From what I’ve been reading and hearing it’s been quite difficult for some of the US collectors to find the Classified Series Cobra Eel. I was able to order one from Amazon(.com) when they popped up and it finally arrived here.
Cobra Eel
Whilst it was just recently announced that the EU Hasbro Pulse store will be shipping to Belgium (just in time to back the Dragonfly), this figure was not yet available and so I had to check the .com site of Amazon when they were announced. I was lucky enough to be able to order one and for around $45, it was delivered in a very clean box. It would seem that Amazon takes better care of their international shipped products than they do for domestically ones if I look at some of the horror packages some of the US collectors received.
The figure
The figure itself is a nice callback to the original O-ring figure with it’s red, grey and black colors.
Box art
As has been the case with so many of the Classified Series figures, the box art is on point yet again. We get a close up of a very mean looking Eel. I must say that I’m still in doubt about the new plastic free packaging. On the one hand, it’s a shame you don’t get to see the figure and the accessories when you look at the box, on the other hand, the box art does look great and really gets all the attention. I also like the smaller footprint of the boxes.
That’s all for now, keep following me on the socials and here because more is coming (sooner than later it would seem).
It seems like I’m getting a nice stream of new figures every week now, you’d almost think that their is a lot of stock everywhere. The sad reality is though, these are all figures that have been on pre-order for quite some time. Whatever the case may be, I’m happy to say that some new figures have arrived again.
Red, red guard, aims for my head…
First up is another Crimson Guard, the Classified version this time around (remember, last time we had the Retro Carded version). The figure itself looks pretty much the same, although this version has a black helmet and holster on his left leg, where the Retro Carded one has a silver helmet and red holster.
We’ve had the officer, next up is the woman. And what a woman it is. Let’s take a closer look at Zarana.
Pink is the new Black.
She is fierce looking. Definitely not someone to mess around with. She also comes with quite a set of weapons in the form of a dagger, a (bloody?) red bladed knife and a rifle with what looks like a small circular saw underneath. If that doesn’t scream, Stay out of my way, I don’t know what will.
Mugshot
I’m not the biggest fan of the headsculpt. It’s nice that you can change her hairstyle, but the face/expression is a bit to hard for my taste. The details on the jacket are really beautiful by the way. The zipper, the silver shoulderpiece and the strap on her left shoulder truly make the figure stand out. That and the bright pink.
Zarana Quinn
She looks so much better in the artwork. Kind of reminds me of Harley Quinn or maybe Danger Girl from J. Scott Campbell. In any case, Marcus Williams really did an awesome job on this. I’m not saying that the artworks are the best thing about these series of figures, but I’m not denying it too. The style reminds me of the 90’s-00’s comics we got from DDP, somewhat cartoony maybe, but I really like it.
More art on the side
I want to end this post with a shout-out to TBHstore.nl. I bought these 2 figures from them (and have a lot more in pre-order). They always package the figures with the greatest of care. They can keep some things in storage, so you can group pre-orders and save on shipping costs. They are truly passionate about action figures and that shows in their service and dedication to their customers to deliver the best possible shopping experience. If you haven’t checked them out, do so now and I promise you, you won’t regret it.
That’s all for now. More is on the way, but you’ll have to check in later to find out about that. For now, as always…
Several years ago, I was looking to buy a Nest mini for my home, but they weren’t available in our country (where have we heard that before?). I browsed the internet and was able to find them with a big German website. Unfortunately, they didn’t ship to Belgium. After some research, I found a site where you could get a German address to ship your parcel too, they then stored it if needed for up to a month and then ship it to Belgium. The fees were reasonable and so I bought 2 Nest speakers and had them shipped over to me. The whole process went very smooth and I honestly kinda forgot all about it. It never occurred to me to shop in Germany before that, and frankly, I never shopped there again. That is, until very recently.
You see, Hasbro has made Pulse available in some parts of Europe (UK, France, Italy, Spain & Germany). However, they only ship within their own country. I was looking around the site at the pre-orders for the Classified Dr. Mindbender and Serpentor. I was actually able to put them both in my basket and move to the checkout. Then it became clear that I would need an address in Germany because I couldn’t enter my own address. And then I remembered that I used this mailing service years ago. I looked it up and sure enough, the service is still up and running and my account was still functional (I’ll look over the GDPR issues for this once).
I placed my order and now the waiting game was started yet again… And the waiting will be even longer since today I received an email from Pulse that the delivery of Mindy & Serpy will be delayed to April-May 🙁
On a positive note, I also ordered a Classified Retro Crimson Guard figure from Hasbro Pulse Germany and they shipped that one out to the German address. I promptly received an email from the storage/shipping company and I just had to pay for the shipping. The same day, the package was prepared for shipment to Belgium and 2 days later, it arrived on my doorstep.
Well, you’ve made it this far into my story. I guess it’s only fair that we start looking at the figure. Here we go.
Crimson Guard
The figure itself is really nice. It looks exactly like the Crimson Guard figure we know and love from the 3.75” line. It comes complete with a rifle (with bayonet), pistol, backpack, dagger and sword. All in all, a very complete and nice looking figure.
Is that you, Fred?
The helmet is fixed, so no way of knowing if it really is a Fred Series Siggie underneath there. Still the silver look is more suitable for the figure than the black mask on the Classified boxed figure in my opinion.
Old school cardback.
The back of the card does resemble the old school cards, but the description is now in 5 languages and only 3 other figures are shown. Retro? Yes. Interesting? Somewhat underwhelming.
Paper cut waiting to happen!
As I mentioned before on the review of the other Retro Carded figures, the cardboard of the card is very flimsy. It’s truly a miracle that the card arrived here after being processed twice by shipping companies, in a very good state. It’s still straight and no bends or tears. Still, I would really appreciate it if would be thicker (that’s what she said!).
That’s all for now. Keep coming back to read more about Joe and see me getting Dr. Mindbender and Serpentor from Pulse, hopefully somewhere in the near future. More Classified figures are on their way, keeping track of these pre-orders is nearly a fulltime job. See you next time.
The first package of 2023 has arrived and what a package it is. Number 53 doesn’t match the Love Bug this time around, but the one and only (if you’re not counting the Valaverse Action Force figure), Sgt. Slaughter.
Herbie?
The Sarge is in the house
The box art on this one is unique in the fact that we get multiple versions of The Sarge. Top left is his WWF pose, top right looks taken from the comic books, bottom right from the cartoons/movie, front and center almost looks like a picture and then bottom left is the actual figure ‘s upper body. Somewhere in there is also a detail of his fist clenching a Classified Figure that is holding his mini-figure that is also included.
Side art detail
Also on the side, the art is lifelike and looks the part. Being a windowless cardboard box again, we also get actual photo’s of the figure on the back of the box. Including the actual size of The Sarge, which is, truth be told, not as big as I would have guessed. Still, he’s probably very imposing in the flesh.
Need a hand? Or a fist?
Sarge in action
That’s all for now. See you back soon. Until then, Happy Collecting and YoJoe!
Karma, karma, karma, karma, karma Kamakura You come and go, you come and go Loving would be easy if your colors were like my dreams Red, gold, and green, red, gold, and green
61 already
Mostly green though. And some silver. This package just arrived today straight from that big river store in the US of A. It’s also my first figure that comes in the new all cardboard packaging.
Smaller and cardboard all the way.
I get the switch from the windowed boxes to these full cardboard ones, it’s less plastic and less cardboard and will probably be more cost effective as well as better for the environment. If it’s better for us as collectors? The jury’s still not out on that. I personally like it. The art has always been great on these Classified figures and this way the focus can be more on the art. What I don’t like is the fact that the size is different from the other Classified figures (I guess I could just open them all up to counter that). The small picture of the figure on the front bothers me. They have all this space to let the art pop from the page, it feels wrong to me to put a picture of the actual photo on the front, they can (and do) that on the back. I’m guessing it’s some legal obligation. All I can say is that it ruins the art. I know, with the window boxes you could also see the figure, and you’re right in pointing that out, but still, that is completely different. They should have fully embraced the new packaging and went for an full-on art attack with these boxes.
One mean looking Arashikage ninja.
On the back of the box, we get a complete view of the figure, complete with a ruler to show the actual size of the figure. I genuinely think this is a good way to show off everything that’s included in the package. Keep it like this, don’t put a small picture on the front and take attention away from the art. Especially since the same image (but larger) is re-used on the back again.
The figure with accessories.
The left bottom corner of the back
On the back, they also reprinted the photo from the front, this time instead of the bust, the complete figure in an action pose. As I said before, this should be enough, I don’t need to see it on the front.
As a side-note, when will we be getting an official checklist for these figures, comparable to the little pictures we used to get on the back of the cards of the 3&3/4 figures? I know this is also probably not done in a way to keep the production costs as low as possible, but still. How cool would it be to have a small poster inside these boxes with an overview of the classified pictures on one side and then an action shot on the other side? Maybe we’ve been to spoiled with the European catalogs we got in the 80’s and 90’s, but still, I’d really would love to see that make a comeback.
That’s all for now. More new Classifieds coming soon I hope. Happy Collecting and YoJoe!
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