City Strike Duke & Friends
Recently, GI Joe: Rise of Cobra (ROC) toys went on sale here in the Philippines and I decided to pick up a few. The 45% discount was too good to pass up so I got the first ROC Snake Eyes, Paris Pursuit Storm Shadow (PP Storm Shadow), and City Strike Duke (CS Duke). I’d seen these three warming the pegs for quite some time and at Php 300 each, I figured it was time to get them before people started clearing them out, leaving me with only Cover Girls, Vipers, and Zartans.
City Stirke Duke is one of those unlucky figures seems to have come out at the wrong time. Seeing as how he’s part of the wave that includes City Strike Snake Eyes people kind of glided over him when they saw him on the pegs. Here’s what I imagine went on at local toy stores when wave 5 hit the shelves:
So I might be exaggerating a bit. I did however say something along similar lines to several reps on my failed searches for CS Snake Eyes, and I’m sure some of you did as well. I only took the time to look at CS Duke when the Christmas Sales were in full swing and it became apparent that if I ever wanted a CS Snake Eyes, I’d have to pay some scalper on eBay my right testicle for it.
Once I did pause, CS Duke didn’t look so sucky. He’s got a pretty good arsenal of his own and doesn’t look all that bad. He still suffers from Melonheadinitis, but it’s not as pronounced as my other Duke figure from the Rescue Mission set. The sculpt is sort of the reactive armor uniform, but with pants. Bright blue pants. It’s weird looking, but it really does grow on you.
His accessories are a rifle, a sub-machine gun, a knife, a pistol, a sword with a scabbard that plugs into the hole in his back, and a belt. The belt is pretty useless. They didn’t even think to put a sheath for the knife or a holster for the gun. You can tuck them in there, but it’s not the same thing is it? The rest of the gear you’ve seen with other figures, but like all GI Joe toys, that never really matters. It’s all good and it all looks pretty nice.
Articulation is very good. A lot of the ROC toys enjoy the double knee joints and stomach joints that allow them to do proper kneeling positions. Coupled with the great ankle ball/hinge joint and his hasbro elbows and hip ball/sockets, you’ve got near Marvel Legends poseability here.
Which makes this figure that much more fun to play with.
The first release of Snake Eyes was another I’d passed on, mostly due to those ugly molded lips. Whoever thought they should add those to the design should be given a stern talking to. Really? Lips? It’s as bad as Schumacher’s nipples on the Batsuit.
Accessory wise, he doesn’t have a whole lot. The standard Snake Eyes uzi, a backpack, and a sword. whoopdeedoo. There’s also that stupidly huge gun, but do we really need to get into that again? What’s irritating is that he has two runners for swords on his backpack… only one sword. duh, Hasbro. Most likely the peice is a leftover from another toy, I guess. he’s also got some horrible webgear with a sculpted holster and gun. Would have been nice if we had gotten a useable pistol.
The Paris Pursuit Storm Shadow is probably one you’ve already seen reviews about. I agree with most of the points on those. It’s a nice toy, but not all that well executed. The head doesn’t look too much like the actor, but that’s a given at this scale. Also the Storm Shadow in the Paris scene looks nothing like this, but it’s a action figure so a guy in a suit would probably have been boring for the kiddies.
Oh, well.
His accessories are a lot better than Snake Eyes’. He’s got a pair of swords, a pair of sais, a pistol AND a holster, plus a ridiculously big gun and ridiculously big suction cup. Both of the latter went right into my never-seen-again-box.
What I really had fun with after I opened these three figures was mixing and matching their heads. So I don’t have a City Strike Snake Eyes. I’ll make one (but with bright blue pants). Ever wonder what Duke would look like in Snake Eyes’ armor? Or Storm Shadow’s suit?
Hell, I even took off John Connor’s head and gave it a permanent home on Duke’s body. I think it makes old melon head look loads better.
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