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I think most fans seem to be having the same sentiment in regards to the concept shelf, and the same feeling of mixed emotions.  While I personally love to see pre-production items, unproduced items, and things in various stages of design and production, having a full blown glass case of figures that are currently not due for release is a real blow to the gut.

That’s not to say I don’t want to see them and I want Hasbro to not show this stuff…I absolutely love it and eat this up, but it does fill me with some serious mixed emotions.  Obviously the G.I. Joe: Renegades shelf hit me hard with very nice, crisp pre-production Coyote and Flint’s Jeep concepts.  Scrap Iron was a beauty as well.  But for many folks, it was likely the 30th Anniversary shelf that was particularly devastating.

An awesome Flint update with his classic look, accompanied by Lady Jaye.  Beachhead, HEAT-Viper, Snow Serpent, Laser-Viper, Tele-Viper…and Hit & Run.  Oh good God that  Hit & Run.  This figure is something I’ve been dreaming about with the character for years.  It reeked of Hit & Run perfection…but apparently it is not to be.  Twist that knife a little deeper, Hasbro.

In all seriousness, I cannot stop commending the Hasbro designers for what they’re able to do.  This case was loaded with a ton of great looking figures that were by and large cobbled together from existing parts, and the fact that they could get updated designs to come out as strong and flawless as they did without doing too much new tooling is quite simply astounding.  Applause, Hasbro designers…  now, how do we convince the bean counters to let this stuff get to retail?

Check out some images below, as organized as I can make them.  I will refine this all into a SuperPage at some point very soon, but for now, let’s just get the images up there.

G.I. Joe: Renegades

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G.I. Joe: 30th Anniversary and the Pursuit of Cobra

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G.I. Joe: Legend of the Arashikage Ninja

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G.I. Joe: Zombie Attack

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G.I. Joe Vehicle Concepts

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Items of note… the guy with the hockey mask is a “Dreadnok Trooper”.  The Howler and the Diver were both shown in Providence.  The diver figure has the familiar “Sigma 6” ports on his uniform, so that wounds me like a gunshot.  The bearded guy behind the Dreadnok Trooper is an unreleased PoC Clutch.

In talking with John Warden and Derryl, they were certain to point out that these are all definitely concepts and not to expect release on anything shown here, however, they were very interested to hear in our favorites.  They strongly encouraged communication with Hasbro to express our interest in some of these offerings.

I plan on rolling out some polls and top ten lists perhaps next week once Con hysteria slows down to try and form up some sort of consistent message that can hopefully be relayed about how much we want to see some of these items released.  I would imagine stuff like the G.I. Joe: Renegades items are pretty much off the table, just because of the nature of the brand at this point, but I would imagine there might be other possibilities if we can express our opinions intelligently and constructively.

As I said, I will get this better organized in a SuperPage format going forward, but I wanted to at least get the images out there, I know they are spreading like wildfire already as it is.  Interesting note in my opinion was that all of the G.I. Joe: Retaliation product shown had shelf tags leading up to 4/12/2013, but nothing beyond.  That shows to me there is still a lot planned for next year, so it will be interesting to see what ends up being revealed tomorrow at the Hasbro seminar.

Fingers crossed!

More coverage to come, I promise.  Sorry for the delay on this stuff.  Crazy day as you can imagine.