I guess I could start this post off with a bad joke like “How many Tele-Vipers does Cobra Commander need to make his troops retreat? “. Nowadays he’d use 140 characters, but I covered that in last week’s post ?
This time around, we will discuss the Impel Trading Card #33, the Cobra Tele-Viper (or Televiper?), Cobra´s force of Radio Communication Officers.
The Joe team have 2 Communication Specialists, Breaker and Dial-Tone. Cobra has like hundreds of Televipers to transmit messages on all frequencies. Of course, Cobra Commander has been known for hijacking the various TV channels all over the world and divulge on his current plan or ask for ransom demands. I guess he would need an army of technicians and hackers to get this done.
For what the toys are concerned, 9 iterations of the Televiper have been released. Of these 9, 2 were Python Patrol editions. The original 1985 version is still the coolest if you ask me. Just look at that Cobra belt buckle and tell me you´re not impressed. I dare you! I´m not much of an army builder, I´m more of a gotta catch them all collector, but I must admit that I don´t have a lot of Televipers in my collection.
I´m sure the Tele-Vipers are present in the cartoons, I just can´t remember them being there. They are not the most memorable foes, to be honest. They are what they are, technicians working behind the scenes and making sure that every single one of Cobra Commander´s rants gets onto the air for everyone to enjoy. I do remember seeing them in one of my favourite episodes. It´s an episode I have on VHS (in Dutch) and I believe the English title is In the Presence of my Enemy. Slip-Stream (my all time favourite pilot, who the F is Ace anyway?) crashes onto an abandoned Cobra research facility with a female Strato-Viper and they encounter several traps and they have to work together in order for them to escape. Anyway, in the beginning of the episode, the Tele-Vipers send out a message to one of Cobra´s satellites and Slip-Stream intercepts it.
All in all, not the most memorable Cobra out there, but they are important none the less. Without them, nobody would know about Cobra Commander´s mad schemes and plans to conquer the world. Not until Twitter was available that is 🙂
Next time, we go out with a BANG when we discuss a hockey analyst?! Who comes up with these? Oh, right, Larry Hama (who is a GOD!). Have you seen the Kickstarter campaign for the Larry Hama Action Figure? Too late to enter now, but I´ll post about it when I have the figure in hand 🙂 (Admit it, you´re jealous!)
Until next time. Happy Collecting and YoJoe!