Official solicit:

G.I. JOE 25th Anniversary Edition: COMMANDO SNAKE EYES

SNAKE EYES is proficient in 12 different unarmed fighting systems and is highly skilled in the use of edged weapons. He has received extensive training in mountaineering, underwater demolitions, jungle, desert, and arctic survival, and some forms of holistic medicine. He is a qualified expert in all NATO and Warsaw Pact small arms.

Celebrate 25 years of the ultimate action team with this articulated commando action figure! Display your action figure on the included display base! Figure also comes with interchangeable weapons!

Item #: 63842
Approx. Retail: $ 6.99
Ages: 5 & Up

I’m not alone in saying this I’m sure, so I’ll just jump right into the cage with the rest of the sheep and declare that Snake Eyes was always my favorite Joe. Sure, I had others too; Beachhead, Chuckles, Ripcord, Quick Kick, and that’s not even counting any of the Cobra’s! I always really liked the visored/ninja Snake Eyes the best though, at least back in the day - something about ninjas and the 1980’s which would be kind of hard to explain to a kid of today, but it was all ninjas and karate back then. ALL!

When I started seeing these new 25th Anniversary reinterpretations of the the classic figures showing up on shelves late last year, I wasn’t super impressed, and have passed on all of them. The details on the new sculpts left a bit to be desired, and the figures seemed smaller too, and frankly I guess I was kind of over war toys.

And then I saw this guy. And now you’ll read my review. Damnit.

The new card and graphics are an amazing call-back to the original ‘83 line, looking amazingly close to the original packaging. The back of the card is also in tune with the originals, which also features I believe the exact same bio-card info as the original - including having his real name and birthplace being listed as CLASSIFIED! Something about that always made Snake Eyes stand out to me as a kid, even before we would all later find out that he was some kind of Army super-ninja of course.

Off the card, Snakes comes equipped with an uzi, a handgun (some kind of Beretta?), a knife and a nameplate base to stand on, as well as his satchel/gear pack which is he wearing (and is also removable!) featuring all sorts of little weapons and grenades etc etc.

Out of package and fully armed, standing on his base, Snake Eyes is a very impressive update. The handgun he comes with fits into a holster on the left side of his belt, and his knife fits into a sheath on his right leg. Snake Eyes is mostly all matte-black, with a few brassy high-lights on belt and clasp areas for detail.

Standing around 3 6/8th inches tall, he’s roughly the same height as the old Joe figures (we’ll get into that more later…), but with a ton more detail. The sculpt on this is great, so great in fact that it seems that most of the new 25th Anniversary line have figures made up of the same essential body-parts, legs recycled, arms as well etc. Which is fine, but if I was collecting the whole line I’d be a little mad at that fact that every one of my Joe’s had the exact same creases and folds in their pants, yeah?

Articulation on the new Joes is really impressive, and pretty well redesigned from the old figures. Featuring about 18 points of articulation, posability for Snake Eyes is massive. Head is on a ball joint, arms go up and around as well as ball-rotation at the shoulder, the upper abdomen also allows for rotation with some kind of joint (possibly a ball, or rubber band system like the old figures?), the hands rotate at the wrists, the feet are on a hinge to allow for stabilization, and the knees feature the double joint just like the latest Iron Man figures or the later Sigma 6 figures did too.

Snake Eyes can’t pass the Murdershow Karate Kick Test™, because his ankles/feet are too small and the rest of his frame is pretty top-heavy, but that’s where the base comes in to play and makes it possible. Although for me, GI Joe figures were always more about playability, instead of leaving or keeping them posed…

However, with the new articulation, posability is as I said earlier massive. Posing on bended-knee in a believable position is possible now too, thanks to the double-joint extension there. The ability to rotate the wrists 360 degrees also means added position for his weapons to be held in, which is something Snake Eyes is known for!

My major problem with the new figure is the material he’s made out of, which seems to be happening with more and more figures lately. Using that softer & rubbery plastic, instead of a harder thicker kind. First of all, it’s smelly, it never stops smelling weird, and even kind of feels cheap and “dollar store-y” as well. 2nd, it makes for issues when it comes to figures and their accessories, holding things can become difficult because that softer rubber won’t hold things as snug. Sure, using this material means no more busted crotches and thumbs on GI Joe’s (the major death of all GI Joe figures from the 1980’s ahem!), which is a plus. But it seems there could be some kind of halfway point reached between using this material, vs the fragile and easily breakable plastics of the original figures, yeah?

Minor gripe, but gripes is what I do best…

I’ve spoken about the details, but here are a few pics to really zoom in and see how great they are. The mask and knife, the pouch and satchel, and even the folds in the material of his suit, all are really well made and make this figure stand out in design, even if not in stature…

Which brings us to size. I said earlier the new figures are roughly the same height as the old Joe’s, I doubt there is more than an 1/8th of an inch difference at most. However, the builds are completely different. As you can see above right, the old figures were much more stocky, with larger heads, waists and arms. The new figures are much more designed to be anatomically correct (as you can see above left), meaning smaller heads, smaller arms, chest, and even thinner legs are more in scale with what a person would look like at that size. These differences in design really show that the new figures are smaller than the older ones, especially when standing next to them. It’s not a huge deal, and only super ocd-nerds will be bothered by it, but as I suffer from slight ocd-nerdness I am actually a little bothered by it. It might have been nice to up the size of the 25th figures to a full 4 inches maybe then, to show off the new molds and designs, all their weapons as well.

Which comes to the second problem I have, since the hands are a little smaller, and a little more rubbery than the old figures, the weapons tend to fall out much easier. I just about lost Snakes handgun twice while taking the pictures for this review, and I imagine if you dropped it onto a carpeted floor or outside in the grass you’d have an even harder time of finding it again than I did (against the black backdrop in the Murdershow Photo Booth!), so be careful where you go with your weapons and these guys!

In the end though Snake Eyes is a great reinterpretation, my few gripes aside. I’m never going to play with this guy the same way I would have 25 years ago, so losing the weapons isn’t going to be a big deal for me. And as I said, not all of these 25th figures are as nice as this one, many of the new molds are downright awful (Tomax and Xamot looking especially fugly around the face, and the new petite body types looking kind of ridiculous with really gaudily colored figures costumes), so choose wisely!

All in all, considering there are about 6 or 7 Snake Eyes figures running around in the 25th Anniversary line, I’d say this one is probably my favorite, and therefore the best. The visored ninja Snake Eyes is a little too silly for me now, but the all black commando version is right up my alley. I may even have to go back and take a look at some of these other remakes now, to see if I hadn’t judged them all a bit too harshly, yeah?