Cloudburst is one of those figures that would have made for an excellent repaint. But, even his original figure has some merit. The sculpt is solid and the colors do work within the context of his release. He's a pretty obscure release. Which leads to a dearth of content available about the figure. But, there's some fun stuff that you can find below.
Wasn't sure if you would appreciate the comment more here or with your very good original write-up back in 2018 for Cloudburst.
ReplyDeleteI have some vivid memories of Cloudbusrt from my childhood - received him as a gift for my 10th birthday in 1992. He was a figure that I liked immediately and incorporated him into my regular rotation of heavily played with figures. I liked the Air Commandos concept and glider as well but did not like the idea of a brand new figure scraping the ground or getting dirty so I only threw the glider by itself. Although I liked him a lot I did end up trading him away to my friend for some other figures that I cannot recall but they were probably more classic figures from the 80s - as a 90s kid I got really geeked out seeing some of the 85-88 figures I would impulsively trade some of my newer in very good condition figures for them.
I re-acquired Cloudburst a few years ago and it was great to have him back in hand. The rush of nostalgia and fun childhood memories were unlocked. As you mentioned in your original write-up the visor bumps up his price and I have no real desire to shell out a bunch money for a complete figure (their is a buy it now complete figure on Ebay listed for $94.98 - lunacy). In my little Joe Verse Cloudburst traded in his glider to become the pilot of the Locust. Perhaps down the road if/when the Joe market crashes back down to earth I will end up getting one with a visor. The Air Commandos as a whole have become a fairly popular and expensive subteam to collect - Skymate is crazily priced as well as are the three awesome Cobra figures I would love to army build but never will be able to - Cobra Air Devil, Sky Creeper and Night Vulture - all three are fantastic figures that seem to be overlooked when it comes to Cobra in 90s.
I'm astonished at the prices for Air Commandos. But, they were, likely, a relatively short production run. And, the Canadian overstock of them were all unaccessorized: making complete figures more desirable. (1992, in general, seems to exist in smaller quantities than 1993. Though, 1991 seems slightly less common.) I don't think they're quite as scarce as new collectors think. They were acquirable for a long time. But, they've gotten caught up in they hype. And, if one or two guys in the big FB groups push a figure as "rare" you tend to see prices go up and stay up as FOMO kicks in for those who don't have one, or only have 23 and really "need" 40.
DeleteIt's fun to hear from people who were kids when this figure came out. I was out of toys and didn't know about him until I was an adult collector. Looking back, I REALLY wish I'd spent all the money I wasted on junk wax era sports cards on Joes instead. Both were social poison, but sports cards were less so. But, I probably got most of the 1991 - 1993 figures for cheaper than retail when you could still find lots of them for a buck or two per figure on Ebay in 1998 and 1999.
Sky Creeper is a character, though.
DeleteI wish it was easier to repro those visors.