I'm not a great fan of the Steel Brigade. But, every now and then, a repaint of a bad figure or bad idea comes along that redeems the figure or character in my eyes. In 2017, this occurred with a Red Laser Army release of the Steel Brigade done in up in a combo of silverish grey and blue. This "Sky Patrol" version of the anonymous Joe army builder was a new look for the character and created a striking color contrast that really worked with the mold. The colors matched up well enough with vintage Sky Patrol figures and created a great little subset of figures with which a Sky Patrol army could be built. While this figure hasn't removed the stigma of Steel Brigade in general, it has allowed me an opportunity to enjoy the mold more so than I have with most other repaints.
Sky Patrol has also long been a concept to which I've been cool. Even during my heyday of buying Joes, I only ever got a couple of the figures. Now, I have just two of them. It was never a subset that really clicked for me. And, I'm not a big fan of the Steel Brigade, either. Yet, together, the concepts mesh extremely well. The idea of support troops for a unit that I kind of see as ancillary to G.I. Joe rather than integrated within it works for me.
Somehow, the Steel Brigade mold ended up being released by both Black Major and Red Laser. Each made different color schemes. So, that created a wide variety for the character. In very short order, there were desert, arctic, black, blue and even Action Force Steel Brigade figures released. The plethora of army building options allowed collectors to fill out their Steel Brigade armies. Some were great repaints. Others were just OK. Personally, I found this blue and silver version to be the most compelling. The colors aren't often seen in the Joe line. And, the Sky Patrol figures that debuted the color scheme no longer call my collection home. So, the colors were even more unique to me.
When I first saw this Sky Patrol rendition of the Steel Brigade, my first thought was that they'd make a solid crew for the Tomahawk. The blue and silver shouldn't work with the brown helicopter. But, that was my main thought about usage for the figures. I suspect that the connection was just a manifestation of my desire to use the Tomahawk more. But, with the figures in hand, I still didn't do anything with the Tomahawk. Even today, I have yet to put it together, again. I will do it at some point. And, then, I'll finally take photos of the iconic chopper with their crew. Until then, I often look at these Steel Brigade figures with grandiose ideas in my head. And, I then utterly fail to properly showcase how cool the figures are in any attempt at photos.
Sadly, these Steel Brigade figures suffer from a design flaw. The hands are extremely small. So small that they won't really hold the rifles without either modifying the rifle or modifying the hands. Both are bad options. And, it really limits these figures since it's very difficult to get them to hold their weapons without risking thumb breakage. Aside from that, though, the quality is very good. The plastic is different from vintage and repaint era Hasbro plastic. So, you'll notice it once in hand. But, the joints are tight and the paint masks are crisp. So, the these Steel Brigades work well in a collection.
The figures included a nice complement of accessories. The coolest piece was the silver backpack. It is a cool color that works perfectly with the figure. He also includes a small pistol and knife. I'm not 100% sure of the origin of these sculpts. They are Joe-adjacent and not reproductions of vintage Joe gear. The coup de gras, though, was the inclusion of a black Steel Brigade rifle. This rifle was highly desired outside of the baby blue in which it debuted with Recoil back in 1989. And, for the first decade of online Joe collecting, it was acquirable. But, that had changed by 2017. So, being able to acquire large quantities of properly colored versions of the weapon was the real value in the figure. As the very common version "D" Steel Brigade was my entry point to the character, I only consider the Recoil weapon as the viable weapon for any Steel Brigades. So, it's great to have it included with this version.
In the late 2010's, Black Major produced a dozen or so repaints of the Steel Brigade. Simultaneously, Red Laser Army released another 1/2 dozen, give or take, repaints of the mold. Black Major's figures included an alternate, Airborne torso to help differentiate your armies. The Red Laser figures, though, did not. Black Major's figures also included an Airborne rifle while Red Laser Army included a more modernly sculpted pistol that didn't fit into the figure's hands. Between the two factions, there were more than enough Steel Brigades to go around. But, after the initial runs were completed, the molds disappeared from both sellers. In 2023, Black Major brought the Steel Brigades back with a newly updated mold. Again, many new repaints were produced. The Airborne torso was gone. But, the new figures filled in gaps that had been missing for nearly 40 years.
Sadly, Sky Patrol Steel Brigade figures have pretty much dried up. You could buy lots of three figures for $12 each for a long time. But, those days are gone. And, all of the Red Laser Steel Brigade flavors have gotten much harder to find. You can expect to pay in excess of $30 for one of the figures these days. The popularity of Steel Brigade in general, the high quality of this figure and the usefulness of this specialty within the Steel Brigade ranks all add up to a desirable acquisition for newer collectors. It's really amazing to me how much the Joe world changed between 2017 and 2020. That short span fundamentally altered the landscape of collecting from an affordable past time to a speculative collectible with a high cost of entry. It's too bad. Because, figures like this Steel Brigade were designed to be an affordable way to build the army you always wanted as a kid. Now, they're single purchases that get tucked away in drawers or boxes and check off a box on a spreadsheet. It's fun to recall these days of Red Laser Army as they speak to a simpler time in the collecting world. I think this figure represents the innocence of that era and the potential that still existed in the line.
