2005 Comic Pack Dreadnok Thrasher - Around The Web

There's not a ton of content featuring this Comic Pack Thrasher.  Mostly, because he's not a good figure.  The original Thrasher is substantially better.  And, he's easier to find.  To top it off, this Thrasher also badly discolors.  So, there's no reason to spend a lot of time looking for one.

None of that takes away from the bizarreness of the figure.  There was no demand for Thrasher and he was never a popular character.  So, the fact we got two versions of him in the repaint era speaks to the perceived popularity of the Dreadnoks, in general.  Many people believed that the Dreadnoks were among the most popular concepts in the Joe line.  But, all of the products themed around them turned into retail duds.  So, they really weren't all that popular.

But, this Thrasher exists.  And, he does have some fun colors.  But, his head is worse than the original and the rest of the mold remains dated.  So, check out the sparse content on him from around the web.

2005 Thrasher Profile

2005 Thrasher by relena_warcraft

2005 Thrasher review at JoeBattleLines.com

2005 Thrasher by themexicangriswolds

2005 Thrasher by yotothejoe

2005 Thrasher by relena_warcraft

1986 Thrasher

I don't really know what to think about Thrasher.  He was among the first 1986 figures I acquired.  And, he was terrible.  His design, head and accessory were such a drastic departure from 1985 that I thought he must have been an early figure and the later releases that year would be better.  Alas, as far as vehicle drivers go, I was wrong.  And, Thrasher was perfectly exemplary of the quality that the 1986 vehicle drivers would feature.  Most of them had overly large noses and heads.  None came with cool gear like the '85's.  And, none of the them really stood out as a figure that deserved a single carded release.  All these years later, my opinion of Thrasher remains unchanged.  And, for a figure that entered my collection at the height of my Joe world building, he is conspicuously absent from my stories.

There are people who love Thrasher.  While Road Pig gets the most association with Mad Max, Thrasher's look is also out of derivative post apocalyptic fiction.  The oddball armor, bare midriff and green streak in his coiffed hair, though, don't create a particularly compelling design.  The paint applications and colors used for Thrasher, though, are pretty good.  And, it's a shame that he's one of the more adorned 1986 vehicle driver figures.  He features layers of color and painted details that do tie him more to the 1985 releases than the spotty paint mask drivers who would follow through the year.  In addition to his grey and black motif, Thrasher features green, brown and silver.  It's a solid array of color that bring life to the mold's details.  If Thrasher's shirt was not torn off, the figure would probably be more amenable to me.

The 1985 vehicle drivers are known for their accessories.  The figures included amazing weapons that were the envy of several single carded figures.  1986, though, did not follow this path.  Most of the drivers did not include any accessories at all, further downgrading them from the previous brethren.  Thrasher, though, was one of the few who did include an accessory.  Sadly, though, it's an oddball lacrosse stick with a spiked ball instead of a net.  It's a silly weapon.  Though, it's made worse by the fact that the handle is incredibly thick and did not feature a natural grip.  To this day, I have never successfully put the stick into Thrasher's hand.  Others have done it.  But, I can't bring myself to risk it.  Especially for a weapon that's simply useless.

As my only Cobra land vehicle available as 1986 started was my old Hiss Tank, Cobra found themselves at the mercy of Joe's superior mechanized capabilities.  So, with the introduction of the Thunder Machine, it made no sense to have it be a one off vehicle that was manned by a named crew.  So, in short order, the Thunder Machine was driven by old, beat up Cobras and was an army building, anti-infantry vehicle that rode in support of the Hiss battalions.  When the STUN entered my collection later in the year, it simply joined a now formidable Cobra force.  But, the Thunder Machine was not part of the Dreadnoks.  It was Cobra.

Of course, this left Thrasher as the odd man out.  And, I had no use for the figure.  But, he was part of the inspiration for the bands of "punks" that inhabited my Joe world.  These were people who lived in the ruins and debris fields left by the massive battles between Joe and Cobra.  They were not affiliated with either faction and they were dangerous to each.  They survived by salvaging machines and weapons from the discarded battlefields.  They sold these to 3rd party merchants who sold them back to Joe or Cobra.  The punks were based on a throwaway line in an issue of Savage Tails that was passed around my classroom.  I only remember that the good guys blasted their way through a nuclear winter wasteland.  The "punks" became my wild card.  Often, Joes or Cobras would have to scrounge debris fields for missing comrades or lost intelligence.  Here, they'd run into punks.  

The punks were savage and could be formidable fighters.  They had access to large caches of weapons.  And, they'd use them to soften up their quarry before they'd finish the job in brutal, face to face combat.  I built an entire society for these people.  Some of them were runaways from the cities and towns surrounding the battlefields.  Others were born into the life.  And, some, like Buzzer, were disaffected intellectuals who found the allure of such raw brutality too much to resist.  So, Thrasher would embody some of the punks.  It was rare that they would win a skirmish.  Even if they killed a few Joes, a larger force would come in and annihilate them.  But, it was a way to get some use out of poor figures like Thrasher and also liven up the Joe vs. Cobra dynamic and provide diversions from the standard story.

Thrasher had just the one release in the vintage line.  As the Thunder Machine made its journey around the world and was released in various countries, Thrasher didn't follow.  He was completely MIA until 2004 when he appeared in a convention exclusive attendee set with Zanzibar.  This red Thrasher repaint showed that there wasn't much redemption for the mold.  And, it sat unsold, for years...only selling out when it was offered on clearance.  On the heels of the convention figure, though, Thrasher showed up in the first series of DTC Comic Packs in 2005.  This figure got a new head.  It also got blue pants which discolor worse than the plastic used in 1985 on the original 3 Dreadnoks.  He was an odd choice and that Dreadnok Comic Pack was also clearanced for $3 after it had sat around, collecting dust in the warehouse for a few years.  So, Thrasher got way more than he deserved.

I'm not alone in disliking Thrasher.  He is one of the few cheap Joe figures left.  High quality figures can be had with no effort for $10.  And, mint and complete with filecard versions top out at $15.  In this market, that's about as cheap as figures come.  Honestly, though, I'd avoid Thrasher even at those prices.  He just offers nothing.  But, for Dreadnok fans, he is one of the few members of the team.  So, that alone makes him somewhat desirable.  And, the Thunder Machine is a staple of any Dreadnok collection.  So, you need a Thrasher for that.  But, the overall package of the figure is just off from the original design of the Dreadnoks.  But, again, my opinion of the figure is not shared by all. So, your personal value from the figure may vary from mine.

2005 Dreadnok Thrasher - Comic Pack

In early 1986, one of my younger brother's friends found pretty much all the new Joes at once.  He brought them to school and immediately put me into a "must have it now" mindset.  This was exacerbated when my brother found the lone 1986 figure at Target, a Dial Tone figure.  I was upset and spent the next few months desperately trying to get over his win of the Dial Tone find.  At some point in February or early March, word got around that the local KB Toy store (always a hot bed of early finds) had a new vehicle.  I convinced my mother to take me and found the Dreadnok Thunder Machine.  At first, I was underwhelmed by the vehicle and the figure included.  However, there was no way I was going to pass it up as it would afford me the chance to be the first to have the 1986 catalog insert that would show all the new toys rather than just the cardbacks.  So, I bought the Thunder Machine, enjoyed the jealous looks of my friends as the insert was passed around school and promptly forgot about the vehicle.  One of the reasons for this, though, was the less than stellar driver: Thrasher.

The vintage Thrasher figure was pretty bad.  His head was too big, he didn't have nearly enough shirt and his weapon was just lame.  In short, he was nothing that I wanted to use.  Not even being new was enough to save the figure.  Fortunately, he was able to just sit in the Thunder Machine, out of sight, where he would periodically die.  That was the extent of my interaction with him.  That summer of '86, though, Thrasher showed up in the comic.  I was fond of the story arc where he was introduced, even if the character himself was fairly forgettable.  This brought the figure out.  But, his poor overall quality quickly relegated him back into obscurity.

In late 1986 and into 1987, though, my Cobra armory was in desperate need of an upgrade.  While I still had decent Hiss Tanks, they had been around for nearly 5 years and were old hat to me.  I had gotten a STUN in '86 and it was a good foil to the Havoc.  But, when Cobra attacked the Joes in my room, they had two Hiss Tanks and a STUN.  That was it.  (The Stinger had long since died a thousand deaths.)  Against the Mauler, VAMP, Havoc, Dragonfly, Bridge Layer and a host of smaller vehicles, Cobra didn't stand a chance.  So, the Thunder Machine was retrofitted as a Cobra vehicle.  Out went Thrasher and in went a spare Viper whose thumb had broken.  The Thunder Machine became Cobra's anti-infantry weapon.  And, with that, Thrasher's limited role was taken away.

As 1987 progressed, Thrasher found use as a random civilian.  (All the Dreadnoks were moved to this role, eventually.)  Here, he would attack either Joes or Cobras from inside an A-Team van.  It was a way to expand beyond the Joe vs. Cobra dynamic.  But, those were short lived adventures and the figure was merely filler rather than a character.  As such, my childhood Thrasher figure survived in excellent shape.  This was not due to diligence but indifference to the character.  And, so, Thrasher faded out of my mind.  In 2004, the figure was repainted for a convention exclusive.  I bought the set, but never actually opened Thrasher.  (Zanzibar was opened the minute I got the set.)  He stayed in his bag until I sold him off.  Then, came this 2005 figure.

When the final comic packs were announced, they were met with relative yawns.  Collectors had seen the #9 comic pack for years.  So, finally getting it at retail was anti-climatic.  The Tunnel Rat/Hawk/Flint pack seemed boring since there had been so many Tomahawk and Tunnel Rat versions and the Flint mold had been used a few times.  The Fred figure was worth it for the head and Zartan was a cool upgrade.  But, both he and Zarana had appeared in the 2004 convention set and has recently been Funskool releases.  So, they seemed tired.  The Dreadnok pack was the most damning, though.  All three of the figures had been released just one year prior in the convention set.  While this set was pricey to buy prior to it's release, most of the figures from it were available for under $10 (yes, including Thrasher/Zanzibar) in 2005.  So, there was really no need for the figures to be so quickly re-visited: especially after the Dreadnok themed convention set was met with such malaise from the collector base.

But, the Dreadnok pack did feature excellent upgrades of both Buzzer and Ripper.  Buzzer's head was akin to his comic appearance and Ripper's melon was shrunk down to a more realistic size.  The colors on both figures were kept in line with the character's original looks, but given just enough difference that they were worth picking up for another look for the characters.  Thrasher, though, did not get the same treatment.  His new head was more narrow.  His hair was less '80's, but still overly large.  While the vintage head was bad, this new head was not much of an improvement.  The real failure, though, was the color scheme.  The original Thrasher featured a subdued back and grey motif that fit with the "Road Warrior" vibe of the design.  This new figure had orange highlights, pastel green details and a bluish-grey base with purple highlights.  Basically, the figure is a mess.  There is nothing about him that is an upgrade in any way.

But, in this eye-gouging menagerie of colors there is the redeeming factor of Thrasher being something different.  The comic pack and Toys R Us set colors of that era didn't take many chances.  The same themes of tan, green, blue and red were released over and over again.  Getting a figure with some different colors made for something a little closer to the variety of the vintage line.  In that vein, this Thrasher was welcome.  But, at the end of the day, the Thrasher mold is still fairly bad and the character's look has not aged well at all.  The new head brings nothing to the mold that you can't get in the vintage version.  In general, it's a bad figure.  (And, to top it off, mine is starting to discolor even though it's been stored out of sunlight and only used for this profile.  The 2000's era plastic may be worse than we thought.)  But, at least it's bad for different reasons.

In 2004, the Thrasher character was "fleshed out" more in a Convention filecard.  They gave Thrasher a file name and had him born in Belgium.  This is all fine and good.  Except for the fact that Thrasher's original filecard is dripping with classic Larry Hama disdain for suburban, yuppie life of the 1980's.  While not a uniquely American stereotype, it was the roots of what would later become the "Ugly American" archetype.  Aside from this, Thrasher's original card heavily hinted that he simply wandered into the swamps and found Zartan.  Knowing Zartan's base of operations was in the Florida Everglades, it implies more and more that Thrasher was a lost American youth.  (Another favorite Larry Hama theme that appeared in the comics more than once.)  So, there's a definite schism between the various characterizations of Thrasher.  For me, the character is so poor that I really don't pay either much heed.  But, based on my introduction to Thrasher in 1986, I'm more inclined to stick with Hama's original dossier rather than the fan fueled update.

This Thrasher figure was heavily clearanced by both Hasbro Toy Shop and, later, Toys R Us.com.  This put massive amounts of cheap Dreadnoks into the marketplace.  Today, you can get a mint, complete Thrasher for $3 or $4.  But, they are not nearly as plentiful as they once were.  While carded Dreadnok comic packs used to clog online auction sites for 1/2 their retail price, they are now fairly sparse.  Even carded, though, this set doesn't eclipse much more than $20.  But, this is a case where buying the individual figures is a better deal than getting a carded set since you can probably get all three Dreadnoks for under $10 if you look hard enough.  (Buzzer is definitely worth it.)  Had I not been both a completist and a fan of the Buzzer figure in 2006, it's unlikely I would have this pack at all.  When they were blown out for nothing, I picked up a few extras.  Those, of course, are long gone.  But, a complete set remains.  While I'm not a fan of Thrasher in general or this figure in particular, it was a good way to get something different into the hands of collectors.  I can at least appreciate that effort: even if the execution was a bit off.