Pursuit of Cobra Steel Marauder

I remember when the Steel Marauder and the Cobra Deviant came out at regular retail. I thought that they looked pretty cool, but didn't really want to drop $19.99 for each of them. All I needed was a little patience!
After last Christmas, i went by one of the local Walmart stores and they still had a couple of the mechs - one of each. A quick test scan - $9.99 each! Sold!
A few days ago, actually on Father's Day, I stopped by the nearest Ross store and spotted both at the low price of $7.99 each. I didn't really want another Deviant - weapon arms are a bit lame, so I picked up another Steel Marauder.

The GI Joe mech is a decent toy. Hasbro used the mech from the small Sigma 6 line amd upgraded the cockpit to allow the bigger Joes to fit inside. With the claw arm and the multiple missle launcher, this thing is much more formidable than the Cobra mech

The driver, Kickstart, is pretty decent. Another Franken-Joe from Hasbro. I didn't realize that Kickstart actually makes use of Airborne's head. Great job by Hasbro with the reuse.

The mech looks formidable and ready for a fight. One interesting element of both mechs is that the arms are interchangeable. You can switch out the arms with the Cobra Deviant mech or, in the case of multiple mechs, arm them with specific weapon arms.

Here is a close-up shot of the cockpit of the Steel Marauder. Very detailed and a great use of the control arms. The Deviant mech is the same.

Both of my Joe mechs together. If you notice that the one on the right is missing a missile, I have it -somewhere. I remember seeing it in an odd place amongst all of my Joe storage - I'll find it eventually.
With both arms switched to the missile launchers, this mech can pack a serious punch!

The two claw arms together looks pretty cool as well. Much better than the Deviant mech!

Now this is a bit much. Just a little too excessive! The arms start to sag at the connection points and I'm sure that there would eventually be too much strain on the conncetors. Okay for one picture, but don't leave them like this!

I have always been a fan of mech suits, even back to the days of Playmate's Exo-Squad line. Playmates did an outstanding job with those mechs, smaller scale with even more articulation. Hasbro did a decent job with their two mechs. Perhaps Hasbro will revisit this vehicle with the new movie line?

G.I. Joe: Renegades

If you haven't seen G.I. Joe: Renegades and you are a fan of G.I. Joe, especially the 3 3/4" figures, I have a question for you. What's your problem?

I've been recording Renegades since it started and I've been behind six episodes. I'm working on catching up today.

this is a damn good show. Animation? Yeah, different style, not really detailed. So what? The stories are kicking ass!

Two more episodes and I'll be caught up. New episode tomorrow.

And Hasbro is putting the show on "hiatus" so that there is no confusion between Renegades and the next movie. Yeah, okay... Bad move, Hasbro.

I hope Hasbro at least allows Renegades to be released in a DVD collection. I'll buy it!

Pursuit of Cobra General Hawk

General Hawk gets an upgrade in the Pursuit of Cobra line. All of the previous new sculpt versions were basically remakes of the original o-ring versions. The first was a remake of Hawk from his original style. The next was my favorite, the newly promoted General Hawk in his brown bomber jacket. Very cool updates, but an upgrade was needed.

General Hawk gets an upgrade that gets him out from behind the desk and into the field, fighting Cobra on the front lines.

Hawk comes with a pretty decent set of accessories including a back pack, the rifle from the ROC General Hawk, a Shock Trooper's mini machine gun and radio, helmet, goggles, a pistol, and the briefcase that came with a Destro figure - w/o the MARS embossed letters. Plus he has two sets of web gear - Beach Head's resolute web gear and somebody's pistol/shoulder harness. Good stuff! Fully loaded, Hawk is ready for some serious combat.

The base figure for General Hawk has already been showing up in fan pictures as a troop builder. I agree, this figure can easily serve as General Hawk and just about any other troop that you may decide upon. Sometimes, the heads of the assorted Joe figures don't always swap very well. Just a minor issue with head swaps.

I used jungle assault Duke's head so that he can join Hawk on missions.

Of course, Steel Brigade troopers can also join in for added firepower.

Pursuit of Cobra Cobra Troopers - Upgrade

Just switched out a few bits of gear to give these guys an upgrade. Everybody gets goggles from the Shock Troopers. I like the goggles on these guys better than on the Shock Troopers.

I switched out the web gear on three of these guys, using two sets of black GI Joe web gear and one set of web gear from a MARS trooper.

These guys also needed back packs. I used the small back pack pack most commonly found on Resolute Cobra troops, two ROC Snake Eyes packs, and a ROC Viper back pack.

Pursuit of Cobra Cobra Trooper

When they original Cobra trooper came out way, way back in 1982, I was okay with the figure. But once the various specialist versions of Cobra soldiers - vipers, eels, snow serpents, Crimson Guard, range vipers, etc - the standard Cobra soldier was sort of left behind. Abandoned because the newer specialists looked much better.

Along comes the 25th Anniversary line with a new version of the stalwart Cobra soldier in 2008. Improved, but still a little off. The figure suffered from many of the flaws from the early 25th line. Wobbly legs, arm articulation a little off. Just didn't really work for me, so I never got into them too much and only bought a few. I wound up trading most of them to Wess.

Here comes 2011 and Hasbro gives us this guy. Damn! A much improved version of the Cobra soldier. Using design elements of the Pursuit of Cobra line, Hasbro has really created an excellent version of this trooper. Almost...

So here is the trooper out of package with all of his gear. An RPG, a sniper rifle, a knife, two silenced pistols, helmet, web gear and a roll of barbed wire. Really? Barbed wire? A dumb accessory when it came with Dusty, just as bad with this guy. Hasbro did a great job with the figure, but the gear should have been kicked up a few notches.

Two silenced pistols! Very cool, but the pistols are so thin that one is too loose in his holster. Be careful with those silencers, kids, you might and probably will lose them!

The figure is another Hasbro "Franken-joe" and that's just fine. It looks like Hasbro used the Shock Trooper arms and torso, Snake Eyes' legs, and a Resoulte Trooper head. The helmet seems new, very similar to the Resolute trooper helmet. The web gear comes from the original 25th soldier. A great combination of parts that just really works well together.

Here's the trooper holding his two weapons that are included. Not bad, but he needs more weapons!
From left to right - the AK-47 from the Jungle BAT, a standard Viper rifle and a Marauder NVR (?).
Trying out a couple different options for goggles on the helmet. Left - Para-Viper goggles, right - Desert Viper goggles. Both seem to work pretty well for the trooper, but the Shock Trooper goggles really work the best. (Pictures later!) The goggles for the Shock Trooper just don't seem to work for that figure, too loose on the helmet.

A quick comparison of the original 25 th version with his upgraded counterpart. No contest.

Another comparison between the original 25th, the POC upgrade and the Resolute trooper. I am definitely planning on troop building the new Cobra trooper. I just don't know the amount that I'll stop at. Of all of the assorted Cobra soldiers, the largest quantities are as follows - 9 Elite Vipers (ROC), 10 Resolute troopers and 20+ BATs. I think I may go up to around 9 or 10 of these guys, I'm at 3 right now. Twenty BATs is a bit out of control. But if sometime in the future, these guys show up at discount retailers, I know I will get out of control and load up. The Cobra soldier finally gets a respectable figure.

Today's Toy Run

This past Monday, I lucked up and found my first new GI Joe figures in a while. I picked up a Jungle BAT, a Steel Brigade trooper and a Cobra trooper. I stopped by the same Walmart again today...


Oh yeah! I picked up 2 more Cobra Troopers, 2 more Steel Brigade troops, 2 General Hawks and 1 of the new versions of Cobra Commander. Sweet!!

I've seen pictures of the General Hawk figure used as a troop builder. I'm all for that. Looks pretty cool. Reviews to follow soon.

And I left the Jungle BATs on the pegs! Plus I passed on the new version of Blowtorch. Maybe when Hasbro redoes him in shades of green, I'll pick him up.

Comedy Relief

This version of Duke is just so bad. But it also so much fun. So fun to abuse!

Pursuit of Cobra Steel Brigade

The vintage mail away offer of a personalized G.I. Joe gets a great update for the Pursuit of Cobra line. The Steel Brigade trooper was originally a combination of assorted Joe parts with a new head sculpt. No exception here. I don't think that there is anything new on this figure.
But Hasbro has done a great job in recreating the Steel Brigade trooper from an assortment of various sources.


I haven't done a side by side comparison, but I believe that the body of the Steel Brigade trooper matches the exact body of the Cobra Shock Trooper, including the web gear. The only changes, of course, are the colors. But it works. The Shock Trooper body is a great base for potentially any new character with only minor changes needed.


The Steel Brigade trooper is meant to be a "generic" soldier, sort of a G.I. Joe recruit. He is almost a full fledged G.I. Joe, but not quite. They can also act as support troops for the G.I. Joe team.


The figure comes equipped with a wide assortment of gear. Looks like a SMAW with a back pack of removable, lose-able shells. The widely used SCAR rifle, an M4A1 (?), and a heavy machine gun w/ tripod wrap up the firearms. He also comes with another back pack and the Steel Brigade helmet.




The figure also uses the Beach Head head sculpt used with both the Resolute and Pursuit of Cobra versions, plus the collar used with both Resolute Beach Head and Stalker.



I'm thrilled with Hasbro's execution with this character. Unfortunately, the guy is generic and therefore may become G.I. Joe cannon fodder. I do like the concept and definitely need a few more of these guys to create a little squad of these guys.

Pursuit of Cobra Jungle BAT

A Jungle BAT? Seriously?
Yeah, I guess so. Hell, he's got a machete, so why not?

But a Jungle BAT? Most of the latest releases from Hasbro for the Pursuit of Cobra line appear to be "Franken-Joes" - a combination of assorted parts used to make either a new character or an update of other characters. This new version of the BAT is no exception.

This version uses the entire mold from the 25th Anniversary Battle Android Trooper with just a new color palette and a new assortment of weapons. The original version kicked all sorts of ass and still remains as one of the best updates from the classic to the new style body construction.



The Jungle BAT comes with an assortment of goodies. Besides the standard BAT arm weapons, there are several different choices for arming your Jungle BAT. A machete, an AK-47, and a mini-gun w/ ammo belt and ammo backpack. Plus the BAT comes with the battle damaged head. That battle damaged head is really well done. plus the chest panel has taken a few hits as well. The BAT loaded up for some heavy-duty brush clearing in the jungle. A Jungle BAT?


I'm just not digging this color palette of this thing. The camo pattern, while cool, just doesn't work for me. And I'm not sure how well a complex electronic device is going to work in the hot, humid jungles.

Close-up of battle damage - nice job, Hasbro!
When the 25th Anniversary excess inventory arrived at discount retailers such as Marshall's, TJ Maxx, Ross and Family Dollar, I loaded up on BATs. I guess I got a little "BAT-sh!t" crazy. I bought nearly every BAT that I could find. I'm just not feeling it for these new versions. I think that I might buy one more of these Jungle BATs.


It's not like he's going to be lonely. He does have a few friends.

Now if Hasbro had redone the BAT in a more urban camo color palette? I might have again been hit by BAT fever and "needed" to load up on these rascals.