This year’s PulseCon started off a bit slow for my taste, but finished off with a bang with the Legends and Classified teams. I can see why they scheduled them at the end as I left the showing feeling really excited for what was to come. Today we’re talking about the highlight of this PulseCon for my money, the G.I. Joe Classified reveals!
They started their presentation as they usually do with some name-only reveals, though they were so crunched for time, I could barely register the names as they flew by. Fortunately people wrote them down and they include:
- Metal-Head
- Night-Creepers
- Cobra Ferret
- Gnawgahyde with “friends”
- Retro Beachhead
- Retro Eel
- Retro Snow Serpents
Metalhead’s render was actually shown a bit after this, so we’ll talk about him later. The Night-Creepers make a lot of sense as a fairly popular army builder Cobra troop. They will make more great fodder for Snake Eyes and Co. to take down.
The Cobra Ferret makes me happy to see they are continuing on with more vehicular expansion. I wonder if it will come with a figure since it is a bit bigger than a bike. The original box art has Storm Shadow and Firefly, but I doubt they would re-pack those two with it. Maybe they’ll make a new Ferret pilot.
Gnawgahyde was a bit of a surprise since I kind of view him as a third tier Dreadnok behind just about everybody else and I would have thought that guys like Road Pig and Zandar would come first. I did find it interesting that they specifically said he’d come with “friends” instead of just mentioning his boar. I wonder if there will be more animals like snakes and lizards and such since he is a Poacher. Maybe cages? I hope so, they do great work with the animals in this line. Maybe they’ll do a Kangaroo that you can put with Big Boa to simulate his Kangor variant.
The three retro figures were nice to hear. I got my hands on plenty of Eels, but not everybody was so lucky, so I’m very glad to hear that they will be mainline releases in the future. I hope they go the Lady Jaye route with these and release some more classic accessories with the figures like the classic Snow Shoes and pack for the Snow Serpents or the Eel’s classic pack and gun.
Next up were the render reveals and there were quite a few of those with:
- Big Boa
- Airborne
- Techno-Viper
- Quick Kick
- Metal-Head
- Mutt and Junkyard
- Retro Duke
- Retro Scarlett
- Retro Recondo
- 60th Anniversary Action Soldier
- 60th Anniversary Action Sailor
Big Boa skews extremely classic, but it is pretty cool to see his actual face under there. He reminds me a little of Frank Castle somehow. I like the bloody taped hands, but I do wish they were fists instead and the weights are fun bit of world building. I do like that they went to the trouble of making a new torso instead of re-using the Gung-Ho/Roadblock body completely.
Tony mentioned that they toned down Airborne’s colors, but the look of this works for me perfectly as a classic Airborne. I do wonder how torso and leg articulation will be effected by that overlay as it looks like those brown straps go from around his shoulders to around his crotch. The helmet and goggle options look like they’ll give you a lot of posing possibilities.
I absolutely love the cartoon influence with the inclusion of the Frozen Fudgee bar. The longer hair makes me think of the card art too and I’m stoked they gave him a bit of “woo” expression on that alternate head. It’s very Bruce Lee, which never hurts with me. He’s a guy I’m glad to see gets some fists though chop hands are less my thing and I think I would have gone for a more open hand Kung Fu posturing hand. I also like that they added a slight bit of detail to the sides of the pants and sash to juice up his extremely simple outfit. Quick Kick was probably my sentimental favorite of these render reveals, but I also was really impressed with the detail in his build in terms of musculature and veins and such.
We knew this guy was coming, but I’m glad they didn’t make us wait long. The techno viper is another solid Cobra Trooper with very classic ARAH styling. I’m very curious to see that holo-display in action on an actual figure.
Metal-Head is not a character I ever cared about. I have a vague memory of him being annoying on the DIC produced G.I. Joe Cartoon, but he’s a great example of them taking something I had not interest in and making him into a must-have looking figure. They put a lot of love into this deluxe figure and he’s packed with a ton of display options. His original figure helmet looks pretty dopey, so I’m glad they took a different approach here, though I can’t imagine not displaying him with those yellow goggles and all missiles firing at once. Props for the Cold Slither reference on his neck armor.
I got to see Mutt and Junkyard up close at SDCC, but I still liked seeing the renders with everything laid out all clearly to see. Mutt is great, but Junkyard is looking to be another stellar entry in the pantheon of G.I. Joe Classified animal companions. I love the balance they struck with respecting the original design elements like Mutt’s muzzle and goggles on his helmet, but bumping up to the next level of detail and functionality. I can’t wait to mess around with these figures.
Retro Scarlett was also no surprise since we heard the name only reveal and saw the Glenda figure that uses all Scarlett parts, but I loved seeing it anyway. The inclusion of fists for her and Duke are such a welcome addition and I love that they thought about how the ponytail would work in conjunction with the pack. The thigh-mounted quiver is a neat addition that’s not strictly classic, but feels like it should be.
The original Classified Duke is still one of my favorite figures in the line, but it looks to me like they also knocked this one out of the park. He looks a bit bigger and way more classic and I’m so glad he’ll be able to punch Cobras right out of the box. It’s also nice to see that classic OG 13 style helmet in Classified and I’m for including the Sunbow rifle in all the retro releases going forward too.
Retro Recondo was a little less exciting than the rest, but I do love that color scheme, so he’s coming home with me for sure. I like how full his camo pattern feels. Sometimes these guys seem a little light on the camo, though that’s certainly not the case in our next figure.
I had heard rumors of a 60th anniversary couple of figures quite a while ago, but I did not imagine these modern takes on the original Action Solider and Sailor figures. I had seen that Adventure Team Joe statue from Diamond select and was hoping for a Classified version of Adventure Team Joe Colton, but now that I think about it, this makes a lot more sense. I’m less interested in modern military aspect of G.I. Joe than the fantasy aspect, but these do look like wonderful figures. I’m curious to see how the soft goods poncho turns out. I could still go for a Classified version of Adventure Team Joe Colton whenever that anniversary rolls around.
They wrapped up their presentation with pre-orders and pretty action photos of the next wave of figures and they all look gorgeous to me. I’m more of OG13 Col. Hawk guy than a ’86 Hawk, but they made this guy look great with the leather jacket detail and the removeable goggles on the helmet. He’s got a great face too. I was also really pleased to see that this wave will keep the closed box packaging style with the neat little scene renders on the front of the box.
Shockwave is another really solid figure with a great looking set of weaponry and display options. He’s not super flashy, but just looks like a solid, playable soldier figure in a unique color scheme.
Helix gets a whole new vibe with those blade arm weapons. There’s almost an insectoid feel in some of these great photos. The nice thing too, is if you don’t dig the arm blades, you can just take them off and go with strictly samurai swords.
Buzzer looks even better in figure form than he did in the render. I don’t think I got the full effect of his sinister visage in those renders, but the photographer Matt really brought it out here. It’s kinda interesting that it looks like he re-uses Destro/BBQ legs. I wouldn’t have thought that would work as well as it has here.
Finally, I’m going to wrap this up with my personal favorite reveal of the show, the final figure of Ripper. The personality in the portrait comes through so much better now and I love that his mohawk extends into this rat tail mullet. It’s perfectly ’80s. It’s super fun that the Dreadnok’s box art depicts their gas station hideout, even showing empty Grape Soda cans (the Dreadnok beverage of choice) littering the floor.
Ever since Classified started, I’ve been wondering how the Dreadnoks would look and they did not disappoint with these two at all. There’s a great mix of classic styling with some updated detail with tattoos and spikes and jewelry. I was also shocked to see they are due to release THIS YEAR! I cannot wait, and thankfully won’t have to wait long.
I was blown away by the breadth and depth of these reveals and they didn’t even talk about the VAMP which we know is coming! The line keeps going strong and grows and new and interesting ways. That’s my thoughts on the PulseCon Classified reveals, what are yours?
Source: Fwoosh
