Zandar

One of the most hotly requested figures over the past year or two has probably been Zandar, though for the life of me, I'm not sure why. In my opinion, Zartan was always the coolest sibling, and considering Zandar's penchant for pink or light blue I had a hard time understanding why so many fans were clamoring for him.

Even in the Marvel Comic, when Zartan drifted over to the side of the angels, Zarana shot up through the ranks of Cobra, often working alongside Cobra Commander while Zandar was kind of forgotten in the shadows. I will say Zartan's brother had a measure of redemption when he ended up in the Coil during the Devil's Due run, but I still wasn't sure what drove the fandom to demand his presence in the 25th Anniversary or 30th Anniversary line.

But now that we have him, I must admit, I'm excited. In my own little corner of the G.I. Joe universe, I've done some things with Zandar to try and separate him from his siblings a little bit. I never thought that his feeling of being unnoticed was properly expressed in either the comic or cartoon, so I elected to have him stranded on Cobra Island for 10 years, living off the swamp until he finally found a way to escape and make it back to mainland. This decade of total isolation, for someone already feeling alone and unappreciated, twisted him up mentally pretty badly. In my dio-stories he was just getting acclimated to normal life again when Zarana was killed, and now I fully expect him to go totally off the deep end.

But this is a figure review not my own little character analysis...and I have to say, it's obvious Hasbro took this character very seriously when building him up for this 7-pack. He has a totally new head sculpt that is a great update to the original character. His torso belongs to the Pursuit of Cobra Zartan, while his arms are from the 25th Anniversary Zartan. His legs are a mixture of Rise of Cobra troopers and... I'm not entirely sure what the top halves are, but I know they're familiar.

The end result is a figure that actually doesn't use a whole lot of new tooling, but really effectively uses existing tooling to create this character to near perfection.

The paint applications also compliment the figure and character well, going with the familiar hair color, the tatoos and warpaint, and just the ride shades of blue and gray. The figure is instantly recognizable.

Zandar comes with a couple of new items for his secondaries, including a great ragged neck scarf and his familiar shoulder holster that really look like they did back in 1986 (though his scarf is pretty large). His holster has a removable pistol, he's got a removable knife on his right leg, and comes with a version of Eel's spear gun. All told, a great selection of accessories that isn't large in number, but suits the character really well.

I continue to be amazed at how much progress Hasbro has made on holster and sheath design as well, able to produce a form-fitting shoulder holster that isn't overly large, but also fits his removable pistol perfectly.

This is a great figure and a great addition to this Dreadnok 7-Pack. It makes perfect sense for Hasbro to find a way to release him, and he fits seamlessly with Zartan and Zarana, who were already released. Very cool addition.

GRADE:

Pre-Order this great 7-Pack at Big Bad Toy Store now!