Cobra Commander with a cape? Fabulous, absolutely fabulous. Only the truly motivated world conquering megalomaniacs among us would dress up to this level of snickerdoodlery. The man was flashy enough with his double breasted fascist business suit with matching hood, but to add a cape, not to mention one festooned with gold cobra finery, just shows a new level of
Read moreIf my nine year old self could have seen this toy, I think my head would have exploded. There were quite a few characters, locations, vehicles in the Sunbow toon that I had wished to see on toy shelves, but this one would probably have topped my list. The MASS Device mini-series still stands out in my mind as my
Read moreChuckles gets flak for his shirt. I’ve never understood why. He’s supposed to be an undercover agent, right? What better way to maintain cover than to look a little ridiculous. I think it makes sense that a guy dressed in a bad shirt would be the last person in a crowd you’d think of as a highly trained and dangerous
Read moreAll three of the original Dreadnoks were very cool characters, and some of the most out-there action figures of the 1980s. After all, what’s not to love about a group of rough and tumble bikers who looked like they stumbled off the set of a Mad Max film. Larry Hama’s characterizations of the group in the Marvel comic always made
Read moreI loved the Sunbow homage figures. The animated universe, especially the first mini-series, had so many interesting filler and background characters populating the show. It’s only natural, since the animated mini-series was limited to the first two years of the action figure line. The Cobra troops in particular needed a bit of fleshing out. The Cobra Diver’s first claim to
Read moreI like the concept of the early days of Cobra and their use of specialized troops that look like the regular infantry with only a few different accessories. The Marvel comic had a few sprinkled throughout the early issues. Simplicity is the name of the game with this figure, and that also plays out in the file card, as these
Read moreSince a new, and apparently improved, modern version of Cobra’s leader is coming out soon, I thought I’d spend a little time looking at one of the many previous versions. The 25th Cobra Commander isn’t one of my favorite versions of old bumper face. It has issues with proportion and the overall sculpt just leaves me a little cold. The
Read moreMashups are all the rage in the geek world these days. There are no shortage of t-shirts and other fan art that combine two pop culture properties, whether they be references to movies, comic books or even video games. Hasbro was a bit ahead of the curve in 2008 when they managed to mash GI Joe and MASK together. The
Read moreI’ve been more than a little hard on some of the 25th anniversary figures. Some of my distaste stems from disappointment with the figures having them in hand vs in the package. In 2007-2008, I was so excited to get new GI Joes based on classic designs, but then ended up mostly bagging them and relegating them to storage. A
Read moreAs much as Duke gets grief from collectors now and again, I’ve not really had a problem with the character. Maybe that comes from being a fan of the Sunbow cartoon, and the great voice acting of Michael Bell. Now that I’m thinking about it, Duke really didn’t do much in those first few mini-series until later in each one.
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