plastic with red painted fletching and a knob on the back to help the figure hold it. He can sort of pose as if he’s knocking the arrow, but with the string being plastic, he can’t draw it very well, so it doesn’t really work for an action pose. Let’s move over to the Sky-Cycle.
This vehicle requires just a slight bit of assembly, as you have to snap the bottom onto the body and the windshield onto the front. There’s also a semi-translucent stand that connects to the bottom with a ball joint and socket. This stand is the same design we’ve seen Hasbro using with Star Wars Speeder Bikes and whatnot. As far as Marvel Legends vehicles go, this is way simpler than any of the motorcycles or scooters we’ve seen, as there’s no moving parts. It does look really good and there’s some nice sculpted detail, even on the bottom where you can see the two VTOL engines. It’s mostly all cast in a gunmetal gray, but you do get some brown for the seat and black for the thruster cones on back. There is also some paint on the instrument panel between the handlebars.
I think this is a nice little set, until you factor in the original MSRP of $50, which is just nuts! Even if you grant that these figures are going for $25 these days, I can’t come up with $25 for the Sky-Cycle. It’s got no moving parts, virtually no paint, and it doesn’t come close to other vehicle-figure bundles that we’ve seen retail for less. It’s no wonder the price has been slashed everywhere, including Hasbro Pulse, where it’s down to half price. I picked it up for $25 with free shipping, and I’m pretty happy about that, because I’ve been watching it for a while now. I do wish Hawkeye got a new quiver and a bow with an actual string, but other than that I think he turned out really well.
Some new Dreadnoks arrived last week, one of whom, Torch, completes the original trio of terror. I’ve already checked out Buzzer last year, but I never got around to Ripper, so I decided to pair them up for today’s review. It seems somehow appropriate since back in the 25th Anniversary Collection, Buzzer got his own release and Ripper and Torch were sold in a two-pack. I make it no secret that I absolutely loved the Dreadnoks in both the original Real American Hero line and the Sunbow cartoon. These guys were like throwing a bomb into the middle of the balance of power, and with how often Zartan and the Dreadnoks betrayed Cobra when I played with my JOEs, it’s a wonder why they kept hiring them. And their sudden reversal at the end of the second cartoon Mini-Series remains one of my all time favorite moments from that series.
One nice thing about waiting so long to get to Ripper is that it lets me to a side-by-side comparison of the package changes. Buzzer and Ripper were released in the plastic-free, fully enclosed box, but Torch sees the return of the window box. I’m glad I don’t collect these figures for boxed display because this sort of thing would drive me crazy. It also means that only Ripper and Torch get those nifty cardboard footlockers for their gear. Still, all in all I like the window boxes a lot better, as it gives you a great look at the figure and most of what he comes with. Let’s start with Ripper, since he’s been waiting around for a long time!
Infamous for extorting candy in nursery school, Ripper has been a bad seed his whole life and now he’s arrived to make life miserable for the JOEs. The Classified figure takes the original RAH design and runs with it. His camo tank top is no longer a half-shirt and now completely covers his abs. The blue jeans are a darker denim with some nice texturing, there’s a wide belt, a chain hooked onto two of the belt loops, black knee pads and high black boots. The gold bicep band on the original figure’s right arm is now fully fleshed out with a spike strip, there’s a sculpted wrist band on his left arm, and the holster that was sculpted onto the original figure’s right thigh is now a fully functional separate piece, held in place by friction. The sculpted grenade and knife on the RAH figure is replaced with a separate shoulder harness that’s worn by the figure. It’s got a pair of pineapple style grenades sculpted onto the right shoulder strap, while the left one has a functional sheath for his combat knife. And, of course, the shoulders are reinforced with spikes! Everything about Ripper screams that society failed him, and I love everything about this update, and we haven’t even gotten to the head sculpt yet.
Oh yeah! Ripper’s giant meat head, features a full beard, mutton chops, and I don’t even know how to describe that haircut, but I do know that the barber responsible hates the world. He’s got a mohawk that tufts in the front and runs down the back to form a mullet tail, while the sides are close shaven. And boy did Hasbro do a nice job texturing that buzz cut. He’s got one dogtag serving as a right earring and a necklace of more dogtags strung around his neck. I also failed to previously mention the beautiful tatts that he’s got printed on his right shoulder and left arm.
The glasses are removable, and these work a heck of a lot better than Buzzer’s did, which had problems staying put. I’m not going to say these will never fall off when posing or playing, but they do stay on much, much better. Take them off and you can see him popping a glass eye with a smiley face in his right socket, and that has got to be one of the greatest and most bizarre little touches I’ve ever seen on a mainstream, mass market action figure. And for you parents out there, you can have fun explaining to little Timmy what the tear drop tattoo under the left eye means! Ripper’s whole expression is fantastic, as he growls, showing his teeth. You even get scars bisecting both of his eyebrows. Top notch work!
Moving on to weapons, we’ll start small. The thigh holster houses a rather unique pistol that looks like some kind of Road Warrior custom job. There’s no visible magazine, so it may be very low capacity. It does have a serrated knife-style bayonet on it, and overall looks pretty cool.
The combat knife stowed in his shoulder sheath is a nice piece of work. It has a sawback blade with a clipped point and a knuckle guard on the hilt. A lot of these Classified knives are just tiny black pieces of plastic with no personality, so I really enjoy when the cutlery gets a little extra love thrown its way. I also dig how the left hand is perfectly sculpted to hold it, but will still work as a trigger-finger hand for the guns.
Next up is his rifle with the crazy curved metal splitter blade. I fell in love with this rifle design ever since I first saw it in the animated commercial for Marvel’s GI JOE #30. The initial main strategy of the Dreadnoks seemed to be that they just snuck into your base while you were sleeping and wrecked your equipment like a bunch of assholes. Anyway, this weapon is so damn badass, and Ripper was using it to stab the hell out of a VAMP in the commercial. There is some fantastic sculpted detail on this weapon, including a scope, top rail, suppressor, and it has a removable magazine. There’s also a peg on his back, so you can secure it through the trigger guard.
And that brings us to Ripper’s signature weapon, the giant power jaws. Patterned after the Jaws of Life that first responders use to rescue people, Ripper just uses it to wreck stuff. It looks like the unholy mating of a pincer claw and a leaf blower and I do love it. I’m kind of disappointed that we didn’t get a backpack and power cable to go with it, but in fairness it does seem to be redesigned to be self contained. Maybe it’s for the better because the power cable on my 25th Anni. Ripper was pretty frustrating and to be honest, I’d rather have the option to stow his rifle on his back when he’s using this thing. OK, let’s turn up the heat and move on to Torch!
The OG Dreadnok trio is rounded out by Torch, and there’s no way I can write a better introduction to him than what was printed on his original filecard. “Torch is an illiterate, unrepentant thug whose penchant for sudden and unexpected violence is matched only by the utter depth of his stupidity.” That’s just gold. As with his comrades, the Classified Torch sticks pretty close to the original RAH design, but maybe with fewer embellishments here. The leather jacket is cast in soft plastic and worn by the figure with the same three straps connecting it below his chest. There’s some bright and snappy silver paint applied to the buckles and zippers, as well as the chain loops at the shoulders, and studs on the back. I do kind of miss the graphic added to the jacket for the 25th Anniversary figure, I thought that was a nice bit of embellishment and added some character, but i guess the studs are nice too. The light blue jeans are textured and disappear into his high black boots, which have reinforced knees. He has twin holsters attached to his thighs and held on by friction, along with a spiked band on his left arm. His hands have sculpted gloves, with chains wrapped around the wrists. These are left gray plastic, and it’s a shame they couldn’t have been painted silver. The silver belt sculpted around his waist looks very nice, and I dig the flame tats on his forearms. He also has some cheeky flame patches on the back pockets of his jeans!
The head sculpt is solid, but I feel like it shows a little lower effort compared to Buzzer and Ripper, kind of like they started to run out of steam by the time they got to him. It definitely hits all the beats of the RAH original, with the mustache, side beard, and ball chin. He’s also got his trademark glasses and red headband. The glasses are are part of the sculpt this time, and I don’t have a problem with that considering the success rate on glasses so far was only 50-50. But, the overall quality of the sculpt here seems softer and less detailed. There are also uneven lines around the beard’s paint, which is disappointing. I do like the studded choker and the animal skull pendant is very cool, especially the way the neck cord looks like horns protruding from the top. This is not in any way a bad portrait, just a step down from the other really great ones.
The dual holsters hold a matched pair of automatic pistols. These are cast in grey plastic and nicely detailed. You also get holes in the barrels for blast effect parts, though none are included. Considering the original figure only came with his torch and backpack, it’s cool that he got a pair of pistols here.
Of course, Torch comes his signature weapon, which was an acetylene torch. The tanks are worn on his back and are given a bit more personality here, with the central tank painted in yellow and decked out with some graphics and the and “Nocks Rule” There’s a hose coming off the side of the backpack, which plugs into the torch itself. The torch can be attached to the bottom of the tanks for storage, with the hose awkwardly looping out to the side. But, you can remove the hose if it gets in the way.
The torch is cast in gray plastic and has two handles, with the trigger being in the front. There’s also a really bitchin demon skull on the front with the tip of the torch protruding from its jaws and flame shooting up from the eye sockets. As cool as the flaming eyes are, it’s a pity they aren’t removable for when the torch is not in use, because with them there it looks like it’s always on. You get three different flame effect pieces, the first of which is just a bit of flame puffing out the nozzle.
Now, I’m certainly no expert, but I think I know the difference between an acetylene torch and a flamethrower, but I’m not sure the world of GI JOE does, because this thing is clearly a flame thrower. I don’t know, it has three tanks on the back, which is one more than you need for an acetylene torch, so maybe it’s rigged as both? Sure, let’s go with that. Still, who’s going to quibble when the flame effects look this damn good!
Boy it feels great to have the original three Dreadnoks finally together in the Classified line! If we’re going by the figure itself, I think Ripper is my favorite of the three, with Buzzer second and Torch falling in a close third. On the other hand, if we’re going by specialty weapon, Torch takes the prize because he just looks so damn cool shooting out those flame effects. Either way, you can’t go wrong with this trinity of terror, and they look fantastic with Zartan and Zarana. Gnawgahyde and his menagerie also arrived, so I hope to be getting to him soon. Next on the top of my list will be Zanzabar!
I’ll confess, I feel so guilty pushing new Classified releases to the head of the review line when I have so many older figures to look at here. But then again the new Cobra Ferrets rolled in this past weekend and how could I not? This Combat ATV was first introduced to the Cobra arsenal back in 1985, and was just another prime example of how many cool toys this line had that were still small and affordable. And by affordable I mean that if I was really good and tagged along with my Dad when he went to Sears on Saturday morning to get a tool, I might have a chance of talking him into getting me a FANG, a SNAKE Armor, a FERRET. or some other small vehicle. These were also featured several times in the Sunbow cartoon, which just made them all the more desirable, probably because of hidden subliminal messages.
And behold, the new Classified Ferret. No longer a little impulse item, this new Cobra ATV is scaled for the 6-inch line, is big enough to carry a couple of riders, and is bristling with weaponry. This release was a Hasbro Pulse Exclusive and sold out fairly quickly, and there is a Target Exclusive JOE version on the way. You get a colorful box with some great artwork and shots of the toy. And unlike the original RAH version, this one comes with a dedicated driver, The Cobra Ferret Scout, visible through a window panel on the front of the box. Oh, and hello! It’s a lady! The Ferret requires a bit of assembly, and make sure you take note of the direction of those tire treads, because once you put them on, they’re a bitch to take off again. I bought two and learned my lesson putting together the the first. Let’s start with the figure!
The Ferret Scout is a repaint of the Cobra Valkyries that came in a two-pack not that long ago. The previously black and blue fatigues are now light grey and dark grey, with some black, blue and trim added. It’s a rather unique deco that is very pleasing to the eye and maybe leans into an urban camo vibe for me. The belt, bicep strap, and holster rig are all borrowed directly from the Valkyrie, but an ankle sheath has been added to the left leg. There’s also an additional vest piece that’s worn by the figure providing a little armor to the vital bits, and stamped with a red Cobra emblem on the front.
The head is also borrowed from one of the noggins that came with the Valks, but it now includes a riding helmet. This piece is cast in soft plastic and encompasses the entire head with an opening for the eyes. The design is awesome, with a snakehead motif forming the top of the visor, complete with snake fangs, and a pair of painted fangs over the mouth guard. It fits the figure very well and it’s nice to have the option to remove it, rather than have a sculpted helmet head.
As for weapons, the Ferret Scout gets by with two automatic pistols and a combat knife. The combat knife is small and cast all in black plastic. It’s nothing special, but a nice addition, since the Valks didn’t come with one. No doubt useful for taking care of any JOE that jumps onto the Ferret, by stabbing them in the neck with it. Yeah, I went dark with that one! The pistols are the same pair that came with the Valks, with one worn in a cross-draw holster on the left hip and the other on the right thigh rig. These are also cast all in black and have sockets in the barrels for blast effect parts, although none are included with this set.
I really love this figure, which should come as no surprise, as I was a big fan of the Valks. The recolor and rework done here makes her stand out on her own and I think the overall design works wonderfully for a dedicated Ferret driver that we never got in the original RAH series. A rifle and some blast effect parts would have been cool, but I can always dig into my copious box of Classified accessories if I need to kit them out a bit more. Now, let’s move onto the Ferret itself!
As we’ve seen time and again, the Classified version takes the original RAH design and updates it for scale and maybe just a little bit of realism. The coloring remains blue and black with red trim and all the design beats are still here, from the side mounted rockets to the pivoting front guns, and the large side-mounted cannon. This new version feels a more chonky and durable, as it no longer has an exposed engine compartment where you could see through to the other side. You do, however, get some exposed sections of the engine, which are painted over in silver. There’s a ton of tampo’d lettering on this thing, many of which are lifted directly from the original toy, like the X02 under the steering column or the Caution Exhaust on the rear pipes. Even the tires are branded!
The front of the vehicle has a non-working winch, protected by a cage, the steering wheel has a detailed instrument panel and can turn, but it is not connected to the front wheels. You do, however, get working independent suspension in each wheel, which is very cool. The side rockets, originally called COM-BAT laser-seeking rockets, have the same weird double sided design, which I never really understood, and this new version looks even more confusing. Either way, these simply peg into the launch carrier and I’d nitpick about not getting a launch effect piece, but when the rocket has two nosecone and no exhaust, where would you even plug it in? I will say that the rockets are kind of rubbery, which is a bit disappointing.
The side cannon pegs into a clip, which in turn clips onto the cage, allowing you to mount it on either side of the vehicle. It also allows it to be easily removed for a figure to fire it when it’s off the vehicle. The system of attachment allows it to raise and lower as well as pivot. I’m thankful that you can remove the cannon by the peg attachment, because constantly removing and attaching that clip will probably cause stress to the plastic, so I don’t want to do that. .
Despite coming with just the one driver, the Ferret was always designed to carry two figures, and this one is no different. The gun hands do a good job grabbing the handlebars. I did find the leg placement a little awkward, but you can definitely make it work, and there’s no trouble getting a second figure on the back.
Of course, I always had my Crimson Twins riding the Ferret together when I was a kid! The Ferret was released at about the same time as the Tomax and Xamot set and it was colored to match their outfits, so I always assumed it was intended as their unofficial vehicle. I’m pretty sure I got the twins and the Ferret pretty close to each other and it was theirs from that moment on.
The Ferret sold for $55, placing it right in line with the Trouble Bubble and Televiper bundle, a set that I have yet to review here and I really need to remedy that! I’ve seen some complaints over the price, but with a bundled figure, I don’t think it’s that bad, although I did limit myself to just two, whereas I really wanted to pick up three. I guess I do have a little bit of willpower left. Either way, the Ferret sold out pretty quickly, and it seems to be going for around $80 to $100 on the second hand market. I haven’t seen anything from Hasbro about planning a restock, but Hasbro really needs to get on that, because I’d now that I’ve played around with it, I’d probably pick up a third. As I mentioned earlier, the mold has been recycled into the Target Exclusive GI JOE Tiger Paw. I generally skip the Tiger Force stuff, but I did break down and preorder that one, so maybe I spoke too soon about that willpower. And yeah, that one seems to have sold out too.
Where am I at with Marvel Legends these days? Well, still being extremely picky over new releases and buying others as they hit clearance. Case in point, with the new Zabu Wave, I only preordered one figure and as you can tell by the title, it was Cable. I may pick up Black Winter and Wolfsbane, but that’s all I’m really willing to pay full price for out of this assortment. We’ve had three versions of Cable released in the modern Legends line: One in the Sasquatch Wave, One in the Juggernaut Wave, and the MCU Version. One might think I’d be all Cabled out, but there was no way I was passing on him in the iconic blue and yellow jammies.
We’ve been back to the window boxes for at least a few waves now. Maybe more… I haven’t been watching too closely. The package let’s you get a great look of the figure and accessories, as well as part of Zabu’s leg, which kind of looks like fried chicken. There’s some nice character art on the side panels and the back shows you who you need to buy to complete the wave.
And here’s Cable all decked out in The Team’s colors and looking sharp as all hell! Hasbro gets away with using a mostly generic buck, with the obvious exception of the cybernetic left arm. The bulk of the body is cast in blue plastic, with the boots and feet cast in yellow and a little paint above the lower leg swivel to help the boots reach up to the sculpted knee pads. And they did a pretty decent job of matching the yellow paint to the plastic, which couldn’t have been all that easy as it was going over blue. The belt and shoulder straps are all one piece, cast in soft plastic and worn by the figure. This includes some sculpted pouches and the black on red X symbols on the belt buckle and up high near his shoulders. Finally there are a pair of wrist cuffs and thigh straps with more pouches, all cast in soft plastic and worn by the figure as well. The thigh straps stay put pretty well by friction, but you have to be careful of those wrist cuffs when swapping hands. All in all it’s a clean and simple comic look and the blue and yellow deco is positively smashing!
The head sculpt is new and I’d definitely rank it as at the top of my list of Hasbro’s best. The skin tone looks great, especially with the ever so subtle dusting of whiskers. His manly chiseled features include a slab of chin and a strong jawline, some wonderful creasing in his brow, and the distinct folds running from his nose and framing his dour, downturned mouth. The left eye has a techno-organic glow created by a burst of translucent yellow plastic, similar to the figure from the Sasquatch Wave. And boy did they do a great job with the grizzly crisscrossing scars over his right eye. Finally, his white coif is cast as a separate piece of plastic, which gives us that immaculate hair line that I love so much. I can’t say enough great things about this portrait, Hasbro positively nailed it!
This figure holds no surprises when it comes to articulation, as he has all the usual points. One thing that is a tad disappointing is the use of pins in just the right arm. The legs are pinless, as is the cybernetic arm, so at least we’re three out of four, but having one throwback limb is a shame. On the upside, I really love the work they put into the cybernetic arm sculpt with the ribbons of metallic muscle. The finish is really nice too. You get two sets of hands, which include a right fist, a left graspy hand and a pair of gun-toting hands.
And yes, you get guns! These are both interesting sculpts with a futuristic sci-fi flavor, kind of halfway between big pistol and short rifle. One has a double-barrel and the other has what looks like a chaingun barrel. They are each cast in that sort of cheap looking gray plastic Hasbro rolls out now and again, with some black paint hits. I like them both well enough, but I would have liked them more with some silver paint. I also would have liked to see a BFG-style rifle here, but I can always loan him one from a previous Cable.
Cable here is proof positive that Hasbro can still tempt me with full price Marvel Legends, and also impress me when I do decide to buy them. Granted, I was the target audience for this figure, because I’ve been wanting a classic blue-and-yellow suit Cable for a while. Yes, the pins in the one arm are nagging me a bit, and the guns could have been a bit more spectacular, but there’s still a lot to love here. The head sculpt is an absolute homerun and the blue and yellow plastic pops beautifully. Plus, he’s just loads of fun to play with. So much so, that this figure will be probably stay on my desk within arm’s reach for at least a week or so before he finally Body Slides over to the display shelves.
So many great Classified figures have been pouring in and I’m so woefully far behind. I could probably review a different Classified figure every day for the next two weeks and still not be close to current. And with so many awesome figures waiting their turn, I decided to just randomly grab one off the stack of recent arrivals. And the winner is Quick Kick!
And we are officially back to window boxes! Now, I didn’t totally hate the enclosed boxes and the cardboard foot lockers were kind of neat. But, I will not miss having to go through those tissue baggies with a magnifying glass to make sure I’m not throwing out an accessory. Here we get everything laid out in the tray, a great look at the actual figure, and even some fantastic character art too! I’m pretty torn on Quick Kick as a character. Some of that comes from me preferring the shooty side to GI JOE as opposed to the Ninjas and Kung Fu stuff. But with Quick Kick, I was just not a big fan of how the Sunbow cartoon treated his character as a wisecracking actor obsessed with old movies and doing bad impressions. It’s especially unfortunate when you consider how interesting the figure’s File Card was regarding his mixed heritage being the inspiration for his martial arts training. It’s also worth noting that 1985 was an absolute banger year for JOE figures and Quick Kick kind of got pushed down on my want list, buried by a lot of other figures. But I got him eventually and I definitely had fun with him, giving him a very different personality than the cartoon version. So, let’s see how the Classified version turned out…
As has been the trend lately, Quick Kick sticks pretty close to the original RAH figure, which itself wasn’t too far off from what we saw on the cartoon. Quick Kick’s uniform consists entirely of a pair of black martial arts pants with some gray printing on the sides, a gray belt with some sculpted pouches, two gray wrist cuffs, and a shuriken-studded red baldric. He’s showing more skin than any JOE so far with some wonderfully sculpted muscles in the upper body and newly sculpted bare feet. The printed pattern on the gray side panels of his pants is crisp and you get a little silver paint for the belt buckle. The baldric is the biggest departure here, as both the RAH figure and the cartoon design had it running straight down from his left shoulder and into his pants. Here it runs across his chest and back and under his right arm. I think this design makes more sense, especially since it’s actually worn by the figure and not just part of the body sculpt. There’s some stitching sculpted into the sides, and I really love how the shuriken are sculpted to look like they are tucked into pockets, rather than just stuck on magically.
You get two head sculpts to choose from, the first being a neutral expression, and I really like what they did with it. There’s a lot of personality in this portrait. It leans into the cartoon likeness a bit, but still manages to be its own thing. The hair is sculpted separately from the head with his head band included as part of it. There’s a little slop between the hair strands and the white band, but you have to get in pretty close to see it.
The second head is good too, but I would have much rather had something close to the artwork on the box over this one. He’s got one eye brow arched a bit more than the other and his lips are kind of pursed like he’s about to whistle. “You know how to whistle, don’t you Quick Kick? You just put your lips together and blow.” Yeah, I’m not sure they were going for the Humphrey Bogart reference. It kind of looks like he’s out shopping for a car and the dealer just told him the price and it’s a lot more than he was hoping for. Or maybe he just hit his pinkie toe on the coffee table and he’s waiting to feel it.
The articulation in this line has been consistently great and that’s certainly the case with Quick Kick. He features the usual double hinges in the elbows and knees, swivels in the biceps and thighs, hinged pegs for the wrists, along with hinges and lateral rockers in the ankles. You get a swivel in the waist and the ab crunch hinge isn’t terribly jarring to look at despite his bare upper body. The neck is ball jointed both top and bottom and you get the lateral crunches in the shoulders, along with the regular rotating hinges, and the hips are ball jointed. He is super fun to play with and even has a very nice balance. Quick Kick comes with three sets of hands: Fists, karate chop hands, and accessory holding hands.
The RAH figure came with a black backpack that you could stick his sword through, but here it’s been recolored to red to match the baldric, and it comes with two slots for swords, because Classified Quick Kick has double the sword count! The swords are twins and have some great sculpted detail on the pommels and grips. The blades are painted silver and have slightly curved blades and narrow fullers.
He also has four loops on the back of his belt to hold two sets of nunchucks. It works well and reminds me of a Michelangelo figure from Playmates TMNT line. The chucks themselves have pommels and grips that match the swords, and I thought that was a cool little touch. The chains are plastic, and while that’s not usually ideal, the plastic is very pliable and doesn’t look like it’ll suffer from stress marks are breakage. They pose well and I’m happy with the way these turned out.
Two final accessories include a thrown shuriken effect piece and a Fudgie Bar. The first is cast in translucent blue plastic with the shuriken itself painted silver. I like what they were going for here, but I don’t think the effect works all that well. At least, to me it doesn’t really look like he’s throwing it, but your mileage may vary. The partially unwrapped Fudgie Bar is really well done and they even sculpted the little breakaway cubes that make up the candy bar. It’s interesting that Hasbro is now throwing cartoon specific accessories in with Classified, as that’s been Super7’s wheelhouse, but it’s fun that they did.
Yes, Quick Kick was pretty far down my list of anticipated figures, but I think it’s a credit to how great the line is that I was always going to buy him anyway. And I am sure glad he did, because he turned out great. The minor changes made to his design work really well and the fact that he has places to store both sets of weapons is a big plus in my book. And he’s already got his buddy Bazooka here, plus Hasbro just dropped a preorder for Alpine, so he’s going to be in great company on my shelf!
FigureFan Zero 