There are devils in Tasmania and Ripper is probably the meanest of them all. Was expelled from nursery school for extorting candy from his schoolmates and spent most of his adult life in various correctional institutions. He is a professional criminal motivated by greed and a malignant dislike for the niceties of civilization—except for motorcycles.

Head construction and copyright indicate a 1984 design, but carded with the 1985 assortment. Reportedly released for the 1984 Christmas season with Buzzer and Torch as a Dreadnoks 3-pack a Sears exclusive, but this is unproven. Recolored versions were released in India. Versions from 2002 onward were named Dreadnok Ripper.

Shipwreck grew up in the shadow of the Navy, specifically the shadow of the sprawling San Diego Navy Yards. He enlisted at the youngest possible age with his parents' permission and proceeded to serve with distinction in the Mekong Delta where hand to hand fighting with river pirates, smugglers, and insurgents was the order of the day. Put in time at "Gitmo" and Yokosuka and was on hand at certain carrier-initiated operations in the Middle East.
Graduated Naval Gunnery School Great Lakes. Qualified expert: M-16, M-14, Browning .50 cal., 20mm Cerliken AA gun, M1911A1.
"Shipwreck is your quintessential sailor. He can splice a line, fry powdered eggs in the tooth of a gale and eat them, tell taller tales than a Senate Appropriations committee and take a three day liberty in Thule, Greenland and come back smiling."

Featured in the AWE Striker commercial. A slightly different version was released in India. A Tiger Force version was released in Brazil as Marujo.

Subject served in Long Range Recon Patrols in South East Asia. Left the service to study mystic martial arts with the same Ninja family that produced Storm Shadow. Snake-Eyes was living an ascetic existence alone in the High Sierras with a pet wolf named Timber when he was recruited for the G. I. Joe Team.
Qualified Expert: All Nato and Warsaw Pact small arms, black belt in 12 different fighting systems and highly skilled in the use of edged weapons.
"Snake-Eyes was tempered on the anvil of life until he was as dangerous as a razor-edged sword, flailing in the dark. The G. I. Joe Team sheathed that sword and harnessed its deadly energy but even they are wont to forget that even within the safety of its scabbard, the blade retains its cutting edge."

The first carded character to be a new version of a previous character. Featured in the commercial for the Check Point and Air Defense. Snake's name is not hyphenated for the 1982, 1989, 1991, 1997/I, 2002, and later versions. The 2006 version was named "CLASSIFIED."

Snow Serpents are the Arctic Specialist branch of the Eels (COBRA Frogmen). They must undergo the same rigorous training program as the Eels with the addition of a six month cold weather course somewhere above the Arctic Circle. Other aspects of the training include airborne operations (under arctic conditions), anti-tank procedures and the use of snow-shoes, skis, and kayaks.
"If the Eels are the elite of COBRA's naval branch, then the Snow Serpents are the best of the best. How else could you characterize an individual who would parachute onto an ice floe in sub-zero temperatures and then be prepared to march 50 miles with full field pack, assault rifle, and anti-tank weapon?"

Also released with different accessories at a 1992 convention.

These are the RTOs (Radio Telecommunications Operators) of the COBRA ground forces. They carry a standard modular radio pack that contains as a main unit a VHF transceiver equipped with an automatic frequency hopper, a crypto unit and passive jamming and anti-jamming devices. The Tele-Viper helmet contains high resolution earphones with overload dampers and two sets of voice actuated microphones. The interior of the helmet offers an alternative LED readout triggered through the optional computer pack. Optional transmission modes include microwave beam and laser—Both available as add-ons to the basic pack.

The 1989 version was named "Python Tele-Viper."

Spell out the name TOMAX in capitals and hold it up to a mirror. It reads XAMOT. The same holds true for the actual brothers. Each is the mirror image of the other except for a scar on Xamot's face. Both twins served with the Foreign Legion Paras in Algeria before the officers Putsch. They honed their mercenary skills in the bush wars of Africa and South America. They were too smart to be soldiers forever. Went to Zurich and became bankers.
They quickly found the ins and outs of international finance to be too haphazard for their tastes. They preferred a situation they could control. COBRA was willing to give them access to that control. Now they command legions. But their legions wear three-piece suits and fight their battles in executive board rooms. These then are the most fearsome of the COBRA adversaries. They don't fight with steel and claw, backed with muscle and honest sweat . . . They chase you with paper, wound you with your own laws, and kill you with the money you loaned them.

Sold only with Xamot; originally available in stores as a two pack. Also available through several mail-in offers from 1988 to 1992.

Subject was remanded to Borstal Reform school at age fourteen. Escaped and went to sea in the Merchant Marine where he learned the use of the cutting torch.
Torch is an illiterate, unrepenant thug whose penchant for sudden and unexpected violence is matched only by the utter depth of his stupidity.

Head construction and copyright indicate a 1984 design, but carded with the 1985 assortment. Reportedly released for the 1984 Christmas season with Buzzer and Ripper as a Dreadnoks 3-pack as a Sears exclusive, but this is unproven. A slightly different version was released in Argentina as Calavera. Versions from 2005 onward were named Dreadnok Torch.

Spell out the name TOMAX in capitals and hold it up to a mirror. It reads XAMOT. The same holds true for the actual brothers. Each is the mirror image of the other except for a scar on Xamot's face. Both twins served with the Foreign Legion Paras in Algeria before the officers Putsch. They honed their mercenary skills in the bush wars of Africa and South America. They were too smart to be soldiers forever. Went to Zurich and became bankers.
They quickly found the ins and outs of international finance to be too haphazard for their tastes. They preferred a situation they could control. COBRA was willing to give them access to that control. Now they command legions. But their legions wear three-piece suits and fight their battles in executive board rooms. These then are the most fearsome of the COBRA adversaries. They don't fight with steel and claw, backed with muscle and honest sweat . . . They chase you with paper, wound you with your own laws, and kill you with the money you loaned them.

Sold only with Tomax; originally available in stores as a two pack. Also available through several mail-in offers from 1988 to 1992.

Tripwire's proficient with all NATO and Warsaw Pact explosives, detonators, and blasting machines.

Includes the briefest filecard of all Joe figures prior to 2004's Built to Rule line.

There are several ways to get from one place to another in Kansas and driving fast is most of them. Crankcase was racing street machines when he was sixteen. This was no great feat since he had been building them from the time he was thirteen. He worked the stock car circuit for years until the boredom hit him like a brick wall. A recruiting sergeant with a crooked smile signed him up for a burst of four with promises of speed and glory. Crankcase graduated Ranger School and Desert Warfare School and attended the Special Air Service Tactical Driving School under the NATO Exchange program. Qualified expert: M-16, M1911A1, M-60 and TOW.
"Ever get irritable when you're standing in a line that just doesn't seem to be moving at all? Well, the whole [world] seems to be moving in slow motion to Crankcase—all the time! That's why he's constantly ticked-off. He's just not happy unless he has a wheel in one hand, a shifter in the other and the wind in his face."

One of six vehicle drivers available through 1988's mail-in orders "Is This the End of Sergeant Slaughter?" and "Capture the Excitement," as well as 1992's offer, "Mission Rescue: Code Blue."

Frostbite was born in a place where summer is a myth and a crowd consists of two people standing on the same acre. He worked briefly as lineman on the pipeline but found the job unchallenging despite the 40 degrees below zero temperatures and hazardous conditions. The army promised to give him a challenge whenever he wanted one. Frostbite graduated from transportation school, Fort Eustis, and armored school, Fort Knox. Qualified expert: M-16, M1911A1 Auto Pistol, M-2 50 cal. MG, and M-60 7.62mm MG.
"Frostbite has to be cool. The environment he works in is too unforgiving. If his Snow Cat throws a piston, he's got to step out into weather that'll freeze a hex-wrench to bare skin in five seconds and carry through a repair job that would be taxing under ideal conditions. He can't afford to panic. Not if he wants to stay alive."

One of six vehicle drivers available through 1988's mail-in orders "Is This the End of Sergeant Slaughter?" and "Capture the Excitement," as well as 1992's offer, "Mission Rescue: Code Blue."

There are sections of Brooklyn that are less accessible to outsiders than the mountains of Transylvania. In Heavy Metal's old neighborhood, a trip to Manhattan (just across the East River) was considered a major expedition. Aspiring to become middle class was daydreaming, pure and simple. Heavy Metal enlisted to go to Finance School, his ultimate goal to become a CPA. But one day at Fort Belvoir, he watched a column of tanks roll by and was never the same again. He put in for a transfer to Armor that same day. Qualified expert: M-16, M-1911A1, M-2 50 cal. MG and M-60 MG.
"Many people find comfort in order and discipline. Mathematics reduces the complexities of the world to manageable sums. Heavy Metal likes tanks. They are immutable statements in iron."

Available as Rampage through 1991's mail-in offer, "Escape from Doom."

Graduated Annapolis and Navy Flight School. Flew Phantom F-4's off the Intrepid in late 60's. Attended the Naval War College in Newport, RI and the Armed Forces Staff College. Holder of the Navy Cross, DFC, and Air Medal. Keel-Haul is a respected military historian, a nationally rated chess player, and possibly the world's worst clarinet player.
"Keel-Haul was always cool. He could set an F-4 down on a carrier deck at night with half his instruments out and walk away whistling. You know what it's like to land on a carrier at night? Try jumping on a moving skate board while blind folded!"

Keel-Haul's rank is derived from his 1993 filecard; it is not listed on the original. One of six vehicle drivers available through the mail-in offers "Special Assignment: North Atlantic" in 1988 and "Operation Deep Six" in 1989, then sold separately through 1990's mail-in offers. Keel-Haul must have been vastly overproduced; the figure was released as a prize for various carnivals, arcade restaurants, and "Skeeball" games. I do not recall his aircraft carrier being given away in this manner.

Lampreys are the elite of the COBRA sea-arm. To qualify for Lamprey training, a candidate must be a COBRA trooper in top physical condition who has completed his EEL training (EEL's are the Frogmen underwater demolition specialists of the COBRA legion) and has been operational as an EEL for more than a year. The training is highly selective and more than 50% of the applicants wash out before completing the course.

One of six vehicle drivers available the mail-in offers "Special Assignment: North Atlantic" in 1988 and "Operation Deep Six" in 1989, then alone in 1990's "Stop Cobra in Their Tracks" and 1992's "Mission Rescue: Code Blue."

Tollbooth's love for building started when he was six. His parents gave him a construction set for Christmas and he wore it out before he was seven. Every year his sets got bigger and more complex until he outgrew them all. Started building in earnest. Got his Masters in engineering from MIT. Needed a bigger challenge, so he joined the army expressly to sign up for the G. I. Joe Team.
Stalker says: "We're on our way to an objective and come to an obstacle we can't cross. River, crevasse, mountain, whatever . . . . Tollbooth gets us across. He may build a bridge out of whatever's there. Blast a pass through solid rock or lay down a four lane blacktop . . . . The man's got magic."

Tollbooth's neck joint reflects 1982-1984 construction. He and the Toss 'n Cross was available as a Sears exclusive by January (possibly December 1984 in some stores) before its general release.

Kurt was the kid who could hold his breath the longest. He was also the kid who had the largest collection of plastic dinosaurs on the block. He was a weird kid who grew up to be an even stranger adult. It takes a mighty weird person to walk into a cloud of toxic gas strong enough to fell a mutant weight-lifter cockroach wearing a protective suit built under contract for the government by the lowest bidder.
"Airtight is an unreformed practical joker; sneezing powder, plastic barf, whoopee cushion—the whole bit!! No prank is too low for him. You'd think that other Joes would hate his guts, but they don't. Because when the bad guys escalate the fire fight and start playing dirty, it's old Airtight who suits up and wades into the thick of it."

Featured in the commercial for the Check Point and Air Defense. Airtight's job description somewhat foreshadows the role of the Eco Warriors later in the toy line; in view of this, it is perhaps surprising that Flint, Deep Six, and Barbecue, not Airtight, were chosen by Hasbro for the unit. A slightly recolored version was released in India. A Tiger Force version was released in Brazil as Ar Puro. A second version of Airtight was planned for the cancelled fourth wave of DTC (2007-08).

From the middle of the flat dusty Snake River Plain where Alpine was born he could see the mountains on the horizon in almost every direction like a physical barrier between him and the world he wanted. He took up mountain climbing during college and continued as a recreational climber during his brief tenure as an accountant for a large publishing firm. The G. I. Joe team gave Alpine the most hazardous of all conditions: with COBRA shooting at him!
Graduated Ranger School, Fort Benning. Qualified Expert: M-16, M-14, M-60, M-1911A1.
"Every time Alpine scales a sheer cliff piton by piton, overcoming granite and gravity with muscle and persistance [sic], he is symbolically climbing out of the quagmire of his past. That's why we send him up first on vertical assaults. He doesn't take to being knocked down too easily."

Featured in the commercial for the Check Point and Air Defense. The only other mountain climbing figure was Rock Viper.

If Kelly hadn't joined the G. I. Joe Team he would have been the seventh Kelly in his direct line in the Boston Fire department. His love for the job is not based on family loyalty or even a more general sense of duty; he simply likes riding on the back of the truck with the wind in his face and sirens wailing, lights flashing and the bells clanging. Being allowed to knock down doors and smash windows with his axe is just frosting on the cake.
"Barbecue is what you call your basic party animal. He can open bottles with his teeth, pick up quarters with his ears, and wrap his lips completely around the bottom of a quart Coke bottle. You may well ask how all this affects his function as the G. I. Joe Firefighter . . . . It doesn't. It simply makes him a more interesting fellow to have around."

Featured in the AWE Striker commercial. At some point Barbecue may have been available through a mail-in offer. A recolored version was released in India.

The spoiled offspring of wealthy European aristocrats, the Baroness graduated from student radicalism into international terrorism and finally into the ranks of COBRA. She was severely burned during a COBRA night attack operation and has had extensive plastic surgery. Rumor has it that she is the only one who knows Destro's secret identity. Qualified expert: M-16; AK-47; RPG7; Uzi; H.I.S.S. tank operator.
"Her principal weakness is in the division of her loyalty between COBRA Commander and Destro. Her chief strength would seem to lie in her ability to play them against each other."

The 1997 filecard lists her name as Anastasia DeCobray. Featured in the Water Moccasin commercial. A slightly different version was released in India.

Buzzer was an extreme left-wing Cambridge sociology don who went to Australia to research the biker gang phenomenon only to be transformed into the very object of his research. Years of intellectual displeasure and extreme indignation at society's two-faced morality manifested into the intense desire to chainsaw apart the expensive geegaws of technological society.

Head construction, item number, and copyright indicate a 1984 design, but carded with the 1985 assortment. Reportedly released for the 1984 Christmas season with Ripper and Torch as a Dreadnoks 3-pack a Sears exclusive, but this is unproven. Recolored versions were released in India. The 2004 and 2005 versions were named "Dreadnok Buzzer."

The Crimson Guard are the elite shock troops of the COBRA Legions. All "Siegies" must hold a degree in either law or accounting as well as being in top physical condition. Final stages of training take place in the deepest recesses of COBRA Headquarters and is purported to involve an initiation ceremony too hideous for description.
"Crimson Guardsmen are too precious to be wasted on the conventional battle field. They are dispersed about the country in deep cover, assuming apparently normal appearances and life-styles. Watch out. That friendly new neighbor of yours just might have a red uniform hanging in his closet."

One of the most intricately designed figures at the time of its release. The 1989 version was named "Python Crimson Guard." The 1991 and 2003 versions were named "Crimson Guard Immortal."

Dusty loves the desert. It is clean, pure, and unforgiving. Unlike Vegas which is always willing to give you a second chance, Dusty was working as a refrigerator repairman and studying desert ecology at night when his pre-enlistment application for the G. I. Joe Team was approved. He took Basic at Fort Bliss, TX and loved every minute of it.
Qualified expert: M-16, M-14, M-1911A1, M-60.
"It's not enough nowadays to have a rapid-reaction force responsive instantaneously to explosive situations in far flung corners of the globe. That force must be capable of surviving in a diverse array of hostile environments to accomplish its objectives. If that means having one expert for every type of environment on every team to take on survival responsibilities on that terrain, then so be it."

Named for Hasbro artist Ron Rudat.

Eels are the underwater dmeolitions specialists of the COBRA legions. They man and operate the COBRA marine outposts disguised as off-shore drilling rigs and augment the crews of larger COBRA naval vessels.
Eels undergo a rigorous two-part training program in the Caribbean and in the frigid dark depths of the North Atlantic. Their training regiment includes marine structural engineering, explosive ordnance, underwater fighting techniques and marine geology.

Not quite the same type of trooper as Valor vs. Venom's Electric EEL.

Flint was a Rhodes Scholar and earned his degree in English Lit. Bored by the Groves of Academe, he enlisted in the Army and applied the tenacity and concentration he had used so well scholastically to grind his way through Airborne School, Ranger School, Special Forces School, and finally Flight Warrant Officers School . . . . Graduating each with top honors. A thorough tactical planner, Flint drafted and personally led a half dozen rescue missions in hostile territories that for obvious reasons of security were never publicized let alone admitted to.
"We had thought COBRA had us in the stinking dungeon for good—So we didn't know what was going down when we heard that chopper comin' in and all the heavy hardware going off like the Fourth of July. Then somebody kicked down the door to our cell and when the smoke cleared, there was Flint with that lop-sided grin sayin' 'C'mon boys, we're going home . . . .'"

Featured in the Terror Drome commercial. While his function is Warrant Officer, that is not his rank (E-6). True warrant officers include Torpedo, Wild Bill, Lift-Ticket, and Major Altitude. Future versions of Flint correct his grade to WO-4 (chief warrant officer). Also, filecards for the 1991, 1994, and 2001 versions spell his last name "Faireborne." A slightly different version was released in India.

Lady Jaye graduated from Bryn Mawr and did her graduate work at Trinity College in Dublin where she acquired the faint Gaelic lilt that adorns her speech. An accomplished actress and mime as well as a studied linguist, she can easily pass as a native in France, Italy, Poland, Russia, Germany, Afghanistan, Spain, and Portugal.
Airborne and Ranger qualified, graduated intelligence school Fort Holabird. Qualified expert: M-16, M1911A1 and reflex crossbow.
"Lady Jaye doesn't go in for that phoney wig and rubber mask brand of disguise like those jokers on Mission Impossible . . . . She becomes the subject: body language, subtle gesture, correct shading of dialect—The right look in the eye. Cloaked and sandaled, she can squat down with a basket of oranges in any Middle Eastern marketplace and blend in perfectly."

A slightly different version was released in India.

Subject's Japanese father and Korean mother owned a grocery store in Watts. Not accepted by either the Japanese or Koreans because of his mixed ancestry and too short to play basketball, Quick Kick turned to martial arts. All martial arts. He is a ranking black belt in Tae Kwan Do, Go Ju Ryu, Southern Praying Mantis Kung-Fu, Tai-Chi Sword, Zen Sword, and Wing-Chun. He was working as a stunt man in Hollywood when he was recruited for the G. I. Joe team.
Qualified expert: All NATO and Warsaw Pact small arms.
"Here's the situation. You want to gain access to a fortified villa. Twelve foot tall continuous wall topped with razor-spiral and only one gate through it. Two inch steel plate on the gate, two sand-bagged guard houses with direct telephone link to the main house, four guards with submachine guns, two Dobermans, and a silent alarm hooked to a deadman's switch that one of the guards is leaning on at all times. How to do it? Have Quick Kick hit it, that's how!"

Also available through the mail-in offers "Escape from Doom" in 1991, "The Secret of the Dark Lagoon" in 1992, and "Terrifying Lasers of Destruction" in 1993. Slightly different versions were released in Argentina as Sigilo and in India as Quick Kick.