Good morning!  Some technical issues got in the way, but I have now posted a report from Mysterious Stranger, who was kind enough to travel to San Diego and cover ComicCon for GeneralsJoes.  As we know now there wasn’t much in the way of new information from Hasbro, but Sideshow Collectibles was on hand with two brand new figures to show off (The Baroness and Major Bludd) as well as in hand samples of some other upcoming figures like Snake Eyes and the Crimson Guard.

Mysterious Stranger took plenty of pictures and spoke with some Sideshow Collectibles representatives.

Click the read the rest of the story link below to read the report and see the great images from the show.

Chris here with a better late than never report on the Sideshow G.I. Joe reveals at this year’s Comic-con International in San Diego, otherwise known as SDCC.  While there wasn’t a lot of new stuff revealed, what we saw was pretty awesome.  I spoke with Sideshow Project Manager  Matt Bischof and got some additional information on the new reveals as well as others in the works.

A figure that was revealed earlier this year that has caused a bit of controversy among collectors is the new “version 2” Snake-eyes with Timber deluxe set.  Collector concerns such as the size of the heads and bulk of the sweater have been heard and addressed.  Sideshow has reworked the sweater so that the material is thinner and has a tighter fit on the body.  They are also increasing the size of the heads a bit so the proportions look better.  The figure shown in the display case is a mix of prototype and factory pieces and while it’s not a final sample it is very close.  And Snake-eyes is going to come loaded with gear – weapons, accessories, the works.

Timber is still in the prototype phase.  They are working on how best to get as much articulation as possible into the figure without the joints breaking up the sculpt.  The sample shown in the case is again a prototype and very much a work in progress.  But they want to really improve on the Timber that came with the Recon Waypoint diorama.

The soon to be released Crimson Guard seen at the show is the final factory sample so this is what collectors can expect when they ship sometime in September (according to the most recent info from Sideshow).  The one main change from the prototype seen on Sideshow’s site is the material used for the coat.  The original shiny red material of the prototype was changed to the duller almost matte finish seen in the display case.  Matt was really happy with the way this turned out and I agree this new material looks a lot better.

Now how about those two new reveals in the display case?  We knew Baroness was most likely to be shown as teasers were released online in the weeks leading up to SDCC.  But Major Bludd was a great surprise.  There was one subtle tease in Sideshow’s twitter feed before the show but not everyone caught on to it.  I have to give a hat tip to Justin for re-tweeting that particular message and bringing it to my attention because I didn’t catch it at first.  Both Major Bludd and Baroness are still in the prototype/approval stages but you can clearly see the direction Sideshow is going with them both.

Baroness is 100% all new from the base body to the clothing, armor, headsclupt and accessories.  She will come with 2 different portraits – the one shown which has the relaxed hair and 1 with windblown hair.  Matt said they are working on getting two sets of glasses for her as well.  She will most likely come with the large round ones seen on the prototype but they also want to include a set of square or rectangular glasses as well.  These will probably be made out of an etched out material that comes on a flat sheet and you essentially pop the glasses out of the sheet, then fold and trim the stems to get the fit you want.  I’m really curious about this new technique as the glasses are what really makes the Baroness different from all the other female figures out there and getting 1/6 scale glasses to work and look good is a difficult thing to do.

Baroness will also debut a new Cobra themed display stand.  The stand will have a drawer built in to store most of the extra parts that come with the figures like hands, boot feet, weapons etc.  This figure also is the debut of the new Sideshow female body which we can hope will lead to other female figures coming out like Scarlett.  No official word on whether Scarlett would be made or not but I think you can keep a spot open for her on your shelf.

The other “Major” reveal was the Cobra Mercenary and poet Major Bludd.  Like Baroness, Major Bludd will also come with two different portraits, the eye patch version shown and one to be determined.  His body armor is made in different pieces with the upper body “football pad style” armor able to be removed, revealing the full torso armor underneath for a classic look.  His backpack and rocket gun both have removable rockets which will have fully articulated fins that fold out after firing.  Also, all those dogtags he’s holding and wearing around his neck?  Those will have names on them though Matt wouldn’t reveal who they were.

I asked Matt about some of the possible characters we might see in the future and while he couldn’t comment on anything beyond what was already announced he did give me a little insight into their approach to the line.  First, they won’t be doing any movie style figures.  They are sticking strictly with the ARAH theme and that’s just fine with me.  They’ve been doing a great job so far and I don’t want them to get distracted by movie stuff.  Second, they’re concentrating on “A-list” characters so while we’d all love to see Captain Grid-Iron in 1/6 scale he’s going to have to wait a while.  Finally I posed the “Destro question” and asked about the development of a large muscle body for him.  Matt said that there was a bit of misconception about Destro and people assuming he’s this massive imposing guy when actually if anything he’s just a buff guy in great shape.  He mentioned their new muscle body that is being used on the DC Comics figures (which look awesome by the way) and that it’s possible that that body could be used for Destro or other larger figures like Roadblock.  So while there aren’t any new developments on Destro to report I think we can hope that he’s on their radar.

Matt also addressed my big complaint about the exclusive Falcon figure, namely the accessory pack out.  He said they wanted to include the new tooling and parts while still keeping the price down.  He mentioned the reasoning for the lack of action pose boots and additional hands is that they figure most collectors already have extras of these parts and in order to keep the price down while giving so many newly tooled parts, some items had to be cut.  But this is not an indication of things to come in the line.  This was just a onetime cutback for Falcon and the convention.  As I said in my review of Falcon, everything you need for the character is there in the box.  We’re just used to getting so many extras that I was disappointed when they weren’t there.  I totally understand their logic and while I don’t agree with it (I’d be willing to pay a few more dollars to get a cartoon laser rifle and some grenades) I realize I’m not the typical money conscious collector.

Overall the reveals from Sideshow this year weren’t as numerous as in previous years but if you’ve seen the other displays around their booth you can see why.  In addition to their busts, statues and replicas they had two cases full of Hot Toys 1/6 scale product (that Avengers display was very sweet), their Star Wars line of 1/6 scale figures and they debuted their new DC Comics line of 1/6 scale figures.  When I spoke to Matt at SDCC last year he said they were looking to scale back the G.I. Joe releases to make room for new lines coming down the pike.  They want everyone that wants to collect all their lines to have that chance without having to choose between brands due to too much product coming out.  Taking into consideration their fans and customer base is something that Sideshow has been doing for years and they do it very well.  While I’m a little disappointed we didn’t see more from the G.I. Joe line this year I’m very glad that it is in such capable and passionate hands.  And I’m sure there are more good things coming down the line that we haven’t heard about yet so stay tuned to GeneralsJoes.com for all the latest news.  We might not have it first but we’ll have it right.

no images were found