My Favorite Accessories - Part 2

Part 1 of this series looked at my favorite weapons from childhood.  This time around, I'll be looking at some of the gear that really drove my second phase of collecting.  This period, technically, covers 1988 through 1997.  During that time, I only was able to find a few figures.  So, you're going to see a cross section of accessories.  And, a few classic items will be missing because, while they were released during this period, I didn't acquire them until 1998 or later.  Some of these items appeared in my early teen years when I wasn't collecting or buying Joes, but my youngest brother still was.  So, the limited exposure to them made them loom larger than they otherwise might have.

Early Adult Favorites:

1. Duke/Stalker/Others MP-5 inspired rifle

As I returned to Joe collecting in the mid 1990's, I spent most of my time tracking down the remnants of the line at various retail stores.  Among the first figures I found was the 1993 Duke.  This is a solid figure.  But, the main source of interest in him was the "new" weapons on his tree.  While I was passingly familiar with Muskrat's shotgun (someday I'll tell that story...), the other weapons were ones I had never before seen.  As far as I was concerned, they were completely new sculpts.  It was the MP-5 inspired weapon that piqued my interest, though.  It looked great with Duke.  It was somehow both compact and large.  This was accomplished by having the overall footprint be small while giving the weapon a larger barrel.  I turned this into a story element.  These newer weapons became "Generation 4" weapons.  They were more powerful and could carry more ammo than earlier weapon designs.  As they were new, they were limited to only the highest ranking Joes.  Eventually, Cobra got some and gave them to elite troopers, too.  As I got more and more 1993 and 1994 figures, the weapons became less special.  And, with more colors in tow, the MP-5 like weapon became one of my favorite standards across my Joes.

Even today, this is my favorite weapon to use with 1993 and 1994 figures.  It exists in a plethora of colors...some rarer than others.  But, you can get it in black, gold, yellow, purple and other colors with a bit of looking around.  It remains one of my key weapons.  And, I'll always pick up a new one if the price is right.  I have unfulfilled plans of being able to outfit the entire 1993 carded lineup with these weapons for a photo at some point.  I'm not quite there on the right number of them in my collection, yet, though.

2. Annihilator Pistol

I first saw this weapon at the home of some family friends who had some younger children.  I remember it being awesome.  Around 1995 or 1996, I found my first Annihilator at a flea market in southern Ohio.  I picked him up for the rifle.  Once in hand, it reminded me of the awesome weapons from G.I. Joe #36 back in 1985.  In short order, I bought as many Annihilators as I could find.  The figure was "new" to me and I loved the portable helicopter.  I saw them as the airborne division of the Alley Vipers and they made up a key ingredient in my early notion of Cobra urban death squads.  With plenty of his weapons in hand, I had them available for use with any other figure I wanted.

And, with them in hand, my fascination with the weapon ended.  It was difficult to make the weapon look good with other figures.  And, it was a bit bigger than I had remembered.  It was less of a one handed pistol and more of a two handed weapon that switched up my notion of the weapon's versatility.  I still find it the necessary weapon for Annihilators.  But, I've long since sold off my army of that figure.  I have a couple of spares of the weapon, though, still hanging around.  I'll use them with another figure from time to time.  I do need to get a photo of it in the hands of a Fred to mimic that old comic.  

3. Hit & Run  Rifle

This one is a bit of a cheat.  I actually did own Hit and Run when I was a kid.  I bought three 1988 figures before I quit toys.  And, Hit and Run was one of them.  I immediately fell in love with his rifle.  But, I didn't to use it very often as I left  my Hit and Run hanging on a wall at my grandparents' house shortly after I got him.  Once the figure was recovered, though, my Joes were put away.  So, it was on rare occasion when I'd get them out.  Inevitably, Hit and Run would be among the figures chosen, though.  Part of it was the sheer quality of the figure.  Part was his amazing rope & grappling hook bag.  And, the final piece was his rifle.  Everything about it seemed perfect.  It had a long clip to store extra ammo.  It was compact enough to be used in close quarters.  And, the figures just held it perfectly.  I wanted to use it with pretty much every one of my favorite figures during this time.  But, I had just one sample with no way to acquire more.

That changed in the mid 1990's as weapon trees began to proliferate.  The real joy was finding extra samples of this rifle being included on weapon trees of 1993 and 1994 figures.  With this discovery, I was able to acquire an excellent rifle in a variety of colors.  As the weapon was my preferred rifle for the 1994 Shipwreck, I came to see it as a standard rifle used by all sorts of Joe themed army builders.  So, having it in cream with Snow Storm and even red with Outback allowed some consistency on the weapons used by the troops who supported the Joes.  Note that this weapon is often confused with the 1992 Shockwave rifle.  They are similar, but not the same.  Also, some late run 1994 figures featured the rifle but with a blocked out trigger guard.  Those aren't bad.  But, I do prefer the original design.

Now the rifle is ubiquitous.  And, I had so many of them that it's become a bit passe.  But, the early 2000's brought some weapons into the mainstream to a point where they started to get stale.  Hit and Run's weapon was one of them.  And, while I still love it, I don't see it as the staple for every figure as I once envisioned nearly 30 years ago.  But, I do still find uses for it and you'll see it being carried by other figures in some photos around the site.

4. Bullhorn's Mask

My youngest brother got a Bullhorn in 1990.  I believe he was  the only 1990 figure that we ever had.  While his rifle was amazing and everyone still goes ga-ga over his weapon case backpack, I found the real value in him was his gas mask.  I love gas masks.  And, as a kid, I lamented that the only ones you could get were either Ripcord's airmask or Lifeline's rescue mask.  I gave them to pilots, troopers navigating gassed caves and just to anyone I wanted to look cool.  But, they had limitations (like the hose you had to plug in for it to look good) and always left me wanting more.

Bullhorn's mask, though, solved this problem.  It was a self contained piece and was sculpted with the air filter right on it.  When placed on the figure's head, Bullhorn could be a faceless army builder.  I now had a way for more figures to be outfitted with protective masks.  Unfortunately, though, the specific design of Bullhorn's mask made it so that it was form fitted for Bullhorn's head.  And, that made it difficult or impossible to really use the mask with a variety of other figures.  And, this limited the mask's use.  But, the overall design still works.  I've since found Bullhorn to be a more boring figure than I'd remembered.  The mask, though, overcomes this and keeps the figure relevant to me.  I just wish it was a little more flexible for use on a wider variety of figures.

5. Spearhead's Rifle

I do not know how this weapon entered into our collection.  We never had a 1988 Spearhead.  But, at some point, his rifle appeared among our toys.  It was likely left by one of my brother's friends.  As soon as I saw it, though, the rifle simply enthralled me.  Mostly, this was because it was new.  But, also, the rifle featured a couple of key design elements that I found among the cooler features of Joe accessories.  First, it had a bayonet.  But, we'll talk more about this, later.  The second, and more important feature, was the strap.  I had long loved strapped weapons.  They allowed your figure to carry their weapon without having to always be holding it in their hand.  I never like my Joes climbing a rope if they didn't have a strap on their gun because it wasn't realistic to just have their weapon magically appear at the top if they didn't have a means to carry it.  It's weird what unrealistic elements bothered me when I was a kid and which didn't affect me at all.

Back to the bayonet, though.  While I really liked bayonets, the piece on Salvo's rifle made the weapons footprint rather large.  And, at some point in the early 1990's, I wanted a knife for some figure.  The bayonet on Salvo's rifle was of sufficient size to work as a knife for a figure.  So, since the weapon wasn't key to any complete figure in my collection, I snipped off the bayonet and gave the knife to someone.  The paired down rifle was then smaller and looked even better with the figures to whom I gave it.  At various points, I've found the snipped bayonet and wondered who's knife it was.  Usually, I then remember that I cut this off from the original weapon.  I'm 99% sure that the bayonet is still sitting in a plastic baggie of superfluous edged weapons stored in a shoebox in the basement closet.  And, you'll see the snipped version of the rifle in a photo below.

In the early 1990's, I gave this weapon that mysteriously appeared in our home to a figure who also had a similar origin: Salvo.  I don't know where Salvo came from.  And, our figure just had the helmet.  So, it was another likely leave behind from some unknown friend of my brother.  But, Salvo and Spearhead's gun just seemed to mesh.  And, without having Salvo's real accessories, it made sense for him to have this borrowed weapon.  So, between 1991, or so, and 1999, Salvo always carried Spearhead's rifle.  In fact, if you can find really old Salvo photos on the site, you'll see him carrying it.  To this day, I more associate Spearhead's rifle with Salvo than I do with Spearhead.  But, that's because Salvo is an awesome figure and Spearhead is...not.

Really, these were the dark days of Joe.  I didn't collect for several years.  And, when I got back into things, I was chasing the dregs of the line at retail while also scouring out the not ready for primetime flea market scene that define the pre-internet days.  You didn't find a lot of Joes back then.  And, those that you did find were often those from my childhood years.  Meaning they were figures I already owned.  So, it was hard to find items I didn't have already.  

There were many more, better accessories that were released in this time.  But, I didn't really acquire them until my collector phase began in earnest around 1998.  We'll explore those in the final installment in a few months.  Until then, though, what are some of your favorite accessories from this time?  Let me know in the comments below.

1989 Annihilator - Redux

I originally profiled the Annihilator in December of 1999. In the nearly 6 years since I wrote that profile, little about my interest in the Annihilator has changed. I still consider him a great forgotten army builder from a year that is already full of great army builders. My re-examination of the figure stems from the fact that as one of my earliest profiles, my take on the Annihilator was not "finished". It felt lacking as the profile had no depth and did not fully cover the usefulness of this figure. Plus, the Annihilator's role in my collection has expanded as my Cobra now focuses its operations in manners that suit the Annihilator.

The Annihilator is a very well done figure. His mold is sleek and streamlined: just as needed for a trooper whose primary duty is operating an individual helicopter pack. His accessories are amazing with the fully detailed and spinning chopper as well as one of the most distinctive guns in the original run of the line. He suffers, though, from poor color choices. The orange and purple simply don't allow this figure to be as popular as the mold and accessories would suggest. The side benefit to this, though, is that the figure is cheaper than many of his contemporary Cobra army builders. 1989 is generally considered one of the best years for Cobra army builders in the history of the line. It is so good that most people would not consider a figure like the Annihilator (who would be the class of several other figure years) to be even in the top 5 army builders released in his own year. That helps to further denigrate this figure and pushes him lower on the popularity scale than he probably deserves.

In my collection, Annihilators are not Destro's troops. They are a highly specialized branch of my Cobra Urban Death Squads. My Cobra learned a few years ago that the best way to terrorize the citizens of various countries was to show them how tenous their civil safety really was. To accomplish this, Cobra targeted several small but densely populated but still rural towns and cities. In a matter of minutes, Cobra dispatched highly trained Alley Vipers to basically run over a small geographical portion of the town: killing everyone and everything they came across. The raids simply underscored how easy it was for a terrorist organization to strike at anyone in the country at any time. No one was safe: not even in the small, almost off the map towns that have reputations as havens from urban crime.

The Urban Death Squads who carried out these macabre orders are comprised of highly trained Alley Vipers. They are trained to shoot first and kill everything. In order to cut down on their friendly fire fatalities, though, Cobra outfitted the brigades in bright orange. While this may seem like it would make them easy targets, the reality is that these troops descend quickly upon towns with small, undertrained and underarmed police forces and no military presence. So, they have little to worry about in terms of opposition soldiers shooting at their orange visages. Instead, they know that anything they see moving that is dressed in orange is one of them and they can sedate their killing tendencies for that one instance. It helped reduce friendly fire deaths but also allowed me a way to explain away the V1 Alley Viper's orange color.

The Annihilators came into play after the third Urban Death Squad attack. During that attack, the Joes had a covert operative in the town. As the Death Squad descended, the operative managed to signal a Tomahawk to come rescue him. The Alley Vipers watched in vain as the chopped picked up the operative and carried him to safety. (Actually, the chopper was hijacked on the roof as it picked up the operative but that's a story for another profile!) This lead to the first surviving witness to a Death Squad attack. Cobra could not afford that and they invented the Annihilators as means to patrol the skies and prevent any more helicopter rescues. While keeping opposing choppers away is part of the Annihilator duties, they are also the first line of offense in a Death Squad attack. When Alley Vipers burst out of their hiding places and come running through the town, the Annihilators appear over the horizon and start landing much as is described in their filecards. They are simply an extension of the Alley Vipers. While some stay airborne the entire time to act as spotters or to mop up any survivors who try to run through the attack line, Annihilators, typically, land on the rooftops of larger buildings to work their way down through the top floors to meet with the Alley Vipers coming through the bottom at some point in the middle. They also land in the center of the attack area and fan their way out to also meet up with the Alley Vipers who are closing in from the outside. It makes the attacks much more efficient and allows them to finish much more quickly. The hallmark of an Urban Death Squad attack is that it is over, everyone in the area who isn't a Cobra is dead and any Cobra fatalities or injuries are cleaned up in under 15 minutes. That way, by the time authorities arrive, there is simply no evidence of who perpetrated the attack but there is a devastating amount of civilian death and destruction left behind.

As the concept of the Urban Death Squad is rather prominent in my Joe world, the Annihilators get used rather frequently. As my Death Squads have matured, they have begun to take on military installations and some Annihilators now fight against real armed foes rather than panicked, unarmed civilians. Here, they don't fare as well. But, the experience learned from the civilian attacks has given Cobra a much more experienced army: especially in South America. As my Cobra looks to expand its operations into Africa, I can see the Annihilators remaining an important part of Cobra's military strategy. The personalized choppers give Cobra a mighty force with the portability to retain the element of surprise against their quarry and a reliable means of extraction if something goes wrong. That is a good combination for them to have as it meshes with their planned style of guerrilla warfare.

After its use in the US, the Annihilator mold was sent to Brazil. There he was released with slight color variances and different accessories. The figure has not been seen since. The Brazilian Forca Electronica series of which the Annihilator was a part also included molds from the '89 HEAT Viper, '88 Muskrat, '87 Outback, '89 Frag Viper, '88 Toxo Viper, '88 Repeater and the '89 Scoop. These don't offer many useful clues as to the status of the Annihilator mold as 2 of the figure molds have been subsequently used in the US, 2 were used in India and the other three have yet to appear anywhere else. So, it's difficult to say whether or not this figure is available. The fact that he was not repainted as part of the 2005 Iron Grenadier themed convention set, though, leads me to believe that the Annihilator mold is gone and this is a figure forever doomed to his orange legacy.

Personally, I would like to see a repaint of the Annihilator. This is a mold that could be painted in a multitude of ways and all would be more useful than the original. The figure could be painted Cobra blue and integrated into Cobra or offered in black and gold as part of the Iron Grenadiers. Either way would work. Unfortunately, as we have yet to see this happen, I doubt it will ever come to pass. Even so, I don't mind that as much as it allows the Annihilator to remain one of the undiscovered gems of the vintage line. I think that some figure molds should be left alone and never repainted. Usually, though, those are only figures that were done right the first time. As the Annihilator was flawed in his original incarnation, though, he would be a perfect candidate for repaint and a figure I would have considered long before many of the repainted molds we have actually received.

Annihilators are actually rather easy to find. Mint versions can be tougher since he the gold paint on the chest does tend to fade easily. However, even a figure with slight paint rubs is still very useful in a collection and makes for a great army. Even complete, you can easily acquire Annihilators for around $10 each. If you want them with less than their full complement of accessories, you can get them even cheaper than that. The fact that this figure is not, technically, a Cobra and the multitude of other 1989 Cobras who outshine the Annihilator help keep him lower in price. He remains a vintage army builder with a great mold and awesome accessories that is still affordable. While his color might scare some away from spending too much time acquiring the figures: I have found it to be an integral part of his specialty. I doubt my use of the figure will change the perception at large in the collecting world about this figure. But, if he gets even just a little more respect, it's worth it to me.

1989 Annihilator

Unlike his sister figure, the Alley Viper, Annihilator remains a relatively forgotten enemy. Since he, technically, was in the Iron Grenadiers subset, many collectors don't consider the Annihilator to be a true Cobra. This has hurt his long term popularity, but has helped keep this figure from becoming too expensive. The 1989 enemy figures were the second best crop Hasbro ever offered. They were very popular in their day and remain so now. While not hard to find, many of the '89 Cobras have started to become as expensive as the great '85's. Fortunately, for every Night Viper and Alley Viper, there is an Annihilator to keep things sane. This is a great figure. Sure, the individual helicopter pack is a bit unrealistic, but it is very cool. His weapon is great. (It reminds of the weapon Fred II used in issue #36 of the comic when he cornered Snake Eyes and Scarlett on the ferry.) I use Annihilators as the air arm of the Alley Vipers. It makes for a great city siege.

I can't get enough Annihilators. They are just awesome figures that you never hear about. As with most years that have a dominantly cool figure or two, there are always solid figures like the Annihilators in the background. I don't know why the Alley and Night Vipers have taken such a hold in the collecting community. They are neat figures, but didn't get any more airtime in the comic or the cartoon than the Annihilators did. It's amazing what the little Cobra symbol painted on their arms will do for a figure. This, though, has made most of the Iron Grenadiers line very affordable. The Iron Grenadiers figure, Annihilator, and Undertow just haven't reached the popularity peaks of the true Cobras released contemporarily. Just look at the figure. The purple and orange aren't the greatest colors, but they seem to work. The helmet is very good and not over done. The helicopter is a great accessory and his gun only completes the figure. He is the perfect addition to any enemy army.

In 1989, I only bought one figure. That was the Night Viper. I bring this up to illustrate my point. This figure is great, but it came out in a year full of great figures. Had this guy been released in 1988, he would be immensely more popular today. Annihilator is kind of like the Televiper. He just had the misfortune to come out in a year full of other great figures. I say I always want more Annihilators. Of course, I also always want more Alley and Night Vipers. This figure, though, gets no press. Collectors never talk about him. No one ever mentions an army of them. They are just a forgotten figure that most people have in their collections but never pay any attention to.

The Annihilator, much like the Range Viper, is a forgotten gem. They are very easy to find mint and complete, not too expensive, and very cool figures to own. Most people have them. 1989 is a very popular year. Most collectors have several of each of the figures from this year and '89's are always coming up for sale in large lots, often with multiples of the Cobras. An army of Annihilators looks very good, especially when mixed with Alley Vipers. These figures are almost always available carded, or mint complete. They also usually appear the same time as Alley and Night Vipers. Those two usually steal the spotlight and help keep the Annihilator even lower in price. If you're looking to start an enemy army (heck, I use them as Cobras!) Annihilators are a great place to start. You can start building very easily and not stress your budget. Of course, you can always send extras my way. They are one of the few figures that I will never stop amassing.