Rarities - 2004 Comic Pack Hawk - Unproduced Head

In 2004, Hasbro came up with the idea of Comic Packs.  This alternate selling method would offer consumers three vintage style Joe figures with a comic book featuring those characters for the whopping price of $9.99.  It seemed like a great idea that was certain to pave the way for the future of retail action figure sales.  And, for a short time, it kind of was.  But, as was common with alternate G.I. Joe retail products, the Comic Packs quickly stalled out at retail and were gone just a year later.  While they offered a nice variety of relatively unimpressive or memorable figures, the Comic Packs also had a few pre-production pieces that featured some oddball coloring.  One such example is this 2004 General Hawk.

If you're a fan of this site, you've seen this head before.  It's the head I put on a 2004 Comic Pack Cobra Officer body for my character Skeres.  I thought the head was distinctive enough to create a new character.  So, this set was the first of the alternate Asian figures that I tracked down.  Originally, the figures were sold as a set of three figures and accessories: all still in their tray from the Comic Pack.  I paid about $33 to have the three figures shipped from China.  Quite a stretch from prices today.

There are no other major changes to the figure aside from the head.  But, the head's distinctive coloring was what made it stand out.  And, even as more and more uproduced figures from Asia began to appear, this Hawk kept his status.  But, he did lose his popularity.  With many more figures that collectors desired, these early oddballs like Hawk fell into obscurity.  And, as alternate Anti Venom and unproduced Wal Mart figures became common in standard collections, this Hawk never appeared.  

It's very unlikely that this figure is anything more than a plastic test.  Since the Stalker in the pack featured pale, white plastic for the skin on the head, it could be that a run got the plastic colors for each mold wrong.  Regardless of how this figure came to be, it's a fun piece of Joe history that was a member of one of the hallmarks of the early 2000's Joe community.