1997 Snake Eyes - Random Photos of the Day

In 1997, the idea of a Snake Eyes figure with painted details was one of the great missing links from the vintage Joe line.  Hasbro was quick to fill that gap with an updated Snake Eyes figure in the Stars & Stripes set.  But, the best laid plans were quickly foiled when the 1985 Snake Eyes mold was not found.  Hasbro was then left with an open slot in one of the three figure packs that were going to supplement the 8 figure boxed set.  So, rather than nixing Snake Eyes altogether, they released a second repaint of the 1983 figure.  These two figures had subtle details to differentiate them.  But, in the end, it was a harbinger of things to come when it came to the Joe Team's favorite Commando.

Over the next few years, Hasbro would release a take on the original Snake Eyes 4 additional times.  All offered something slightly different.  But, with the overuse, the mold became passe.  And, even today, most collectors are tired of Snake Eyes' classic look.  But, these early repaints of Snake Eyes do have value. And, they are one of the few figures from the repaint era that can be stood among original 13 figures from 1983 and not look completely out of place.  

2004 Night Force Short Fuze

In 2003, Hasbro continued their successful partnership with Toys R Us in regards to the G.I. Joe line.  TRU had been the savior for the 15th Anniversary figures in 1997.  And, they had managed to gain a few exclusive products as Joe expanded to full retail based on the success of the short re-launch.  The two partners found a successful formula releasing packs of vintage figures that were repaints of classic molds, but bundled into a theme.  Tiger Force and Python Patrol were the first two attempts to re-capture the magic of the late 1980's and both were relatively successful.

As 2004 neared, Hasbro found that its plans for mail away and internet exclusive army building sets had failed.  So, they moved those planned offerings to TRU exclusives.  Hasbro also then moved to a strategy where they would release both a Cobra and a Joe set at the same time.  To match the first Cobra army building set, Hasbro resurrected Night Force (itself a Toys R Us exclusive last seen in 1989) and created a new design for the members that first began appearing at retail in January of 2004.  The set featured 4 molds recently returned to Hasbro's control from Funskool, another paint job of the 1984 Roadblock and a figure mold that hadn't been seen in 14 years: Downtown.  Only, this Downtown repaint was not the Downtown character.  Instead, it was a re-imagination of Short Fuze.  The Joe team's original mortar soldier had returned.

Short Fuze is, arguably, the most forgotten original Joe.  Grand Slam will come up from time to time.  But, his relatively hard to find Silver Pads figure gives him some collecting cachet.  It's rare to find someone who really views Short Fuze as their favorite character.  He had little relevance in the comic and didn't appear again as an action figure in the vintage line after his original release.  Collectors' focus on the original 13 Joes during the early 2000's, though, helped raise the profile of even the most obscure characters from the line's earliest years.  This helped get a new Short Fuse to retail stores in 2004 and another in 2005.

I will argue that Short Fuse is the best figure from the Night Force set.  That is based, though,  on the criteria that this is the best use of the Downtown mold.  Flint, Beach Head, Roadblock and Tunnel Rat all had better paint jobs in the vintage run.  Action Man/Tracker is the only contender.  I degrade him, though, because Action Man cost us a proper Night Force Tracker that would have been the jewel of the set.  So, Short Fuse is left as the de facto winner.  But, that's bittersweet because no one cares about getting the best Short Fuse.  And, without proper gear, the figure loses much of his value.  And, with that, you have the problem with the Night Force set as a whole: it didn't really offer anything to collectors.  Some figures were nice.  But, they all had a litany of problems.

One of the main criticisms of Hasbro's attempts at making o-ring figures in the 2000's was that they didn't go with anything. The 2004 Night Force set is unlike the 1988 and 1989 sets in nearly every way.  The figures neither match nor complement each other.  So, each offering has to stand on its own.  In some ways, this isn't a bad thing.  And, it has allowed certain figures from the 2000 to become relatively popular as their own thing.  But, it was a detriment at the time of the release.  Collectors had accepted the new look for Python Patrol because it did match the vintage Python Patrol vehicles.  And, few people really collected Python Patrol in 2003.  But, Night Force was a different animal.  Even collectors who had sparse collections often had a couple of vintage Night Force figures.  They were the most popular vintage subset.  So, getting a new team of them that didn't match the originals was a let-down.  

Despite selling rather briskly upon its release, the Night Force set quickly started to languish.  Despite showing up at brick and mortar Toys R Us stores in mid January of 2004, you could still buy all the set you wanted come December of that same year.  2003 had ended with G.I. Joe as one of the most popular retail toy brands.  But, all that momentum was lost with the advent of 2004.  There are reasons for that which were far beyond Hasbro's control.  The result, though, was that Night Force rotted on the shelves for a full year.  Collectors had ample opportunity to acquire it.  And, most collectors of the time did buy one.  But, without the army building aspect and with a couple of figures that collectors didn't really care for, there was simply no reason for anyone to acquire additional sets...especially since pretty much every Toys R Us in the country always had ample options of Cobra sets also available at the same time.  

The reported production run of the Night Force set was around 20,000 sets.  That far outpaced the collector base of the time.  But, the scarcity of available sets now is a function of the set's lackluster popularity among collectors of the day rather than any actual rarity.  There are the same number of Night Force sets as there are Cobra Infantry sets who were released at the same time.  The disparity in individual figure pricing is a function of every collector buying as many Cobra Troopers as they could afford while leaving spare Night Force sets behind for someone's grandmother or uncle to buy as an unwanted gift for a child in their life.

The Night Force accessories were atrocious.  In many ways, this set was the beginning of Hasbro just not caring about figure's gear.  We had seen some of this with the 2003 Tiger Force set.  But, it was forgiven since the important figures had their original accessories.  Night Force did not.  And, this Short Fuse, despite being 100% associated with being a mortar trooper, only included a black update of the 1991 Big Ben's rifle and a pistol originally released with Tomax & Xamot.  I'll argue that the Tomax pistol is the 2nd worst weapon from the 1980's era of Joe behind only the 1984 Baroness rifle.  But, it's also iconic to Tomax and Xamot.  So, Short Fuse's gear was absolutely worthless.  The only upside is that 1989 Downtown gear was cast in black and was relatively available in 2004.  So, it was easy to get proper gear for this figure...even if that was an unnecessary burden from Hasbro.  Frankly, the poor gear kind of ruined the set.  The figures included needed their basic gear to really make sense.  And, Hasbro stripped away much of the characterization of the included figures by giving them generic accessories.

Despite all these misgivings, though, this Short Fuse is still really nice.  On his own, he works as the best mortar trooper in the entire Joe line.  You just have to jump through a bunch of hoops to get him there.  But, the presentation, colors, paint masks and quality are all close to excellent.  If this figure existed as a stand alone figure, everyone would have loved it.  And, despite collectors tending to punish Hasbro for good figures that were of minor characters and obscure molds, sentiment regarding Short Fuze in 2004 was generally positive.  The colors were nice and the overall package was nice enough that collectors could recognize quality: even if the figure was never used and didn't appear in many photos or dios of the time.

In writing this profile, I realized that I harp on the negatives of this figure.  Yet, overall, I still have a favorable impression of him.  In the early 2000's (and, to a lesser extent, today) collectors fell into 2 large camps: "haters" who hated anything Hasbro did and "suck-ups" who believed Hasbro could do no wrong.  The ration middle ground didn't exist in significant numbers.  Because of this, Hasbro simply didn't listen to collectors or try to engage them in any way.  Neither Hasbro, nor the few people they did interact with, really understood what collectors wanted.  And, they never asked in any meaningful way.  In fact, the few times they made comments that they thought were absurd proposals, they found themselves quickly backtracking when collectors actually liked those ideas.  It scared the Hasbro teams of the time that they were so out of touch with their consumer.  But, by 2004, the writing was on the wall that the line was dying.  And, the revolving door of brand managers proved that Hasbro knew it was a sinking ship.  I often wonder what would have happened if there had been, at the time, a real fan club capable of communicating with Hasbro.  The answer is we'd have probably seen figure designs and releases more like the Anniversary offerings starting in 2007 instead of the haphazard and unrelated toys we actually got.  I don't know, though, if that would have extended the brand's retail life.  But, we would have gotten a lot more figures and vehicles that would be held in high regard today.

The 2004 Night Force flows in and out of popularity.  If you time it right, you can snap a figure or a set for a good price.  But, that's getting harder to do with  tight supplies still holding over from the pandemic collectors retaining their now-forgotten acquisitions.  As such, this figure is a whopping $30+ purchase these days.  Dealers and open auctions seem to be in line with this price.  Personally, I find that ridiculous.  But, until supply loosens up, we're going to see premium pricing on superfluous figures from the post-vintage era.  I find this the best paint job of the Downtown mold.  But, he's certainly not worth current pricing and will  be an underwhelming addition to your collection for that price.  I do wish we'd seen more molds like Downtown's used in the 2000's.  But, collectors both then and now value the repaints of classic characters far more.  So, you can't fault Hasbro's logic...even if I don't agree with it.

2016 Tank Commander - Black Major Exclusive

There are hundreds of paint jobs available on the 1983 Cobra Trooper mold.  Some are great.  Some are terrible.  And, most, are just there.  They're neat enough designs.  But, they don't really transcend the others.  Many of them, though, serve a specific purpose.  There is one area where a certain color scheme is completely necessary.  But, then, doesn't really make much sense in any other context.  Such is the fate of the 2016 Tank Troopers.  Black suited figures with red trim is a fine design that is also not all that exciting.  But, when paired with specific Cobra vehicles, the Tank Troopers are great.

The idea of having Cobra Troopers in color schemes to match any vehicle or specialty figure seems great.  And, back in 2010, it really was.  Collectors could get Troopers to match some of their favorite Cobra figures and vehicles.  As the decade crawled on, more and more Troopers were released.  And, with that, came some diminishing returns.  Now, in 2024, there are Cobra Troopers for every occasion.  And, you'll go batty trying to get squads of them all.  I find it better to pick and choose and focus on designs that really speak to me.  Among my preferred color schemes of Python Patrol, Swamp Troopers and Soldados, I also have a small cadre of these Tank Trooper figures that are cast in red and black.  

The reason for that is because of the 1985 Sears Exclusive SMS.  This special repaint of a Hiss Tank and MMS was meant for the Crimson Guard.  However, I've never felt that the CGs really matched the tank.  Simultaneously, the blue Cobra Troopers and Officers were not great matches for it, either.  But, with the advent of these Tank Troopers, I finally had an adequate crew for one of the key vehicles of my childhood.  The red black perfectly matches both the SMS and the 2004 Operation Crimson Sabotage.  On top of that, they are also really nice matches for the 1983 Hiss and even the Stinger.  In short, they fit with Cobras 1983-1985 vehicle aesthetic.  So, if you have a soft spot for those early Cobra designs, the Tank Troopers are the crew you wished you had back when you were a kid.

The Cobra Trooper remains the best incarnation of Cobra's classic bad guy.  Vipers are just too well equipped to see them as foot soldiers in an upstart terrorist organization.  But, guys wearing blue shirts and pants with a mask over their face gives the appearance of affordability that would have been imperative in Cobra's early days.  In case you think they aren't dangerous, though, each trooper carries a piano wire on his arm.  These are men of no moral compass who view murder as a matter of their job and nothing more.  Those who place such low value on human life would have been attracted to Cobra by the pay and sphere of safety that Cobra could provide.  

The fact that things like this were incorporated into a children's toy is amazing.  The early Joe team wasn't shy about making the good guys be good guys and the bad guys be bad guys.  The 1980's were the decade of clear heroes and villains.  The notion of the anti-hero would only become pervasive in the 1990's...mostly as a way to evolve the simple tropes of the prior decade that were no longer drawing in audiences.  Now, we have sympathetic villains and heroes who, frankly, have character flaws so deep that they really should be villains.  But, the early Cobra was designed in the vein of Hydra and other Nazi-derivative villains of the post World War II era.  And, the Cobra Trooper is the textbook example of this.

There really isn't much more to say about the Cobra Trooper mold.  I've looked at tons of colorings of the mold.  And, I have several more sitting in my draft folder that will appear in future years.  The mold remains the same.  But, the color schemes offer chances to use the mold in more circumstances and have some nice color matches with additional members of the Cobra hierarchy.  While we really don't "need" any more Cobra Trooper color designs, the fact is that must have colorings still continue to appear.  And, I often find that that there are lots of designs that I never thought I wanted until I saw them.  Once in hand, I have yet to be disappointed.

The Cobra Trooper is Black Major's most used character.  There are at least 4 different incarnations of the mold.  You can tell the differences by the foot pegs, backpack hole and even the head.  The Tank Troopers are earlier molds.  But, the quality is still high.  They don't have the floppy joints of some 2010 era releases.  They hold their weapons well.  (These figures actually include the standard Dragunov rifle, an Officer AK-47 and a backpack.  You'll often find current sales not including all the proper gear, though.)  And, best of all, the paint masks are simple and effective.  It's hard to believe these figures are coming up on their 10th anniversary.  But, the fact that new Cobra Troopers have already been released this year shows the enduring appeal of the mold.  And, it's a safe bet that as long as factory custom figures exist, new Cobra Troopers will be among the releases.

The Tank Troopers were not popular upon their release.  You could buy sets of 4 or 5 Troopers and one Viper Pilot for under $25.  Resellers would offer even better deals if you made a bulk purchase.  Now, you can barely get one Cobra Trooper for that amount.  But, 2017 was a very different time in the Joe world.  The documentary hadn't pulled in fly-by-night scalpers and pickers.  And, the pandemic hadn't destroyed all the collectible markets and created an unsustainable zeal for nostalgia.  So, these aren't $5 figures any more.  But, they are also not expensive.  You might have to wait a while to find the figure, especially if you want a set.  But, you should be able to find them in the $15-$20 range with prices going lower if you can find a full team.