Toy Review: G.I. Joe: “The Rise Of Cobra!”

collection 1024x316 Toy Review: G.I. Joe: The Rise Of Cobra!

It’s almost time…fans of G.I. Joe—the movie, “Rise of Cobra” will be out as soon as August rolls around!  Until then, we have the new figures in most large retail stores such as Target, Toy’s R Us and Walmart.  Each regular action figure is priced between 8 and 9 dollars—until you go to the internet specialty stores where you can be sure you’ll pay up the nose.  Prices so far are either the same as retail or 2-3 times the retail value.

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Baroness packaged and the loose figure from China.

Many months ago I was able to purchase on Ebay a ROC Baroness figure that probably was scooped from the finish bin.  Cricket had done an article on it and I had also posted the figure in the forums.  I had paid $15 with shipping also.

Now the first wave of the G.I. Joe, The Rise of Cobra figures have hit shelves and I now have the packaged Baroness and paid just as well half price—but that’s ok, having something before it’s available to the public is quite fun and made me want to start collecting as I did when I was young.

At this time I have a collection of 5 Cobra’s and 2 Joes.  When I was a kid it was the same way, most of my figures were the baddies and the goodies were few and far between.  Why?  The Cobra’s are just so much cooler.  Most of the Cobra team have wild and futuristic armor and weapons, complete with masks or other head and face covering’s that give an illusion of the characters not being human.  …And according to the ultra classic animated G.I. Joe: The Movie, some of the Cobra’s were not human.

From what I can see through the package and from being able to study the Baroness figure—the articulation is amazing, between the wrists, elbows and shoulders turning 360 degrees to the split upper and lower body and the ankles and leg movements, each figure can be posed for either display or battle in almost an endless array of styles.  The builds between the males and females are anatomically correct unlike back in the 80’s when the girl’s were as big as the guys.  Now there are a proper female form and a proper male form that gives more realism than in the good old days.

Each figure comes with an assortment of weapons and equipment that will allow for many scenarios to be played out that are only limited to ones imagination.  Some of the added features that have come out in just the past few years are gun belts to hold side arms, sword sheaths (such as with Storm Shadow) and finally each has a large firing weapon with a spring-loaded projectile (some which come with other figures, I guess they ran out of ideas?)

My only complaint for some of the figures is that the face sculpt is not that great; that makes it better to buy these figures in stores than over the internet.  Of my collection so far, AND of what I saw in stores— of the females, I found Desert Ambush Scarlett, and Baroness to have nice faces while Cover Girl, and “Pony-tail” Scarlett to not look so good.  So far, the sculpt of the males faces seems accurate to the person or character—Heavy Duty is one that stands out, (Complete with “OZ” action phrases—insert sick lines here_____.)

All in all, I’m being picky with which figures I get, I don’t plan to open them because of many reasons, however the way they are packed in the blister appears to be a permanent prison—you may risk damage by how compressed the arms and legs are in the plastic, but that depends on the character.

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Zartan and Storm Shadow.

I am on the fence with Zartan—his new (movie) concept is interesting and I’m a huge fan of the 80’s G.I. Joe and I’m really tolerating the changes and finding them interesting at the same time.  However, the Zartan figure is so far away from the original, some of the great points are his weapon assortment of odd knives and a sword and his face has paint that you can barely see, however, the paint is reminiscent of the classic, just use your imagination.

Storm Shadow without the mask is more interesting to me than the standard.  I’ve never been a fan of Storm Shadow, but this figure was very interesting to me and that’s why I got it.  He is loaded down with many weapons and has a good face sculpt.

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Destro, Cobra Commander and Baroness

Destro, Cobra Commander and Baroness—they are the leaders and are very impressive and interesting.  Baroness is perfect and appears as the current cartoon-style figure does, except for the movie details.  Destro is…well, Destro, although I would have liked his “mask” to be chromed.  His story is on the file card, so the word ‘mask’ being in quotes is something to read about…  Finally there is Cobra Commander—most would automatically hate it, however I find it to be one of the best figures and new looks that they came up with.  The syringe-like item he is holding apparently goes into a hole in his mask and he “juices” up on some ‘nanomites’ straight into his head.  Don’t know what that’s about yet, but I’m waiting to find out!

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Shipwreck and Scarlett

I only have 2 Joes at the moment; Shipwreck, due to him being one of the few good guys I liked—not just because he came with Polly either!  And Scarlett—to be specific, Desert Ambush Scarlett—she almost resembles Baroness, and has a great face sculpt as mentioned before.

The others I personally plan to get are: Rex “The Doctor” Lewis who is Cobra Commander before he was Cobra Commander—Rex Lewis huh, I will be ok with it, but maybe the weird, blue, Cobra-La scientist with the many eyes would be better for some people!  There is also a character called Agent Helix who is a Joe, she seems interesting; the only problem is, the pictures on the internet don’t have enough detail of the face, so I have to wait on my final decision.  Of the sets or vehicles, I just seem to want Scrap Iron who comes with an ATV.  I could have gotten it, but I wanted to wait—sometimes you have to think about these things.

My final opinion of the G.I. Joe “The Rise of Cobra” figures is this:  The package itself features very nice character pictures or art and the modern file card, the package is small but if you want a lot of them, it’s worth the small size.  The figures themselves are great, although it’s up to each person to pick which ones they want.  Some will like only a few and others will like them all—and then some will hate them all.  I give a lot of credit for the figures being reminiscent of the original cartoon and the vehicle sets being almost the same way such as coming with Scrap Iron, Air Viper and Snow Job who each seem to be repaints of the original’s in the modern build.

My only warning is: watch the prices, what you pay may and will be more than they are worth, buy retail and when you just can’t get the one you want, then and only then go to the internet specialty stores—they may be new and hot, but if you look in the right places, they aren’t hard to find.

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