6″ – European Joe's

Why you too should join the Culture Club.

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

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.

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.

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.

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!

At Ease!

Just a quick update this time around on another pre-order that finally made it’s way to Belgium. It’s the Valaverse Action Force Sgt. Slaughter, delivered by the good people over at BBTS.

During #YoJoeJune, Hasbro announced that they will be making an official new G.I. Joe Classified Sgt. Slaughter figure, but while we wait for that one to get made, we already have a 6″ figure of the Sarge in the Action Force series.

The figure comes with removable hat and sunglasses, four pair of hands, a stand, a knife, and a big ass revolver. The revolver and knife can be placed in holsters on either leg.

That’s it for now. Keep your chin up and see you soon!

Happy Collecting and YoJoe!

You lose some, you win twice

I incidentally channeled my inner Bob Ross and had a happy little accident on eBay. I was still missing 3 figures from the Classified figures, namely, The -00- Snake Eyes, The Baroness with C.O.I.L cycle and the Cobra Trooper. This last one seemed like the easiest one to find, so I started looking online to score one for a reasonable price. I actually found 2 on eBay that were fairly priced and so I placed a bid on both hoping that I could win one of them. And then this happened…

Yes, I won both. I guess I’m an army builder now. I was hoping that they might be variants, there appear to be figures with a black collar and then others with a blue collar, but alas, both have blue collars. I can’t really complain, at least I was able to find one. Ok, two.

The box art is again quite superb, and the trooper does like very menacing. The black, the blue and the orange hue in the background really do blend well together. And there is a H.I.S.S tank there, could it be?

I guess you could call this a win-win, but still, they weren’t exactly cheap, so I may end up selling one. This could help me save up and one day pick up a Baroness or Snake Eyes… For now, I’ll just keep on admiring my army of 2.

Until next time! Happy Collecting and YoJoe!

6 inches of pure evil and silent red danger

2 new 6″ figures arrived in Belgium this week and they are not the friendly kind. First up, we have the Red Ninja.

The question here is, are the Red Ninjas part of the Arashikage Clan or a part of Cobra or somehow both? You see, the art (see below) depicts the figures with the Arashikage symbol on their foreheads, whereas the figure itself has the Cobra sigil there. What’s the deal here? Anybody know why this is? A miscommunication between art en production team? A mistake made somewhere down the line or just some insignificant detail to drive some of the collectors nuts as they try to understand why this is…

Symbol aside, the figure looks really menacing and is stocked with some very deadly weapons. A long sword, a short sword, 2 dagger like weapons (who I know are actually defensive tools called sai), 2 axes and 2 scythes. They probably all have cool Japanese names, feel free to comment them below. Knowing is half the battle after all, and clearly I don’t know them all.

Next up we have the big Cobra honcho himself, Cobra Commander (they will make Serpentor sometime down the line, I’m sure of it, but in my book, CC is the leader of Cobra, Serpie is just a science project gone wrong by Dr. Mindbender).

It was pretty obvious that Cobra Commander would get a figure in the Classified line. It’s actually a nice updated look on his original color scheme. I really like the deep blue and the small gold details. I don’t care for the weapons all that much. The gun looks like he stole it from a pirate somewhere (probably in Disneyland) and the sword looks very ceremonial, as in used by some obscure cult leader to slice open a sheep for an even weirder ritual… Anyway, the figure is great. And talking about great things, just look at the artwork. True pieces of art yet again.

That’s it for now. Believe it or not, but even more figures are in pre-order! So hopefully I’ll be able to show them off here in the not too distant future. This post will go live after the Hasbro Pulscon will hopefully have revealed some new figures. Fingers crossed we get some new goodies coming very soon. Until then, see you again soon and …

Happy Collecting and YoJoe!

24 inch growth

No blue or other pills, but another 4 new Classified figures have arrived. 2 figures from In Demand Toys and 2 from Amazon.com arrived this week. I was quite happy to find out that the figures on Amazon.com could be shipped to Belgium and so I pre-ordered some there when they became available. The first figure to arrive is Arctic Mission Storm Shadow. Now, they packaged him as a member of Cobra, but come on, we can all agree that the look of the figure is based on the 1993 3.75″ Ninja Force Storm Shadow, who by then was a member of the Joe team. A bit of confusion on Habro’s part (to be fair, Storm Shadow did change sides a few times, it’s hard to keep track of) or did they just choose the best look for him?

As with all of the figures released in the Classified series, the art on the box is on point. The artists really delivered the goods on these boxes.

So far, I haven’t had any issues with the quality of the figures (I haven’t actually unboxed them yet, maybe when I do something will come up), but with this one, I can see a (very little) paint error on his face. A small drop of skin tone has dropped on his black covered chin and then a little black drop is located on his gold Arashikage logo… No big deal I guess, but it just caught my attention.

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The next figure I ordered with Amazon that arrived is Gung-Ho. As with Roadblock, it’s a bit of a mystery to me why they chose him over Flint or Lady Jaye or – fill in your favorite figure… In any case, the figure looks good.

In my opinion, the art is better than the figure (something like the book being better than the movie I guess).

Perhaps it’s the placement in the bubble or maybe it’s a design flaw, but his cap looks a bit off to me, a bit too small for his head.

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That’s it for the Amazon figures for now, there is more to come in the following weeks… I already got my shipping notices. I’ll keep you posted on the blog and on socials. If you’re not following on socials, there’s Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Give us a follow and a like.

Now over to the figures I was able to order over on In Demand Toys. I was not expecting to be able to find the Target Exclusive figures here in Europe easily, but to my surprise, they popped up on the site. I was too late for the Cobra Trooper and The Baroness, but I’m on the waiting list, so hopefully they’ll have some more stock coming. For now, I’m quite happy with a v2 Roadblock (I don’t know why he’s so popular, is this The Rock effect?) and the very cool looking Beach Head.

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These boxes really are cool to put on a shelf just like this. And the contents and artwork are even better.

I must admit that I have my doubt about a second version of Roadblock this early in the line simply because there are so many cool and exciting characters to choose from on both sides of the battle. The figure does look cool and it’s not a simple repaint. He actually looks like a different figure, Heavy Duty vibes on that v2 Roadblock. And very hipster with that beard…

Beach Head is a fan favorite for most Joe fans and the figure is a true homage to the original 3.75″ from 1986. I’m not so sure about the color of his weapons, I’d have preferred them in black or even grey (as the ’86 version), but I guess you can’t have it all. The beret is awesome though!

Roadblock’s art gives me a Devil’s Due kind of vibe, where Beach Head looks a lot more realistic. Both true pieces of art though.

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The back of the boxes for these figures features a depiction of Cobra Island (I’m not seeing a landlocked freighter). Interestingly, both show different details and a slightly different view of the island.

That’s it for now, I hope I can get back to you soon with more inches on the way…

Happy Collecting and YoJoe!