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I'd very much like this thread to be a vehicle for ideas and thoughts on those ideas. Please share your own If Hasbro: ideas and please comment on the ideas of others... I'll start:


If Hasbro:


Released an entire wave of 6 brand new characters NOT based on any previous releases... NOT based on any canceled concepts or previously unrealized concepts... and these characters were NOT the result of any other characters (ie no experiments of Mindbender; no son of Duke), just brand new GI JOE characters with their own back stories and place on the Joe team or within Cobra's organization...

What would be the benefits of such a wave and what would be the downsides.

I'll be brief as to not end the discussion before it begins... but I think the benefit would be that it would force Hasbro to put everything they could into these figures to make sure they could 'compete' with 30 years of iconic and known Joes... to make them wholly viable to stand on their own AS a retail wave or exclusive wave. I also recognize, however, that it would be a risk for Hasbro to invest in such a thing and one repercussion would be Hasbro applying a premeditated apprehension to future releases of the same ilk. Or at least retailers would. Especially since this wave of characters would have no film or cartoon or comic or even previous history with the line to support them.

I'd really like to see this and it's something I've been wanting a for a long time. After a while, it gets kind of boring to see the same figures get recycled over and over again, its looks a little updated each time around. As a kid, I couldn't wait to see what kind of new character or troop GI Joe would throw at me next. Not ever reading the comics, I had no idea what might have been coming or what figure I wanted to come out, etc. It was a huge surprise every year to see what concepts were cooked up. Is it a risk? Sure it is, but they've got to innovate with new characters at some point and they've shown they're capable of it ... so why not?

The only negative component of releasing a wave of entirely new characters is some will be unhappy they took priority over modern updates of classic core and supporting characters.

I think introducing new characters into the GIJOE mythology is a good idea, but honestly if it were my decision to make I'd choose more balanced waves...meaning I'd include 1-2 new characters, 2-3 modernized classics, 1-2 full-on vintage look in new sculpt (old school vivid colors where applicable) and 2-3 of whatever Joe visual media (Renegades, movie) is being pushed. I confess I've no idea how to market action figures, though.

I try not to think about what might have been, yet sometimes I wonder how the ROC action figures would have been received had they been incorporated in the Modern line instead of replacing it. Imagine that sweet card art on orange explosion backs with the classic GIJOE logo and maybe the ROC post office symbol on it.

Basically what they're apparently doing for the Renegades action figures...just incorporate them into the main line.

Weeeeellllll...I wouldn't say I'd like to see completely new characters, but I would really like to see characters or designs from the new Sculpt and Sigma Six years, reworked into 25th/ME style. My own "wave" would be Combat Squad Recondo, Combat Squad Desert Wolf, the second version of Hi-tech, Lockdown, Inferno, and jungle Snake Eyes. For a 2002-2006 era wave, DTC Barrel Roll, ST Blackout, ST Scalpel, VvV Mindbender, ST Cobra Coils, and VvV Croc master. What would take this more off track from your idea, Gyre, is that a lot of these would not need completely new tooling, some could work with some frankensteining, but the lack of some known characters could have similar "risk".

Damn, Kev beat me to it. I've always said I would be onboard Sigma Six if it were the 4 - 3.75" scale.

Oh, me, too!

I loved the aesthetic of the Sigma Six characters. I even enjoyed the show. It will always hold a soft spot in my heart as the only Joe media where Scarlett speaks with a Southern accent. Anyway, I thought the design of the characters and vehicles was smashing and I'd have bought most of them had they matched my other Joe stuff.

As it is, I just have a Sigma Six Sky BAT that works well as the infiltrator robot from Marvel #3 and a Firebat with an internet BAT sans arms in the cockpit as a drone.

If they did Sigma Six 7-packs of 3 3/4" like Resolute I'd be all over them. I and maybe 2 other people.

I like the idea Gyre.

I'm always up for new characters.

I think it would easily be successful. Some of the incarnations of existing characters they have come up with have been really cool despite being those characters in name only, PoC Firefly with helmet on, Skydive, RoC Cobra Commander, RoC Ripcord etc. Then you have a few cool characters that get slowly added to the line like Jungle Viper, Shadow Tracker, Cobra Shock Trooper, and the upcoming Hazmat Viper formerly new character Volcano Viper.

I think fans, especially collectors would eat it up. But stores and Hasbro would never go for it without any of the big gun front and center characters. I don't think Hasbro or the retailers are ready to commit to a the line without Duke or Snake Eyes or both in the line up. That doesn't mean the designers aren't up to the challenge. I guarantee you they aren't begging the execs to let them do yet another take on Storm Shadow. The only other downside is the casual toy fan picking up the new character and going "Who is this guy?!" At that point, you've at least got his attention. That's half the battle.

I think the idea of new characters could be a huge success. It's been done before in the Spy Troops & VvV line. Bombstrike, Blackout & Barrel Roll were all new characters with a classic GI Joe (soap opera) backstory and fans eat them up. I think at first Bombstrike won out just by being a new Joe girl, then you find out she has brothers and one of them winds up working for Cobra? Now you have the Stall family instead of 3 individual figures.

You could even make the whole wave a subset of sorts calling it GI Joe: New Recruits or something similar.