I love the Joes, but it’s always an extra-special time when another member of Cobra comes out. And it’s extra-extra special when it’s an ‘84 Cobra, which might have been the strongest year for bad guys.
I had a small delay in acquiring Copperhead when I was a kid. I never had the Water Moccasin—I barely had any of the water-based vehicles—so it would take until 1987 and Hasbro’s mail-order vehicle driver offer that I was able to get him. It righted an egregious hole in my Cobra collection.
Copperhead’s design is…well, it’s just the tops. I love the color scheme, with that dark teal and vibrant neon green rubbing against each other. And the helmet, which exposes only his cruel-looking eyes, is also one of the best. Everything about him stands out from amongst the other Cobra villains.
The Classified figure carries over everything great about the original figure. He looks mysterious and deadly, but also remains as eye-catching as ever. There’s a decent amount of new sculpting here to capture the quirky original design, from his ribbed thighs to his tank-top shirt. The ribbing on his inner thigh isn’t quite as bulbous as the original figure (a detail I kind of miss) but it all meshes very well.
The helmet is the star of the show for me. Since my toy fandom started out with vintage Star Wars, I’ve always been a big fan of fully to nearly-fully helmeted figures of any kind, and GI Joe continued the trend. It always adds an extra layer of menace when you don’t quite know what the person looks like underneath there. Like I said, all you get here are eyes, but they get across the attitude perfectly.
Copperhead’s articulation works great. I had no problems with his hips, which I kind of feel I need to point out every time since so many earlier figures were a little too tight for comfort. Nothing is more troublesome than seeing that white stressed plastic on the hip pegs, but these moved fine right out of the gate.
Copperhead comes with a nice array of weaponry, all suitable for a guy that lives his life in the swamps. He comes with a pistol that holsters to his leg, a bigass sighted revolver that holsters to his back, and a machete that slides into a sheathe on his hip. The original Copperhead figure came with no weapons, so he’d always have to borrow someone else’s gun if he wanted to shoot some Joes. I like the guns for longer range shootouts of course, but the machete feels perfect for cutting his way through the tangled swamp flora…or any Joe that gets too close.
Copperhead is another excellent addition to the Cobra ranks.
Source: Fwoosh
