Custom Dusty mounts the Fridge

Easy custom Dusty.
Recipe: ROC Desert Assault Duke and Backpack
with POC Snake-Eyes hands;
POC Dusty head
POC Dusty helmet with added rag
POC Dusty goggles
Marauderinc modular M4
BBI Marine Grenadier pistol belt

Paint wash with Tamiya paint & thinners

Dragonfly XH-1

This is not the Dragonfly XH-1. No no, this is the year 2k's 'Locust XH-1'. Practically the same vehicle but with a slightly inferior plastic quality and a tan plastic colour that looks a little too close to flesh for my liking. Wanna see what I mean? I love the Dragonfly, and it sees a lot of use (possibly as much as my Tomahawk, since they are normally deployed together) but my 1983 version is a little beat up. I had also never been in possession of a nose gun that elevated as I had the fixed, swivel-only variation. So when the opportunity to own a mint in box 'Dragonfly' for only $20, I bit. Straight out of the box, I sprayed it with a light grey primer. Figured grey would be the way to go for a chopper destined to operate off the deck of the USS Flagg. I was doing bloody well too - successfully masking certain areas I didn't want grey-ed, no fingerprints of clumping, clean work. Then I got it in my head to spray the molded canopy frame. I thought my masking skills were up to the challenge, exposing only the frame and masking the clear bits... I was wrong. But to add salt to the wound, fool child, I thought turpentine would be able to remove the paint.

If it were this colour,I might not have needed to paint it. The prototype seems a bit darker. Pity, it would have fit better with the Tomahawk if the release was the same.

No dice. Not only is mineral turpentine useless at removing Dulux primer, it is very efficient at melting plastic, something I should have remembered from my model-building days. Within moments, a crystal clear canopy had been reduced to a cloudy mess.

Determined to save my 'new' canopy, I was directed to a number of guides on how to sand, buff and polish clear plastic in order to remove scratches and starring and restore its clarity. This involves sanding the canopy with incrementally less gritty sandpaper until you are essentially buffing it. Then you go on to use Brasso (?) and/or toothpaste (??) to get the shine back. Crazy. I sanded that thing for two days straight and presented it in my then severely calloused hands to my buddy Paul who proceeded to declare it a write off. Shit.

But you know what? That just gave me the idea to paint over my fuckup and make this Dragonfly a remote drone attack helo. And I think it looks pretty spiffy. Thanks to Paul's airbrush wizardry, this Dragonfly drone looks very tough indeed. I don't even want to decal it. Nice!

Tales of woe and triumph aside, the Dragonfly must be securely within my top 5 G.I. Joe vehicles of all time. I think I'm a sucker for helos tho. The Tomahawk also has a place in my top 5. I can't decide which is ranks higher. While I love the huge play possibility of the Tomahawk, being both a gunship and a troop transport, the fun of cranking the Dragonfly rotor mechanism is pretty hard to beat. The smoothness of the mechanism and the weight and balance of the blades make for a very realistic rotation, even when you've stopped cranking. I get such a kick out of simulated take-offs and landings, and I dare say I am very proficient in performing them.

She is a light attack chopper, small but devastatingly well armed and crammed with features. Six missiles of anti-armor, structure or anti-personnel use; a cannon mounted portside and a chin gun housing both a chain gun and a grenade launcher. While I choose to ignore it, there is a sculpted detail resembling a gun barrel on the portside nose.

Those sweet guns swivel AND elevate. Wished my vintage could do that. But then where would the gunner's legs go? The non-elevating versions are naturally hollow and I jam the figure's legs into the cavity. Good thing it's a drone! And also pictured is the bizarre extra nosegun. Does the barrel poke into the already cramped cockpit? It's like the Skyhawk... 

As already mentioned, a button spins the blades, very efficiently. Well they do on my original Dragonfly. This 2000 version's mechanism broke on the first day out the box. Sliding the button forward does rotate the blades but the button doesn't return. Very frustrating, made more so by the fact that the mold halves are glued in place and I have no desire to risk separating them. Rounding off the features, the cockpit holds two (when she's not a drone!), and the engine covers are removable. So clever, unnecessary but such vanilla. A mark of a design company that want kids to be able to play the hell out of this toy, and sadly a notion we are unlikely to see again.

Came with this guy. Rehashed Battle Corps Wild Bill.  That's why he stays in the box. Though I must say the colouring trumps the Battle Corps Bill. And he doesn't come with a gun that looks like a log. But I'm spoilt for choice these days. Nothing beats V1 Billy!

 Lastly, there is a winch with a great deal of lead. You spool it out and reel it in manually. I love this feature, and it adds a utility aspect to the Dragonfly and it was used in Marvel comics on more than one occasion. notably in issue 18 where it airlifted a Vamp and five persons out of a pretty hairy situation. Pretty tough bird, isn't she?!

Ya done good Paul, very good. Notice the subtle shading? The weathering? Beaut!

Why does it make the top 5, you may ask? Get one. See what you think. The real-world element is hard to miss, the olive green Dragonfly evokes the Vietnam War era so well, and also works well with all of the initial Joe vehicles being that great, dark hue of green. My grey Dragonfly is a shot at the Huey SuperCobra, still very much in active use by the US Marine Corps. BBI do a pretty nice Cobra, yet it is accurately scaled and HUUGE. The Dragonfly's underscaling is a plus in my book (yeah I'm probably just trying to hard to justify myself). It is small enough to handle and enjoy, it still holds two figures (mind you, not all modern era Joes will fit), and it will still be able to fly through a doorway. But seriously, get one, and let me know what you think. She's a goody.

WHALE versus Hammerhead

Killer WHALE

Cobra Hammerhead


It's on.

 In February 2006 (I think), the G.I. Joe Waterborne Hovercraft Assault Landing Experimental or WHALE came into my life. I bought it as a birthday prezzie for my pal Rob. It's always been a fan favourite, being released in 1984 (a really superb year for the line, and incidentally the year of my birth), and done up in a great scheme of 'Joe' green on a black plastic skirt. I loved this toy, but not being my own I longed for it as much. After five and a half years of Rob's WHALE exclusivity, I decided to get my own.

Normally I'd go into a discussion of the real-world purpose of the WHALE, but this page does it far better than I. Ah the joys of the interweb! The link does the work so well, that I'm going to rather write about a possible engagement between a WHALE and a Hammerhead.

Why those two, you ask? Well the likelihood of them facing each other is pretty great. WHALEs would typically be deployed in an amphibious assault scenarios and Hammerheads are deployed as coastal defenders. The linked article describes a possible mission scenario where a WHALE is used for a clandestine four-man team insertion. On this particular occasion a lone Hammerhead crew discovers the Joes.

Backed up into the treeline overlooking the beach, the Hammerhead sweeps the seas before it with its sensor array. Decimator peers out at the endless blue with his image intensifiers, alternating between night vision and thermal imaging. Two miles out to sea, Cutter, G.I. Joe sailor and skipper of the WHALE performs a similar task from his command station. The hovercraft is in possession of a range of noise-reducing wizardry making it uncharacteristically quiet. They had made good time covering the 90 miles from the Joe mothership, the USS Flagg. The next phase was critical. The craft had to navigate a shallow river leading inland where it was to deliver its cargo. Having spotted the river mouth, Cutter sets a course correction for his first mate, Topside, who swings the nose of the vessel to starboard and opens the throttle. In the guntubs Rampart and Deep Six begin sweeping their sectors of fire even more vigilantly than before.

As the WHALE veers right and races towards the river mouth, Decimator catches a glimpse of the warm speck of the WHALE's hot engine block. To protect the secret of his ward, he has standing orders to prevent any unauthorized landings with deadly force. He wastes no time, briefing his crew that they were going weapons hot and engaging any confirmed target. The trouble was that the target was too small and too quick for a missile lock. Even the sophisticated ordinance of the Hammerhead needed a stronger target than the WHALE was providing, so the order is given to start up the engines and pursue. The Hammerhead springs to life and tears off onto the white sand, reaching a top speed of 40 miles per hour. Decimator swings his command pod to track the WHALE as both vehicles began to close on each other. With less than a mile between them, Decimator satisfies himself that they are indeed tracking a small vessel and fires off one of his surface-to-surface missiles. The missile tracks well, arcing upwards and coming down onto its target, but undershoots, striking the water behind the nimble hovercraft. Witness to the flash of the missile launch, the WHALE's four .50 deck guns clatter into life, spitting glowing tracer fire onto the shoreline. At the wheel of the Hammerhead, the Eel driver whips the vehicle left, ramping it over a dune and putting a wall of sand between it and the incoming fire. By this time, Topside swings the nose of the WHALE towards the shore and begins shelling with the dual 40mm cannons. With shells exploding mere metres away from the Hammerhead, Decimator orders that they escape inland and head for the river in order to deploy their arsenal of attack craft.

What happens next? You tell me. Come on. Comment. I dare ya.

Killer W.H.A.L.E review

Braving one of the smellier parts of Johannesburg, I give you some action shots of this beaut. I still smell like sewerage, thanks.

Here it is dear readers, the Killer WHALE, making boys fantasize about big green hovercrafts since 1984. Based on real-world hovercrafts used in the Vietnam conflict (most specifically this craft), the WHALE became G.I. Joe's most oft used light watercraft and seeing use in most of Joe's naval operations. It's regarded by fans as one of the premier pieces in the line. It can travel on land (practically by use of four trolley wheels beneath its skirt) and water, as it really does float quite well. It crews two, can hold a further two crewmen in two gun tubs, has a troop capacity of four in a cozy concealed cabin, and a compartment for a sled, which I suppose could also contain a sled operator or diver. A push plunger makes the rotors spin providing imaginary propulsion, a lever allows a rack of depth charges to roll overboard one-by-one, another button launches the sea-sled from its compartment in the fore of the craft, it comes with an included scout bike, removable machinery covers, two box launchers with a total of eight missiles, a drop-down ramp for troop deployment, dual cannons, a fantastically molded naval Joe by the name of Cutter. There couldn't possibly be more bells and whistles on this craft. It is an enduring classic and a strong reminder of the heyday of soldier toys.

Torpedo makes a stealth insertion. Smart move since a noisy hovercraft would certainly attract any unwanted attention away from Torps' appraoch, allowing him to get on with the dirty job he's no doubt been tasked with. I don't care what you say, this little thing is hella fun. And it shoots out of the nose of the WHALE at such a blinding speed that it literally falls to pieces. Every time. Fun!

Enough gush. I pride my reviews on pointing out the weakness of a toy. The WHALE's biggest flaw is the frailty of some of it's parts. While it is a sturdy craft in the main, its fan assembly is the big bitch to find in good nick. Each individual vane is made up of two flat portions joined in two places by thin plastic. While this was a design implemented to make them bend realistically, in truth too much bending would stress the vanes to the point of cracking. This is made only more likely by the age of the plastic. Another area of weakness is the box missile launchers. They attach to the craft using three opposing teeth - two face forwards, one faces back and that lonely one has to cope with a lot of strain when detaching/attaching the box. Mine broke somewhere between the ebay seller taking pictures of the vehicle and partial disassembly for packing. It's the risk we all take and I don't begrudge him for not noticing.

It must get really tiresome keeping your knees up all the time. And hitting rocks with your toes must suck bigtime.

The bike is woefully undersized. It reminds me of the vehicle packs of 1988 when you try to place a figure on it. But I think as a child, I could have easily suspended my disbelief and loved it to bits. To think the designers had a spot where nothing much was going on, they could have left it open, or doubled up the depth charges, but instead opted to add some new play value to the toy. Did I say I was going to stop gushing?!

100% stud. And do you know what this skipper's Filename is? Skip A. Stone. Ha ha ha.

As already mentioned, the WHALE enjoyed a great deal of exposure in associated Joe media. It had to. For as long as I can remember it is the only Joe seagoing vessel in its class. And to this day remains so. Sure, the APC and Warthog are amphibious but they can't match the WHALE's speed, agility and firepower. While by no means a ocean-going ship, the WHALE can nevertheless take to the open sea but will primarily shine in swampy environments where conventional hulled watercraft or land vehicles will not be able to move.

Cannons, machine guns, removable covers, missiles. This sucker's got it all. And, fearing the worst, I decided not to put my superglue job to the test - the missile box is stuck on with Press-Stick. Check that sweet Killer WHALE design. I love signature vehicle decals. Especially when the fire missiles out of their blowholes.

In short, if you don't have this vehicle, get it. It is a premier piece in any Joe collection. Beautiful, realistic colouring, a paragraph-worth of features, a great size being large but not obscenely so, and an intricate sculpt full of the little details one can expect from the Joe line's zenith. Did I mention how much fun it is to glide this thing along the floor going 'Vrooom'? Well it is. Very.

Another dawn, another jungle, another mission. Yo Joe!

Regrets

Every bought something and wished you hadn't? I remember thinking that a few times in the Transformers world. I don't know what I was smoking when I got a G1 Galvatron. That toy sucks. Especially the cartoon-accurate one I got. And to top it off, fresh out of the box, his electronic sounds and lights did not work. Fresh batteries ... nada.

In the Joe world my biggest regret? Snake-Eyes. Half a dozen 3rd Generation versions of that guy and my undisputed Snake is the first one I got, 25th version 1. The rest go into the box and never see the light of day.

The Corps!

Poor man's G.I. Joe. Transformers had the Gobots,

The price sticker on the front of the card was R6.99 

Trips me out. 

Note I diligently crossed out the two Gobots I owned at that stage. As if I would one day own them all.

I don't.


and G.I.Joe had The Corps! No, I'm not expressing my excitement. The exclamation point is actually part of the name. They hit the scene in '86, back in the heyday of 3 3/4 inch plastic anti-terrorism. They were and still are made by the company that brought us the original and best Super Soaker - Lanard. While the Joes were always my number one toy, The Corps! had their time in the sun in my collection. I got my first Corps! figure in the late 80's, he was a black-clad ninja with a crossbow and backpack of arrows and molded blades.

Known to me only as 'Black Ninja' this guy was one cold killa...
That is the original backpack by the way. 

It was before the Joe ninja explosion and for a wobbly-toothed five-year old with an 80's hangover, ninjas were the bizness. I played the hell out of that toy for...

... a day. Then it disappeared. All that's left is the backpack.

My next two Corps! came in a two-pack card. Bought for me by my buddy and neighbor, Justin Segers for my 8th birthday. Here are the two criminals:

You know the mark of a knock-off toy is the cardback not having colour. But very impressively these guys did have dossiers. And a two pack? Can't beat that. Interestingly they were carded one on top of each other, so like a 'snip strip' of Nik Naks, you could cut it in half and perhaps give it to a pair of twins for their birthday?! Whew. Long caption

Large Sarge and Hammer. My lonely only Corps! guys. For some reason, I refused to call Hammer Hammer. I guess the compulsion to shout 'Hammer Time' when he was on the job put me off. Whatever the reason, he became remembered as Fox. When I was about 11 or 12, G.I. Joe dried up. The Corps! however, gained momentum. Maybe it was the absence of any real competition, but Lanard started pressing some very decent vehicles.

I longed for the 'Ambulance' and 'Troop Carrier'. Very real world, and quite obviously designed in a later era. But alas, they were the two that never appeared locally

APC's, attack helicopters, trucks, re-release of their original tank and boat from the '80s, and this beaut -

With opening doors and bonnet, and glass windscreens, it was easily superior to my VAMP.

Back then, the closest thing one could get to a Hummer, was the G.I. Joe Hammer. Well, not really. I never saw one on shelves in good ol' SA, and was never partial to its over-designed look with no windscreens. So this toy got a lotta love from me and my pals. But more importantly, it came with three new recruits to give Sarge and Fox some company.

Their names are indelibly burned into my memory. They were the bad guys who gave Joe a decent run for their money. I distinctly remember being very off Cobra for a time. I wanted a believable, real-world group of terrorists and mercenaries for the Joes to fight, not a bunch of weirdos with a reptile fetish. These five hombres were the ticket.

From left to right: Large Sarge, Fox, Carlos Duarte, Boomerang Billy, Razor Ramon. All bastards.

Fox was the sniper; Large Sarge the explosives and heavy weapons guy; Boomerang Billy hailed from Down Under who came with a backpack loaded with his signature weapons; Razor Ramon (another dude I renamed, good thing too. Lanard called him 'Tony Tanner', ugh.) -he was a sadist and master of torture techniques; and finally Carlos Duarte, The Skorpion With A "K". That was his name. He was a South American warlord with ties to all things illicit from arms to drugs to slavery. For warlord with ties to the arms trade, it was most conspicuous that he had no thumbs, but Lanard never did crack robust enough plastic with their o-ring figures...

The thumbs didn't last long. But many good men and women died by those stunted hands. Bastard.

So these figures were the bane of Shockwave, Scoop and M.P. Man's life (see this article).

Then, flash forward a bit and my buddy Rob was tooling around in Tygervalley Mall and found two packs that together held pretty much every o-ring Corps! figure and included a jeep. Probably for less that R80 too. What they lack in thumb strength, they make up for in value! So either Carlos had a bevvy of reinforcements or these figures were my new protagonists. And for a short time, they were. Well, two of them. Before I had a Dragonfly and the original Wild Bill, I had to make do with the horrible blue and white Battle Corps version (Battle Corps was in fact a G.I. Joe subset. Confusing). It was not a very good figure. So a Corps! figure became the gunslinging chopper jockey on my missions. And he even came with a Native American sidekick tracker and co-pilot. And their names? Shooter Sam and Tracker Tom. Uh huh. Good for a laugh for sure.

You can't fight it. Joe had Spirit and Wild Bill, so I guess Lanard had the green light to do some Cowboy and Indian Shit.
And both of them have CORPS! printed on their uniforms. With the '!' . Seriously?!

And then G.I. Joe came back into my life under the guise of the second generation, new sculpt era. I greeted them with enthusiasm and within a year vowed to never buy them again. Not about to be left out of the new wave of action figure furora, The Corps! brought in their new wave of T-crotched badboys.

I often like to touch up figures by painting the or adding a wash or drybrush, these figures had it factory applied. The effect was marked. other figures suddenly seemed very toy like and plasticky. These guys looked grizzled, dirty and fucking hard. They immediately became the principal protagonists at gametime. There were twelve of them, so the no-brainer team name was the Dirty Dozen. Al, Rob and I split the team three ways and set about naming and imbuing the members with life.

Bear, Flash, Kurt and Kite were Al's;

Rob used Eagle-Eye, Howlin' Harry, Paddy and Viper;

And my boys were Dutch, Bronson, Porkins, and Snake.

They were soldiers of fortune, flying around the world dealing death for anyone who could meet their price. Typically their operations consisted of ambushing armed convoys, or sneaking up on fortifications and... stealing stuff. But they were a force to be reckoned with, and for a good while they held the mantle of the most played-with toys in my collection. Good times.

The Corps! have, like G.I. Joe, ditched their o-ring design, and still put out the T-crotch figures with some retooling here and there, but the bodies of the original twelve are still quite prominent. But no iteration of these figures beat the original, dirty, grizzled ones. I am grateful of the day Rob and I walked up the road to the local supermarket where all four of the original three-figure packs were available. They included tonnes of authentic weapons, including smoke and frag grenades, mortar launchers, pistols, sniper rifles, knives and an offroad bike. Each pack set us back only R20. Unreal.

The sad devolution from awesome to okay to WTF. Glad I caught the A-game before the neon palette started seeing some action

Thoughts on Toys

What to do, what to do? This hobby is so much a part of me. I can't ditch it. But I can't feed it like I did as a younger man. I find myself more often than not thinking up a reason to not buy something. Mentally trying to disqualify a toy from being good enough to earn my hard earned $. Why is that? I used to buy with reckless abandon... well, always within certain financial constraints. But I never used to berate a toy before I even had it. Now I scour the net for pics and reviews, nitpicking everything.

I can think of a few reasons.

1. Overwhelming collection. I have a lot of stuff. My childhood room at my folks place does not contain much in the way of clothing or anything really, other than toys and toy paraphernalia. When considering to buy something, space is always gonna be a consideration...

actually I take that back. Space is never a consideration. I always buy thinking 'I'll find some place for it'. Well, I don't know how much that is going to hold true. A Flagg is stashed between cupboards and drawers, and I have been on ebay looking at Defiants...

2. Been there; got that. I have a problem with the rampant re-release of certain characters. In spite of this, I of course have about five no-ring style Snake-Eyes'. With the greatest of respect to the later, greater versions, my clear and unassailable favourite is still the first one I got in the original 25th Anniversary 5 Pack. And I have justified its superiority over the recent POC wave 3 version many a time before falling asleep. So when new versions of old characters get announced, I immediately try to determine whether it will usurp my current favourite or not. Case in point: POC Stalker. Dreadlocks=fail in my eyes, but the rest of his sculpt (being the same as POC Snake-Eyes) is win. And frustratingly the 25th anniversary Stalker head sculpt fits on the new one's body, so the dreadlocks can easily be dealt with. That leaves two more possible detractors. The crap hands that only grip between the thumb and forefinger; and the loose holster for the silenced pistol. Neither of which have been improved, if the new Cobra Trooper (who also uses those parts) is anything to go by. The hands can be remedied with a parts swap. The holster not so much. But there is I suppose a fine line between too tight and too loose. Yeah I said that. Too tight damages the gun (as it does on the 25th Anni Fireflys and Beachheads), too loose and the damn thing keeps falling out. So do I drop dollar on the toy, knowing full well that if it fails to beat my current fave Stalker, it goes into the box, never to see light of day again.

So what to do...

Thunder Machine is compact!

It fits perfectly inside the Chap Mei Chinook. You need only pull out the antenna. Or just bend it to fit if you like playing rough! In the Marvel Comics series, Zartan had a transport helo which could comfortably fit the Thunder Machine, the Dreadnoks and their bikes.  I wouldn't try to cram the whole gang into my chopper, but it's a start! Incidentally Zartan's copter could also disguise itself as a bus holographically. Wow. I give you the 1980's.

The Flagg must belong to COBRAAAA!

I never can decide what kind of loadout the Flagg should carry. Do you ignore it's scale problems? If so do, do you cram it impossibly or try to maintain some space on deck to land and take off craft? If you like the Flagg to be realistically scaled, ie a micro carrier, what is the most useful purpose to for it to have? I took some (bad) photos of possible Flagg set ups. But I have a startling conclusion. Well, not so startling, if you bother to read the article's title!

Option 1- Amphibious Mission.

The deck has an Osprey, two Seahawks and a Skystorm. I imagine this would make the make the most sense for a Marine-style assault force. I would laden the interior with a W.H.A.L.E and a pair of Warthogs. Everything fits, everything can be expanded for launch, contracted for storage and rough weather. Minimum suspension of disbelief.

Option 2- Air Superiority

With only three Navy aircraft on the deck, she's crowded. One of the three must always be on the launch strip, and in preparation for a landing plane, another (the F-18's, in the picture) must be moved into its place. But it works. Assuming the pilot doesn't overshoot, the arrestor cable will snag the tail of a landing plane before it hits the the rest of the planes. Hard to get your head around. But so much fun.

Option 3- 1986

This setup has one rationale - it's G.I. Joe's 1986 air force. I would perch another Tomahawk on there somewhere, but I do wish the rotor blades would fold like the real thing. The chopper can't be positioned flush against the tower. It's a pain. But the Conquest is a very compact aircraft and works well on the deck of the Flagg. A lot better than the Skystriker, for whom the Flagg was intented. For instance, the wings of a landing Striker just avoid clipping the tower. The Conquest lands more comfortably than anything with a wingspan. I just don't really love the Conquest... never have.

Option 4- Mixed Bag

Here we have a compromise - an Osprey for ferrying personnel, a Conquest and Skystriker for air superiority and my favourite, a Skystorm for close air support. I choose the Skystorm over the Dragonfly because it's faster, able to keep up with the Osprey easily and... well the Dragonfly is green and wouldn't look as good! The Osprey is by far the bulkiest craft, but as you can see, it stores nicely like a carrier-based craft should, with folding wings and blades.

Option 5- Purist Air Superiority

Joe jets only. The pic isn't well enough lit, but the Phantom is on the launch strip. With this line up, the Flagg can carry out air support, bombing missions, surveillance and air superiority. And it's all Joe. Feel the love. And you can land a Tomahawk could land forward of the Skystriker, or aft of the Conquest, but how you would be able to shuffle the craft in order to launch and land the jets? The Tomahawk would have to take off, and then the jets would be jostled for position.

Option 6- COBRAAA!

Cobra's craft are well suited to operating in tight spaces. Everything on the deck is VTOL - the Firebat, Rattler, Hurricane, Mamba all take-off and land vertically. I included a black Chinook to demonstrate its space effectiveness as it crams in there nicely. There is an abundance of remaining space, you could easily throw a handful of Fangs or Fang II's onto the deck. Or a swarm of Firebats. And the cool thing about the Firebats is how you can fit two on the deck elevator. And not many aircraft can succeed in that. I wouldn't land a Night Raven on the deck- it would be difficult to move into position around all the smaller craft. And don't get me started on how nicely BUGGs, Hammerheads and Sea Ray's fit into the bowels of the ship. Morays look pretty terrific too.

So in conclusion: Joe needs to appropriate some Cobra craft. Or Cobra should capture the Flagg.

COBRAAAAAA!

Dreadnok Thunder Machine

The first time I ever heard of the Darwin Awards was when family friends were discussing a guy who apparently wiped himself out by bolting a jet engine to the bed of his pickup truck and used it to propel the vehicle. It and driver got smudged against a mountanside I believe. In the same breath, I now turn to the Dreadnok Thunder Machine.

The Dreadnoks were a group of less-than-conventional Cobra affiliates. They were essentially a biker gang, led by Zartan. Their function is a little less clear. On the odd occasion the were used as intelligence operatives, often in support of Zartan or Zarana - which is odd considering how little intelligence the Dreadnoks seemed to possess. But their major occupation seemed to be mayhem and destruction with no further strategic objective. And I'm sure it was always a device the writers and artists of the comic and cartoon had a great deal of fun with. Comic writer Larry Hama, who cooked up the 'Noks regards them as one of his favourite ideas. Personally I was never a fan, particularly since they were in practically every episode of the cartoon. I often felt that the fight was more one of Joe versus Dreadnoks rather than Joe versus Cobra.

Note the presence of the turbine behind the driver position. That's why Thrasher didn't bother installing a radio. I wouldn't recommend wearing a scarf...

Toy-wise, the Dreadnoks were well represented with a varied membership, added to each year from 1985 until 1989. They had a motorpool of Dreadnok-specific vehicles and a few 'appropriated' ones; but strangely enough, no bikes! Well, no two-wheelers at least. They appropriated Cobra Ferret quads, and they had that weird tricycle thing, but the conventional bikes they were depicted on were never produced.

The one vehicle that everyone knows and loves is Thrasher's Thunder Machine. I could be wrong, but I believe in both cartoon and comic, Thrasher blags his way into the established Dreadnok ranks by showing off this beast. And it is.

It's a total cobbling together of parts other reviewers have done a far better job of identifying so I'll just break it down as a Trans-Am front, an armoured roll cage driver/passenger position and the back end of a pickup truck with a jet engine mounted in the bed. Apparently all propulsion comes from the jet, leaving room enough up front for not one but two ferocious 20mm chain guns. This kind of haphazard arrangement requires some suspension of disbelief. Assuming it all works as it should, the Thunder Machine should be able to go frighteningly fast in a straight line. Do anything else, and you don't need to be Jeremy Clarkson to know that you'd be in trouble. The Thunder Machine was depicted as being fraught with control issues, often rolling itself   in battle. But if it caught anything in its sights, tickets. Those weapons are tantamount to having two Rattler's opening up with their cannons. Light vehicles, armoured vehicles, fortifications - if the Thunder Machine got the drop on any of the above they'd be history.

I'm not sure how a subtle guy like Zartan feels about these behemoths. Neither do I. Spinning the wheel feeds the bullet belt through  under the barrels. Trouble is they feed the same way, and there is no getting around the fact that it's one continuous loop of bullet belt. So the one gun is getting the other's leftovers, until the belt gets taut and you reverse. And Hasbro considered this an 'action feature'?

Aside from less than common-sense design, the toy is quite gorgeous. The level of sculpted detail that this era of Joe possessed is staggering, from that bucket seats, to the grip-textured running boards, to the dashboard dials to the turbine detail - I could easily continue.

There is also a very nice sense of less than perfect bodywork as the vehicle is laced with dings, scratches, crumpled panels and general wear. It's a mean machine, not built to look pretty. I generally like to clean my vehicles up a bit. Not in the case of the Thunder Machine as I find grit, discolouration and stains improve it! It has a set of decals which add detail like headlights, tailights, lamps and the police-car lights on the roof. Sadly my sample is missing the latter decals but I'm not too upset. I could use paint or Cobrastickers.com to help me out if it cuts me up too much. And the tyres are rubber. Amen. This means they will realistically grip rough and smooth surfaces and don't go clackity-clack, or get damaged by doing the very thing they were put on this earth to do. I always cringe a bit when I roll plastic tyres over bricks...

My expanding Mad Max-esque motorpool.

The front grille is famously fragile as it comes as a flat piece which you have to bend to fit into place while putting the toy together. It is therefore impossible to assemble a Thunder Machine without stressing the plastic, but a little paint could no doubt make those stresses disappear. The grille is in no danger of breaking (I hope) provided it's simply held in place and not subject to continuous bending. My Thunder Machine appears to be a bit of an anomaly as its chassis is black and not blue. I have not found any reference to this on the net so far.

Note the tow bar. I appreciate the fun kids can have hooking this up to, say, an Assault Systems Pod and hauling it around. But that ASP had better be clad in asbestos, is all I'm saying

So what do I think of the Thunder Machine? Well that question must first address what I think of the Dreadnoks. Personally, I could do without them. To me, they served to diffuse G.I. Joes mission a bit. Instead of hunting a global, para-military terrorist group, they were getting mixed up with domestic biker punks. The Dreadnoks should have been dealt a swift double-tap to the head, but they became fan favourites thanks to their portrayal in the Joe media and have become icons of the Joe-verse. I like this vehicle because it is so very unique but held off getting it for the longest time as it just doesn't fit. I can't very well see conventional Cobra operatives operating it, so it's inclusion in my Cobra motorpool must acknowledge the presence of the Dreadnoks. I only own Monkeywrench and now Thrasher and have no desire at getting any more. So what does my Thunder Machine do? And the answer is: I have no idea. Cobra's attempt at the world land speed record? All I can say is a spoiler wouldn't be amiss as this thing I'm sure would have a tendency to take off.

Being a Dreadnok is all about rocking your midriff. 

Thrasher is starting to grow on me. A solid sculpt (albeit a bit top heavy with a big head, big body and leeeetle legs) he would have seen use in my more imaginative, possibly sci-fi adventures. Must be the lumo green streaks. I like the raised spikes on his shins, and the paint applications sprung to include little dabs of silver to denote spikes on his right wrist. His left hand is sculpted as wearing a sports mitt of some kind. His weapon of choice? A spiked lacrosse stick. Nice. He is also armed with a killer smirk.

A textbook case of 'Quit while you're ahead'

The only Joe vehicle to boast a payload of vibrators.

Yes. The Rolling Thunder. Death on wheels for enemy ground forces and fixed defences. Sometimes you just have to count each individual piece of armament it possesses and wet yourself a bit. Fourteen gunbarrels of varying calibre, fifteen missiles of varying size and function, and two of the largest missiles produced in the Joe line with a further compliment of six bombs stored inside each missile. But that's nothing you didn't either already know or could figure out without much problem from ogling the product catalogue. I know I did. For hours.

But this is not intended to be a beaming review. Don't get me wrong, in spite of the shortcomings I love this vehicle. It is the most formidable G.I. Joe assault vehicle bar none. It has it all. And a glass canopy... but more on that later.

No, actually let me deal with it now. How do I imagine an armored vehicle with a big glass canopy up front? I don't, I ignore it. I might even go as far as painting over it. But ignoring isn't too hard for now. I can understand the choice from the designer's point of view - a toy's playability is very dearly linked to how many of your action figures you can have manning it's various stations. Putting a driver in the cockpit is no fun if you can't see that you put a driver in the cockpit. For all intents and purposes, he may as well not even be there. And without a transparency all the gorgeous molded details in the three-man cockpit would be lost. It really is a very well detailed sculpt, and the level of detail is impressive on the rest of the vehicle too. Hasbro did not disappoint, and the sculpt intricacy exhibited here is something I fear current vehicles lack. Ho hum.

Repeater is totally snug and warm in there. Until it starts to rain, of course.

Did I also mention there is a gaping hole with no hatch to cover it? Another detail best left ignored.

Why then is this a case of 'quit while you're ahead'? Well for example, I have decided that this vehicle's standard configuration while I use it will exclude the four 'gun-chairs'. Two reasons, one aesthetic and another practical. I like the vehicle lines to be uninterrupted, and it gives the RT a nice low profile (well, relatively low, considering how high a behemoth with all this 'stuff' could otherwise ride). The lighter grey colour also offends my eyes ever so slightly. Practically though, those exposed seats are death traps. And the rear two interrupt the rotation of the main gun. So, off they come and into the bin of unused vehicle bits, along with the 'Admiral's Launch' from the Flagg. Don't get me started.

I also choose to remove the double turret and dish that sit atop the cockpit. If the main gun fires zero forward, it runs the risk of blasting that thing clean off. Not great.

The turntable of six red missiles has me stumped. It attaches to the vehicle's deck, where it can't get a clear shot for love or money. If it's designed to be deployed like a death trap for pursuers, the RT has no crane assembly to hoist it and drop it off.

Ridin' the Gun. Beachhead is of course toast if they fire that missile.  So is Hit & Run on the other side. And  everyone dies if the turntable starts firing.

The ATV is such an afterthought it also has to go. I also struggle to close the RT up snugly when it is on board. No loss there really. Its design leaves much to be desired as the occupant essentially fills the vehicle's interior so snugly, I doubt there would be room for an axle, or any mechanicals for that matter. But it's inclusion was no doubt to enhance the vehicle's playability, and such concepts are lost on the discriminating adult collector. Actually scratch that, it's an almost plausible design... I just don't like it much as the driver sits so low it looks a bit odd.

Even a stud like Falcon can't pull off this piece of shit.

Finally, I opt to remove the large red missiles. Once again, their inclusion smell like afterthought to me. Putting a missile square on the barrel of a cannon might look cool (yeah right), but doesn't fly with me. Especially when you have two guys 'riding the gun'. Okay, that's a stylistic reason, but my real evidence for calling it an afterthought?

The missile doesn't sit on the barrel doesn't sit on its post flush because its tail fin touches the cannon mount. So this big red phallus of death angles towards the barrel of the gun it gets fired from. Too much.

It's brothers don't have similar problems, but the jury is still out on them. I was never a fan of the Joe vehicles that just had missiles slapped onto any vacant surface. I much prefer a well-placed, intentional launcher for my ordinance.

The yellow missiles are also problematic. They barely clear the wheels, and firing a missile above your wheels might not have been the best idea. I assume they're made of rubber, right? A much better choice would be to have them on a rack above the deck instead of the gun chairs. But alas, I was born too late and in the wrong place to be on Hasbro's design team in the late 80's.

I'm also on the fence about the chin gun. If this were an attack chopper, I would laud it. It's a formidable weapon and one that covers what would be the vehicle's weapon blind spot (12 o'clock close). But it does stand to snag any kind of bushes that would otherwise offer no resistance to this monster.

That's more like it.

It rides nice and high. Well it would. Let me explain: the mold has hollows for the giant missiles. Those hollows leave two big missile impressions on the vehicle's underside that reduce the overall clearance. But I'll ignore that in my off-road battles along the carpet.

I got my RT for what I would deem a bargain price of $56, which I thought a steal. It had some patent defects which were included in the item description. A few more plague my RT, but I'm not upset. Buying a 23 year-old toy and having it posted 15 000 kilometres (a total guess) is not without pitfalls. Lets say she's a bit of a fixer-upper. The rear left axle is snapped, I hope super-glue is up to the challenge. The tabs that the big missiles attach to are both broken. The auction said that only one was broken, and that the fault was with the missile and not the mount. I figured I would just buy a replacement missile, but no, the mount is fooked, the missiles are fine. Kids! Treat evilbay merchants with much suspicion. Needless to say, no positive feedback for this guy. He packed it like an arsehole, jamming loose pieces into the hold of the vehicle. You think for the amount of shipping he charged, he could have slapped some Fragile stickers on her. Whether it would have saved the axle, we may never know. When I opened up the missile bay, there were a few mystery broken plastic tabs and I have yet to determine where they are from. Decals are nicely applied though, and that is a true blessing. I lose love for a vehicle in good condition but with stray, crooked decals. 

Fail.

So how do I envision the RT? Well when Joe needs to put the serious hurt on a target, this is the vehicle to do it. Enemy fortifications or armoured columns can be destroyed completely by the big ass missiles, allowing the RT to roll in and secure the remains. It is a one-vehicle armoured assault. And without too much imagination one might swap out the missiles for a troop compliment (a simple custom job using the interior of the Joe APC is one idea I saw on the 'net).

Not to end on a downer, but I need to get this article wrapped and something needs to be said about him. Armadillo is possibly the most boring G.I. Joe figure ever produced. In a desperate attempt to make him more exciting (!), count how many exclamation marks they manage to cram into his filecard. What fun!

Epic Fail.

But seriously, who does operate this ride? If you can stomach Armadillo, who copilots? Who sits in the third station? Who rides the gun -assuming you want to man it? A vehicle purpose built like this I think would need specialised training and with most of the Joes being infantry types, you need a decent size contingent of vehicle operators to get the Thunder rolling. You could steal other drivers, Major Storm, Wildcard... but I think a better solution may be to stock it with Battle Force 2000 guys. Since I have no intention on getting any of their awful vehicles, and they are all vehicle drivers, I think I may have just found a use for Blocker, Blaster, Knockdown and Dodger. Trouble is, I never bothered to get any of them, and I don't know if this is reason enough...