|
Community Links |
Social Groups |
Pictures & Albums |
Members List |
Search Forums |
Advanced Search |
Go to Page... |
|
Thread Tools |
06-20-2008, 11:16 PM | #1 |
Eternal F'n Toys R Us Kid
Join Date: Apr 2008
Location: Chicago
Posts: 2,839
|
...SO...
I've been drinkin' tonight, and yes, JOES are on my mind... It's a happy place. I remember back in 82/83...whatev... I had gotten my very first JOE fig... Straight arm Flash...Which HAS SINCE, and ALWAYS WILL BE my fav figure... ANY HOWS...My old man was a Military man. Air Force. Too young for Korea, too old for Vietnam. So once G.I.JOE came out, he was all over that shizznit for me. I was born in the summer of 77, so I literally was a child of the 80's. JOE's, He-Man, Transformers, and was a BIT to young for the SW craze...but the man, he was a sci-fi buff...and the most vivid memory of him is a pict of him, sitting in our living room looking at how to put a Death Star playset together. But I was there for the BEST of it. Flash was first, then Breaker, Stalker and Snake Eyes...back at the time, I vividly remember thinking Snakes was a bad guy...Black, and had a "Cobra" name to him. That Christmas, "St. Nick" put Rock n' Roll and Zap in my stocking I remember Zap's thumb busting off the moment I put that oversized 'zooka in his hand. Crying all day, and not remembering what else I had gotten that year. lol. So...Here I am...32, and back into it. My old man passed away about 2 years ago...I was lucky enough to see him the day before he died after 3 years of near non comunicado. A lot of BS went down between him and I between the years. But two things we had were SW and JOEs. I really wish he coulda' been around to see the treatment their finally getting after 20 some odd years. Both JOES and SW. He woulda' been happy. A part of me is collecting these 25th/modern era as a rememberance of him...the other half because this is who I am/was back in the day. All the way up to Junior year in High School. I had gotten out of it for a while until I met my Middle school friends who were "ninja/Military brats" and they sucked me back into it after a few years off. Our weekends were filled with intricate battles, most famous of course was our night/neon battles (Thanks to my neon phone and blacklight Sylvester and Tweety clock)...Summer Vacations...fergetboutit...Many-a-Joes were sacrificed to the Conana Gods upon our pire of firey death in thanks for their weapons (Downtown's .44 was a coveted treasure) That summer before Senior year...we decided to "grow up"....Hence the mass firing squad which STILL to this day, holds scorch marks upon my childhood home's garage. We took al our "throw away" JOES, placed M80s into their rubber band held torso's, linked them al to a fuse cord, set our 300 plus COBRA firing squad in place, lit the fuse, and TAPED them sumbitches blowing apart....one of us STILL has the tape, I'm sure of it, but over a decade of lost contact with someone or another has prevented me from obtaining it... All that HAD remained was our first venture into customs...OUR teams. Generally consisting of Snake Eyes (2 or 3) Beachhead, and Lowlight...with some randoms tossed in. My personal team was Snake Eyes 3 with a 2 Head, Lowlight 2 with a SE v3 head, NF Falcon (With a NF Sneak Peak torso...which was "mysteriously" stolen cause WE ALL hated Sneak Peak), Jinx, Scarlet V1 head on a Baroness V1 body (cobra Symbol "erased off") and NF Shockwave. THAT was my Delta Force. My two cohorts in geekdom generally had the same "main team" with a tweak here and there. Of course with the lapse of JOES to occupy our time, we switched to table top role playing....RIFTS BEEYOTCH... That didn't last too long before Palladium STOLE our idea for a world book for Atlantis....True Story...We gave them a 500 page book including original artwork and designs, and they stole it only to come out with their "own" Atlantis book 2 years later...which HMPF...had 3/4s of our ideas in it... 1/2 of me SCREAMS....BASTARDS!!!...the other half SCREAMS...IDIOTS...why didn't you copywrite the ideas! So yeah...93-95 was depressing...No JOES...it was retired. In our eyes at least. I sold MY personal collection to finish of a complete Uncanny X-Men run from 181 to 332 Then the end of school, college, and a LOT of moving pretty much killed all thoughts of JOE... till' a TOYFARE issue where you saw the first glimpse of the 25th Snake Eyes "Then and Now" I saw some of the 25th right before X-Mas (HA) of 07 TONS of Flints, SE's, and SS's...but I resisted. X-Mas came around, and my best friend from HS was coming up around her from FL to Chicago cause he recently got egaged...it's been literally 10 years since I saw this guy, so I was thinking..."What can I get him?" Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow... UNFORTUNATLY....I never gave them to him, and those were the first of my 25th. and I've been hooked since then. Here's to another 25!!! |
06-21-2008, 07:48 AM | #2 |
Roboskull Pilot
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: North West England
Posts: 5,181
|
Having my excitement at the Joe figures getting incorporated into the Action Force line being utterly crushed because I couldn't find the blasted things anywhere for ages, and nearly giving up on the line.
__________________
-----------------There's no shame in being a pariah----------------- |
06-21-2008, 08:05 AM | #3 |
Nine Inch Nailer
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: Branson, Missouri
Posts: 768
|
Great stories man! And THANK YOU!!! You totally gave me an idea for what I can get an old childhood friend whos Bday is coming up. We speak about once a month (getting married, growin old and all that stuff) but one thing that me and him were OBSESSED with was GI Joe. Hell, one of the last times we actually hung out, he was looking through my old GI Joe collection, remembering back the days!
I am so gonna find a cool as 25th figure to get him for his Bday, Im sure he doesn't even know about them, the dude would flip! I gotta find a Snake Eyes before July 6th!!! Again, wonderful stories man, totally makes me remember the good days!!! And thank you again for the idea for the Bday gift!!!
__________________
|
06-21-2008, 08:17 AM | #4 |
Laser Rifle Trooper
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: St Paul
Posts: 132
|
I remember the first commercials back in 1982. That's when I was hooked. Army guys the size of Star Wars? I was in. Flash was also my first Joe. He will always be my favorite. I think the draw with him for me and other Star Wars fans was his laser rifle. It made a bridge between the Joes and Darth Vader. Breaker was my second Joe and it went on from there. I was out of Joes by 1986, although I did buy a few from that year like Hawk v2 and Wet Suit. I was going to come back when I saw that TRU was getting the exclusives in 1997, but when I saw what pieces of crap the Stars and Stripe and the Commando set were, I skipped everything from those two years. The things that bothered me the most was how the prototype shots had all of the originals including an awesome looking repaint of Flash and the Commando set had v2 Snake Eyes but what they gave us was poop in a box instead because they lost parts and molds and didn't recast anything. Why they bothered to show those protos if they couldn't reproduce those exact figures still mystifies me. I did come back when the RAH blue carded line came out, though and have been back with the 3 3/4 and 4 inch line since.
|
06-21-2008, 10:35 AM | #5 |
Marauder Ruben
Join Date: May 2007
Location: Chicago
Posts: 3,937
|
Rock n roll was my 1st man I remember getting him at Osco drug for $1.99.
Man wouldn't it be great if hasbrow would have launched the 25th line with the old $1.99 price tag! |
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
Memories | X-factorz | G.I. Joe Toys Modern & General Discussion | 16 | 05-11-2008 03:19 AM |
Memories from the set of Transformers the movie | genoneguy | Movies DVD Television | 5 | 03-02-2008 03:16 AM |
Memories of my collection, new & old | C.I.A.D. | Toys | 87 | 02-04-2008 08:27 PM |
A great ad from 1985. Let the memories come flooding back | ekko | G.I. Joe General Discussion | 29 | 02-03-2008 07:20 PM |
share your G.I.Joe holiday memories! | The Superfly | G.I. Joe General Discussion | 21 | 01-01-2008 12:56 AM |
|
|