Once I had this thing snapped together and had all the wings in place, it’s easy to see that the design doesn’t really hold a candle to the vintage Night Raven. I was, however, surprised by how decent the camo deco looked. I kind of expected it to be horrible and obnoxious, and while it certainly isn’t as good as the original black, I still found it to be perfectly tolerable. The design of the aircraft is very angular, and a bit bizarre, but it’s definitely a nice sized toy with a number of play features, some good and some bad.

Probably my favorite thing about the toy is the way the cockpit drops down for access. It’s pretty innovative and it makes for a nice break from just popping open the canopy to get the pilot in and out. It works with a lever located behind the canopy that raises and lowers it remotely. The jet also has three sets of rather chunkly landing gear that are essential to allowing the cockpit to drop down. There are also missile clusters located on the wings that hold six missiles each. From here on in, though, the play features get a little dodgy.

There’s a handle that drops down that you can hold to fly the jet around. I like this idea well enough, as it’s similar to the one Kenner used on the old Star Wars Imperial Shuttle. By pulling the trigger on the handle, you fire the missiles that are queued up in each launcher while the lights around the missiles activate with the sounds of weapon fire. To fire the next missile you have to pump the jet like a shotgun. Yeah, it really is as goofy and weird as it sounds, but then again if I was a little kid, I would probably think it was awesome as I pelted my brother with an endless stream of projectiles.

The electronics require three AA batteries and include the aforementinoed lights in the wings and three different sound sequences. Each sequence is activated by either pressing one of the three buttons between the rear dorsal wings or by pulling the trigger on the handle. One clip is garbled pilot communications, another is a series of sensor beeps, and the last is an extended flyby sequence. All of the sound clips are nice and loud.

I don’t have a lot to say about the Star-Viper, apart from his goofy name. He’s an ok pack-in pilot figure, but nothing much beyond that. His helmet is pretty huge and he’s got some really ungainly breathing apparatus.

In the end, I’m pretty surprised at how much I like this toy. Sure the shotgun gimmick is stupid and it probably adversely effected the sculpt and design, but all in all, it’s a nice sized, well constructed, and cool looking jet and the electronics are none too shabby. At $15 the price is definitely right too. I’d still recommend picking up the Night Raven over this one, assuming you could have it for around $20 or less, but you could do a lot worse than grabbing the Sand Serpent here, should you stumble upon it at your local Toy Graveyard.

The roof in HQ mode is pretty much the roof in vehicle mode, only with the extra surface added to each side by the fold out wings. I like how this increases the play area, but the wings aren’t very stable, so any figures you put here are most definitly going to have to be pegged in. You still have your missile launcher and cannon, but all the spotlights are now hanging underneith the side flaps. There’s also an opening roof hatch that lines up with the platform elevator. The only other added play features here are a ramp that folds out of the back and a chute conealed under the handle. You need to deploy your HQ near a table or something at about equal height in order to make use of the bridge. As for the chute, just drop a figure in there and he falls down into the prison, which we’ll see in a minute. The roof is a great place to stage battles or maybe get a JOE vs Cobra soccer match going on, but aside from that there’s not much else going on up here and it ends up looking like the lobby in some kind of GI JOE MMO.

The central pillar holds the platform elevator that can go up or down and also has the chute that leads to the prison. The prison has an escape feature, but not much else to it. And that takes us down to the lower deck. The left wing features the breakaway wall gimmick, which sucks because the panels don’t hold in all that well, which means most of the time the side of The PITT’s vehicle mode looks like it’s all bashed in. I finally got mine to lock in pretty well and I’m never taking them off again. The right wing features slots to stick in the cardboard decor pieces, more on those later, and a fold down area that features some lockers and bunks. Behind the central pillar, there’s another little area that has another bunk.

At the front of the base is the little command cubicle, which features a large computer panel and all of the playset’s electronics. Press the buttons to hear all sorts of sounds and phrases, including alarms, and Joes being paged to various areas. It would have been nice if Hasbro provided a chair here, although there are two chairs off to the side. As a command center, it’s kind of disappointing, The ROCC’s was much better. Here there’s also a large opening storage area with compartments for some of the weapons that came with the set. You can also store some of the cardboard pieces in here when you close it all up.

I’ve heard a lot of people complain about the inclusion of cardboard parts with this set. Sure, it’s hard to deny that spending $100 for a playset made partially of cardboard is disappointing, but none of the cardboard pieces are integral to the playset. In fact, they’re all completely optional bonuses. The ping pong table is my only gripe. It’s not in any of the pictures, because it’s such a piece of garbage, I didn’t even bother keeping it assembled and FigureFeline made off with it as soon as he had the chance. The cargo containers on the other hand are pretty cool. Bottom line, if you don’t like them, just toss them.

In terms of size and play features, I think The PITT is definitely worth a look. It’s amazing how many figures you can get onto this thing. I think the box said there are 84 pegs. The set up I used for these pictures isn’t even close to filling it up. I stopped setting up figures just because my cat was beginning to take an interest and it was only a matter of time before he started stealing them or knocking them all over the damn place. On the downside, there aren’t really a lot of specific areas to stage the figures in. A lot of them are just loitering around on the roof or standing on the walls.

In terms of quality of construction, I think The PITT falls short of its original hundred dollar price point. I paid $40 for it, and I’m not dissatisfied, but then again, I got it for display and not for play. I don’t think this thing would last too long getting beaten up by kids playing with it, which seems to be the biggest complaint about it if you read any of the customer reviews on toy retailer’s websites. I suppose the electronics features could have been better implemented. The AT-AT retailed at around the same price and it included not only lights but features that were spread out all over the toy, whereas The PITT really just has a simple soundbox. I’d say if you can snag it for cheap, it’s worth adding to your collection, just make sure you have somewhere to put it, because I still have no idea where the hell I’m going to keep mine.

Hasbro has been fiendishly clever these last couple years by slipping at least one big toy onto the shelves each year. These toys masquerade as vehicles, but are in reality playsets. The Millenium Falcon or the AT-AT were great examples, and so is the GI JOE PITT, a massive wheeled vehicle that folds out and transforms into a multi-level base of operations.

Yeah, that’s a big box, and no matter how much I loathed that Rise of Cobra movie, it’s hard not to get excited when holding this thing. The front has a great illustration of The PITT in action, while the back panel shows off photos of the toy itself loaded up with figures. There’s even a File Card printed on the side for the General Hawk figure that’s included in the box. Open it up and you can slide out the cardboard tray holding the toy and a bunch of baggies.


What’s inside pretty much takes up the whole interior of the box, as the bulk of the toy comes already assembled. Open up the toy and there’s more baggies inside. Then, muster your patience, because this thing requires a fair amount of assembly for the finer details and some of it can be a bumpy ride. This is also where you will first encounter this toy’s biggest failing: The plastic isn’t exactly durable. This is not the same plastic Hasbro uses for it’s smaller vehicles. I don’t know if they thinned it out to save money or to keep this thing from weighing a hundred pounds, probably both, but it is nowhere near as solid as the Millenium Falcon or the AT-AT Walker. Case in point: A few of the railings for the top deck had stress marks right out of the package. Luckily, most of the assembly is just plugging in the little stuff like the railings and the spotlights, but the fragility of the plastic made getting this thing together a bit more stressful than I would have liked. We’ll talk a lot more about The PITT’s durability in Part 2.

Do you like putting on stickers? I hope so, because there’s like seven sheets of them. I love putting on stickers, and even I couldn’t finish this beast in one sitting, and yet somehow a little patience and a lot of Rum and Eggnog got me through it. Ok, so not all of it. As much as I tried, I couldn’t get this thing one hundred percent before I had to just call it quits and start shooting the photos. But it’s mostly done. Besides, if you can tell me that you have a better way to spend Christmas morning then stickering a huge playset, I’ll curse you for being a filthy liar. The PITT also contains some cardboard parts, some of which require assembly, but we’ll get to those in Part 2, when we start looking at what’s under the hood.

Once you’re all done, you have yourself one massive military winnebego. If you remember the old Mobile Command Center, you’ll have some idea of what to expect here, as the concept is the same. Although, The PITT is an entirely new toy and far more complex than the MCC. While some parts of the playset are designed to mimic scenes in the movie, This Pitt is really not something that was in the movie, at least certainly not in its vehicle form. The top surface of the vehicle is loaded with pegs to stand figures and it has more than a few play features, including rotating spotlights, a double missile launcher, and a gunnery chair. Down in the front, there’s an opening cockpit where you can seat two figures to drive this behemoth. If you have it all locked together right, the PITT rolls along on its wheels really well and holds it’s vehicle form fairly well too, so long as you carry it carefully and support it on all sides. If you don’t, it’s likely to fall open, spill shit all over the place, and very probably break it. See that handle looking thingy on the top? That is NOT for carrying it, but rather for helping you to convert it to base mode. The only other issue here is the two removable side panels that don’t really lock in well at all due to a gimmick for the playset. But more on that in Part 2.

As you can see in the pictures, The PITT comes with a General Hawk figure. The figure looks great, but the quality is nowhere near in the same league as the regular carded figures. His arm articulation seems funky and his legs are all bendy and cheap plastic. His vest is removable, though, so you can always pilfer it for one of your other Joes.

I’ll give kudos to Hasbro for the design on this thing, as it’s definitely an improvement over the MCC’s vehicle mode, which basically looked like a giant box on wheels. Granted, The PITT is no less ridiculous in its size, and it looks more like a giant boat than a land vehicle, but at least it looks like a bit more thought went into its aesthetics than the MCC. I think my only complaint would be that it could use more armaments. It has the topside cannon and missile launcher and two rotating guns on the sides, but that’s it. In terms of relative size, just about any GI JOE vehicle is better armed than this monster.

Ok, I’m off to eat some Christmas ham now, and watch the Doctor Who Christmas special, but when I come back tomorrow, fully hung over and with a delightful case of gluttony-inspired indigestion, we’ll see how the rest of this playset plays out… see what I did there? Playset… Plays out? Ok, until then, have a Merry Christmas.

Let’s start with The Baroness. This Paris Pursuit version is good, but it doesn’t replace the first ROC version as my favorite. This one depicts her in her trenchcoat, which is sculpted into the figure above the belt, and sculpted with soft plastic from the belt down, bellowing outward. It looks very nice, but it also severely inhibits the articulation from the waist down and limits the figure’s poseability. You can easily modify the figure by cutting the back of the lower coat and making it removable. This makes the figure look like she’s just wearing a vest and frees up her legs for complete poseability, so you can have the best of both worlds. I liked the first Baroness’ head sculpt a little better too and the fact that you could peg her weapons onto her hips was awesome. So, all in all, this Baroness is very nice, but not a figure I absolutely needed to own.

The Baroness comes with a load of weapons. There’s the giant missile launcher, which is good for tossing in the garbage. And then there’s a cadre of small arms. Whatcha need all them guns for, Baroness? You only got the two arms! She also comes with a personalized figure stand.

Next up is the Nano-Viper. While I think the movie Vipers are pretty poor “updates” to the originals, taken on their own I don’t think they’re too bad. At first glance, I thought that this Nano Viper was just the regular Neo-Viper with his chest plate and helmet painted neon green and some added shoulder and shin armor, but there are a lot more subtle variations in the sculpt. The oddest thing about the Nano-Viper is the inclusion of the neon tentacles, which I believe is a recolored piece from one of the 25th Anniversary DVD packs. I have no idea what Hasbro was going for when they included this as an accessory. He comes all tangled in it on the card. It can actually peg into the figure stand too, but like I said, I just find it bewildering.

In addition to the tentacles, The Nano Viper comes with a dagger, a handgun that fits in his holster, an assault rifle, and a figure stand. Cool beans.

Last, but certainly not least, is the Night Adder. This a really cool figure and as a Cobra Security Officer, it actually fills a gap in the Cobra ranks that I don’t recall ever being released before. He’s a masked dude in a combat vest, who I can imagine patrols the Cobra compounds looking for Joes to feed to his dog. I can’t place the head on this guy, but I’m sure we’ve seen it before, since it obviously has two vestigial peg holes that were used to attach a visor. The vest is really well done, complete with ammo and pouches, but alas, nowhere to carry his combat knife or extra pistol.

Night Adder comes with a combat shotgun, a pistol, a combat knife, his watchdog on a leash, and a figure stand.

So, I’m glad to get a second crack at some of these figures. Sure, I loathed the movie right down to its celluloid core, but I’ll give credit to the figures. With the exception of those ridiculous impact armor figures, this line gave up some solid efforts. In fact, I think I’ll go back later in the week and pick up some more.

The packaging for this line is pretty cool. Its a simple box with some angular corners to make it stand out. There’s a window on the front to show off the included Firefly figure, along with an illustration of the toy in action. The back panel shows off an actual photo with some of the play features detailed. The box is actually significantly smaller than the actual toy, as the tail boom has to be locked on into place. Pretty much everything else comes already assembled. You just need to load up the bombs and pop in the missiles. There are also stickers to apply, which I love, and if you’d rather leave the Gunship more movie accurate, you could leave the Cobra emblems off.

I think the most obvious thing about this toy’s design is the fact that it was originally intended to be helicopter, because it is for all intense and purposes a helicopter without rotor blades. Is this what the vehicle looked like in the film? I can’t really remember, and I’m not curious enough to subject myself to watching it again just to see. What I’m getting at is either this toy started life as a helicopter, or the original design was intended to look like the Gunship was converted from a helicopter. Either way it explains why there’s an conspicuous bump on the top where a rotor blade assembly was originally intended to be placed.

With that curious design element aside, the toy is pretty cool, although it doesn’t do a whole hell of a lot. Weapons include a rotating chin gun, firing side mounted missiles, and there’s a hatch in the top where you can load up three small bombs and drop them out the back, just like Hasbro’s Tie Bomber from the Star Wars line. There are three short landing struts that fold down, two removable engine access panels and the main body opens up with a drop down hatch. For some reason, I love the fact that the cockpit opens up to the side and not straight up and down. Don’t ask me why. The cockpit holds one figure and the rear compartment has seats for two. There are also several handle grips on the bottom so figures can hang on while its in flight… another detail which supports the used to be a helicopter theory.

I think this toy’s greatest disappointment is its size. It really needed to be a little bigger to make the passenger compartment work. As it is, you can barely get one figure in there comfortably, let alone the two it seems to be designed to hold. If both sides had opening hatches, that might have helped too. It would have also been nice if the craft sat higher on the landing gear, as they hardly do anything to elevate it up when its grounded.

The Firefly figure is ok, but at the same time he’s nothing special. I also think he was a strange choice to be bundled with this vehicle. Firefly was a demolitions expert, so when did he change career paths to become a pilot? Nonetheless, he comes with a removable flight helmet and a flight vest with hoses that can plug into his helmet as well as two holes in the cockpit control panels. If you take off all his flight gear, he makes for a serviceable Firefly figure, but his chest area is pretty bland. He also doesn’t come with a stand or any weapons, despite having a molded pistol holster on his leg. He’s also a bit of a tight fit in the cockpit with his helmet and gear on. He’s not going to satisfy anyone looking for a definitive Firefly figure from this line. I think this vehicle would have been better served with a generic Cobra pilot figure instead. Personally, I like using the 25th Anni. AVAC figure.

I usually save the discussion of price and value for last, but in this case I lead in with it, so let me just reiterate that this is in no way what I would consider to be a $25 toy. Compare it to Hasbro’s Star Wars vehicles at the same price, and in those cases, Hasbro is carrying the cost of an expensive licensing fee, whereas they own the GI JOE brand themselves. Needless to say, despite being a nifty little vehicle, at full retail I would rate this toy pretty low. I got mine today at half off, and I’m pretty happy with it at that price. I probably would have picked it up a long time ago had it been $20. Its not like the extra five bucks was going to break me, but at some point I just feel I need to take a stand on the rising cost of toys.