1987 was the apex of my childhood Joe collection. I had found the first figures of the year in the weeks before Christmas in 1986.
Falcon and
Cobra Commander entered into my collection and expanded the final story line of my childhood Joe world. I began 1987 on a sprint to complete the single, carded figure line. And, as it turned out to be a wet year that meant lots of lawn mowing money, I had the cash to pick up vehicles as I found them, too. Upon the acquisition of my first 1987 catalog, I saw a single, weird item. Tucked among the Cobra offerings was a bizarre three pack of
Cobra La figures. They were noted as "living organisms" and featured a figure that looked like he was affixed to a stone base. I had no idea what this pack could be. But, there were enough other new items in the catalog to relegate the Cobra La to insignificance.
Sometime in the summer of
1987, on a routine trip to the local Toys R Us store, I found the newly released 3-packs from the catalog. There were rows of Renegades and Cobra La. I discovered the "statue" figure was actually a snake. I'd later learn that his tail would never coil into the pose from the catalog. But, the reality of the pack was that I had no desire to buy it. The Renegades were far more enticing. So, I cracked open the green wallet I carried at the time and bought myself the Renegades pack. Feeling sorry for my little brother, though, my mother decided to buy him the Cobra La pack. I was fine with him having it as I wanted every G.I. Joe figure to be part of our collection. I just didn't want to spend any money on weird figures. On the drive home, I read over the Cobra La filecards. I still couldn't make any sense of them. They didn't fit with any of the Joe mythos from the cartoon or the comic. The didn't even match other figures. Their purpose was a mystery.
I have mentioned many times that I have never seen the G.I. Joe movie. For some reason, the movie did not air in our local market in 1987. Instead, my friends down the street saw it when they were out of town for a week. When they returned, the told a fantastical tale of a movie where Cobra Commander turns into a monster and Joes were voiced by stars like Don Johnson. There was no way this could be true. I listened to their description of the plot. It was here that they mentioned a bit about Cobra La. Mostly, they recalled the new Cobra chant that added the "lalala" on the end. On some level, I thought it was all a hoax. But, on another, their description was too detailed and consistent to be anything but real. It wasn't until much later that I learned the movie was an actual thing. By then, though, I was pretty much done with Joe. So, I had no interest and didn't watch it.
This raises the question of why I haven't bothered to watch it in the ensuing decades. For a long time, seeking out the movie required effort and money. I wasn't going to spend anything to see it. And, the movie wasn't a significant part of Joe culture. As the film became more available, though, a different malaise set in. Not seeing the movie was a badge of honor, of sorts. As I was a comic guy, not seeing the move gave me message board cred. It's dumb. But, we're all kind of dumb in our early twenties. And, as I got over that nonsense, it opened me up to, maybe, watching the movie.
Which brings us to the reason I still haven't watched it today. At some point in the 2010's, the G.I. Joe cartoon would air on various channels. Usually, it was really late at night. I was up at some point one night and found the cartoon was airing. So, I turned on a random episode. And, it was, not good. It wasn't the type of bad where you can find guilty pleasure in liking it. It was cringeworthy. After a few minutes, I turned it off. I simply couldn't watch it.
Now, many of you reading this still like the cartoon. I know Joe fans who watch it every year and even some who just always have it on in the background in their collection room. If you still like the cartoon, good! I'm glad you do. My dislike of the cartoon has to do with me and my personal tastes and doesn't invalidate your enjoyment. I liked the cartoon back when I was 11 and 12. But, it's no longer my thing. I should also note that upon re-reading many Joe comics, I find similar issues. There are things I enjoyed as a kid that I find groan-worthy today. It's OK to both recognize that you loved something when you were younger but have also outgrown it as an adult.
All of which is a roundabout way to say that I had no idea what the purpose of Cobra La was. And, I certainly had no inclination of how to use the figures in their "canonical" context. What I found when my brother opened up the Cobra La three pack was a useless spike of a figure who couldn't do anything, a bland second figure that lacked any cachet and, a really useful and fun figure that kind of solved a role I had long wanted for my Cobra armies and was also really cool looking. This third figure was the Royal Guard.
On the card art for Cobra La,
Nemesis Enforcer is wearing bat wings. This left the green tentacles that were packaged with him as an odd, extra accessory. I assumed it was meant for one of the other figures. The colors kind of matched with Golobulus. As he wasn't a figure I was ever going to use, though, it made no sense to give them to him. I thought the tentacles were the coolest accessory in the set. The green color was great. And, they had little, sculpted suction cups that made them seem like a really fun item to have around. So, I gave these to the Royal Guard. The green against the red wasn't the color combo I had hoped it would be. But, it worked well enough. And, from that day, I forever associated the tentacles with the Royal Guard figure.
I had to find a greater purpose for the Royal Guard, though. The heavy, armored plates on the figure screamed a heavy weapons operator. But, they also suggested a jet pack like trooper. In 1987, flight in my Joe world heavily revolved around small aircraft. So, it was an easy leap to have the tentacles work like bug wings that allowed the Royal Guard to fly. They were humans encased in heavy armor to protect them in crashes. This was a far cry from the Joes who allowed their jet pack troopers to be armor less. It was the usage of the Royal Guard and his protective gear that lead me to adopt
Maverick as the Joe jetpack trooper as 1987 ended. The Royal Guards became specialized Cobra units who could fly into a Joe base and wreak quick havoc. Their armor was heavy enough to resist small arms fire. So, it was difficult to shoot them out of the sky. They'd serve either as an attack squadron. Or, as a relief/rescue patrol who would appear late in a battle to save Cobra hierarchy who had been taken prisoner. Or, to simply provide cover while Cobra escaped.
The Royal Guard's usage didn't end there. The tentacles served a second purpose: they could be detached and used to capture Joes. The individual arms would wrap around a hapless good guy and hold with an unbreakable grip. The small suction cups on the wings would grab onto the victim and dig into his skin. They would then wrap tighter and tighter. The prey could be subdued for extraction with the wings. Or, they could be constricted out of existence. The limiting factor on the toy, though, is that the arms aren't that long and they didn't hold their shape. So, the idea of the wings grabbing onto someone and squeezing them to near death was far more fun than the actual playing of the same scenario. But, the threat that the tentacles could be deployed was enough to keep many Joes away from the Royal Guard should he appear in battle.
In the mid 1990's, I had just a shoebox of old figures that was leftover from childhood. I did have a nice LEGO tub full of nicely conditioned and complete figures. But, I didn't want to use them. In the shoebox was a hodge-podge of unloved figures from my youth. There were Dreadnoks,
Quick Kick and all the Cobra La figures among some other long broken examples of figures I had liked. These remnants formed unnamed legions who would do battle against the sparse figures I would acquire at retail during this time. Among the figures in this box were the Royal Guard and the
Nullifier. As I was mostly focused on buying Joes at the time (and, Cobras were much harder to find!), I needed enemies for them. The Royal Guard and Nullifer were solid choices. I liked that both were heavily armored. And, both of them were good fits for some of the large, 1990's weapon tree weapons. So, both of these figures became Cobra heavy gunners. They would carry big machine guns or some of the hand held artillery weapons that were superfluous on the weapon trees and lay waste to my army of new Joes.
As I acquired more Cobra figures, though, this purpose faded away. The Royal Guard was the first to go. He didn't have his antenna. (Though, the Nullifier didn't have his face shield, either!) And, he just didn't really have enough cachet to stick around when compared to the
1993 and 1994 figures that were become the bulk of my collection. He was dumped back into the shoebox and stayed there until 1999 or so. The Nullifer fared better. He'd wield the black Airwave rifle from the 1993
Leatherneck well into my adult collecting years. You can even read about him still getting usage in this capacity on the profile I wrote on him in the earliest days of this website. The Royal Guard's days were done, though. The figure went into a drawer with the rest of the 1987 Cobras.
In 2000, though, I picked up an amazing collection from a collector. It was a mostly complete run of figures and vehicles from 1983 through 1986. There were some beautiful 1987 figures included, too. Among them were a complete set of Cobra La figures. I promptly did the same thing with them that I had done with my childhood versions: dumped into a drawer. They stayed there until the late '00's when I purged my collection. My many Golobulus and Nemesis Enforcer figures were all liquidated. As were all my incomplete Royal Guards. But, for some reason, I held onto the single complete specimen that I still owned. I'm not sure why I kept him. It was likely just because the buyer's market of that era wasn't going to yield a selling price I thought was commensurate with the rarity of his accessories. But, I kept this lone Cobra La member.
Again, for many years, I didn't do anything with the figure. There's one photo of him in the late '00's. And, one more in the mid '10's. Mostly, he was stuck in the back of the 1987 Cobra drawer and I didn't think much of him. As the '20's dawned, though, I was looking for obscure figures who hadn't seen much spotlight in my photographs. This brought me back to the Royal Guard. His detailed sculpt, sharp colors and interesting design were enough to compel me to take some photos. And, in doing so, I rediscovered the quality of the figure. I'm past the point of seeing him as a flying, armored Cobra. And, I embrace the weird. The Royal Guard is a fun figure to photograph and works extremely well with both his contemporary releases as well as late in the line oddballs like
Star Brigade and
Mega Marines. He's never going to be a personal favorite. But, the Royal Guard's attributes are enjoyable and fun.
The Royal Guard was used just this one time by Hasbro. In Europe, the Slaughter's Renegades were released on single cards. But, Cobra La didn't get the same treatment.
Mercer and
Red Dog were both released internationally, in
Brazil and
India, respectively. But, again, no Cobra La figures showed up. Hasbro must have known they'd be a tougher sell than the Renegades. During the early 2000's, cartoon figures were still fairly taboo. So, the odds of seeing them in a Toys R Us set was zero. It was finally during the Anniversary era that we saw the glimpse of Cobra La returning. In the new format, a figures like Nemesis Enforcer could be given his scale from the cartoon. While this figure was well received, it also hung around a lot. With the advent of Classified, Cobra La has taken on new significance as we've seen some amazing takes of Cobra La characters in this format: the Royal Guard among them. For 3 3/4' fans, Super7 made a newly colored and molded version of the Royal Guard. It's drastically different from the Hasbro figure. It might be more cartoon accurate. But, my point of reference is the toys. So, I found it far inferior to Hasbro's figure. It sold out fairly quickly, though. So there was a pent up demand for the character.
Royal Guards are expensive. The antenna is the expensive piece. Mint and complete figures run in the $40+ range. Dealers charge a lot more due to low supply. There are lots of 3D printed replacement antennas out there. So, be sure to confirm any antenna is original. There really aren't any affordable alternatives for this character. But, figures without the antenna can be had substantially cheaper. So, you can build up an army of antenna-less figures far more reasonably. I wish I'd taken advantage of cheaper prices in the 2010's and picked up a couple more Royal Guards. They look great in multiples. But, it's also a character who I don't really use much. And, his long ago purpose of a heavy armor Cobra Trooper is long gone: replaced with other figures who are better suited to the role. Despite that, he has value just for his overall quality. So, he's the type of figure who's going to get taken out every 15-18 months when the conditions match up well with his colors. That's a better fate than many other figures ever experience.
