To say children were influenced by ads in comic books is an understatement. In the 1970s, comic books were the place to be if you were a toy manufacturer looking to reach impressionable kids — well, if you didn’t have the money to spend on expensive Saturday morning TV commercials, that is. The funnybooks were how young Anthill learned of the glory of Mego Super Heroes, Superman Crazy Foam, the Ricochet Racers Spider-Man set — and this guy:
If you’ve ever read a comic book before, the above probably seems like pretty tame stuff, but to young Anthill, it was a revelation. We “eagle-eyed” readers could see old GI Joe just couldn’t hack it anymore; it was time for Atomic Men and Human Bullets to step in and save the day. And lest you think this approach was self-sabotage on Hasbro’s part, don’t worry — we kids still needed GI Joe, if only to have someone for our new action figures to rescue. Heresy, I know! But Joe had fallen on hard times and was counting on a hero to save him.
From 1970-1976, Hasbro’s GI Joe was released under the “Adventure Team” sub-line. The emphasis had been taken off of Joe’s military background, and our hero found himself instead dealing with natural disasters, escaped animals and lost historical treasures. And while some serious action figure innovations occurred during this era (“Kung-Fu Grip!” “Life-like hair!!”), the spark that had made Joe “America’s #1 Movable Fighting Man” was gone. Without a clearly-defined foe to fight, Joe floundered. Compared to Mego Corps’ successful 8-inch super hero and movie lines, Hasbro’s 12-inch figures seemed a bit like the dinosaurs of the toy aisle: bigger, slower, and in danger of extinction.
To counter this die-off, Hasbro made some bull moves. It beat Kenner’s Steve Austin action figure to the shelves by several months, issuing its Mike Power, Atomic Man just in time to cash in on the popularity of ABC’sThe Six Million Dollar Man. Less successfully, it courted the “Bigfoot is an Alien” crowd (decades before Youtube) with it’s Intruder: Strongman from Another World figure. And while those efforts are all commendable, we’re here to talk about the Human Projectile — the one and only Bulletman! Wait, whaddya mean who?
Bulletman was Hasbro’s answer to those pesky superheroes cutting into its aisle space. As far as answers go, it was pretty audacious: “Bulletman” was originally a Fawcett Comics character who had recently entered the public domain as the result of a lapsed copyright. DC Comics later claimed it owned the rights to Bulletman, along with those of Captain Marvel and the Marvel Family after picking up the Fawcett option in 1972, but at the time, the situation was murky enough that Hasbro was able to manufacture their own version of Bulletman without legal action.
You’ll note the obvious differences: the smaller helmet, the lack of chest emblem, the pants. But barring these minor changes, the two characters are quite similar. At the time, we kids had no idea about the behind-the-scenes shenanigans — that single ad gave us all the information we needed to make up our minds: Bulletman was half-chrome/half Danskin and all man! With his addition, the Adventure Team became the Super Adventure team, and nothing would ever be the same again! No, seriously — Hasbro called the whole thing off a year later and 12-inch Joes went the way of the 10 cent cup of coffee and affordable housing. Ah, but what a year!
Bulletman was built on the standard GI Joe Adventure team body, retaining all of that figure’s articulation. Unlike Joe, Bulletman sported some seriously cool chrome arms. Well, okay, they were actually just vacuum-metallized plastic, but still, the idea came across. They tied in nicely with his conical-shaped helmet, indicating his powers stem from (or are at least represented by) the silvery metal coating. The fact that his neck appears unprotected is a bit worrisome — while his head may be harder than a diamond, his neck is still going to crumple like an empty milk carton as soon as he hits anything denser than a bed-sheet drying on the clothes-line. Keep those arms up, Bulletman!
Whether you’re a long-established character or just starting out, one thing is certain: in today’s era of niche marketing, self-promotion, and branding, an identifiable emblem is essential. It tells the audience at a glance exactly what it needs to know about you: whether you’re the bold and direct type (sporting the first letter of your name on your chest), literal-minded (I shall become… a bat/spider/Kuhli loach!), or whether you were a graphics arts major in high school (see me after class, Mister Havok). The most important thing is that your emblem is memorable:
Pretty choice, huh? Direct, to the point, and a damn sight better than a big silver “B” emblazoned across his leotard. Granted, it kind of looks like the bullet is exploding out of our hero’s chest, but hey, you get the idea.
Bulletman’s action feature was that he could (wait for it) slide down a thread. With a push. Unless he got stuck — then he’d just dangle there. The snaps on the figure’s back were meant to allow a sort of zip-line action, but it was a pretty weak effort. UK manufacturer Palitoy attempted to jazz up their version of Bulletman with the addition of non-functional “rocket boots.”
As a kid, I don’t think I would have liked this addition to the lore. Somehow not moving under his own power makes Bulletman less… I dunno, super. In the ad, our hero seems to be flying by sheer will alone — obviously that’s way more badass than a pair of goofy-looking rockets stuck to his boots. And let’s not get into the issue of strapping powerful jet engines to his feet without any sort of controls or guidance system. Err, maybe they’re in his helmet?
Hmmm, maybe not. The poor guy could barely see out of the darned thing — the best he could hope for is a bit of padding. Maybe. Anyway, both the helmet and arms featured the aforementioned vac-metal. This technique gets a lot of heat from collectors, primarily because it doesn’t age well. In fact, it usually began to flake and chip as soon as an elbow turned or Bulletman struck something head-on, leaving very few Bulletmen in mint condition. That said, it wasn’t just play that was Bulletman’s enemy — it was Time Itself!
Like all of the other Joes at the time, Bulletman was held together by stretchy elastic bands. Over the years, the bands disintegrate, leaving even the mintiest Adventure Team members in a sad heap of their own extremities. The industrious toy collector can restring a Joe in less time than it takes to fire off a toy-based Internet rant, but the idea of having to restore a figure like this is enough to keep the meek at bay.
As I mentioned earlier, Bulletman was on store shelves one year, only to be gone the next. Hasbro replaced their 12-inch offerings with a new line called the “Super Joe Adventure Team,” made up of a series of smaller, Mego-styled figures — but that’s an article for another time. Bulletman faded into the past, but was never quite forgotten. In recent years he’s enjoyed a new wave of popularity as now-adult consumers scramble to reassemble their childhood collections.
But Bulletman isn’t just collecting dust in man-caves across the country — he’s very active in the community as well. He can often be found in grade schools teaching children about firearm safety as well as the dangers of ramming into things with your head, not to mention his contemporary “Bullet Bro” is the 2014 spokesman for PDD (Projectile Dysfunction Disorder)!
So — Bulletman. We hardly knew ye. And while Hasbro has re-released members of the Adventure Team as recently as 2007, we’ve yet to see a Bulletman reissue. What’s up with that? Is it DC’s fault? Do we have to wait for a crappy Nu52 version of him to appear before we can get a lousy update? And what of GI Joe himself? Did Joe resent being pushed to the side? Personally, I don’t think so. The poor guy was tired — think of all the horror he’d seen in his lifetime. He was probably happy to leave the heavy lifting to Bulletman and Mike Power — Joe just wanted to go fishing. After 13 years, he finally got his wish.
Thanks to Tommy Valle, Mike Gardner, and Tim Weedn at 1/6th Scale Dioramas of Any Kind for use of their photos! Check out the further adventures of Tim Weedn’s Bullet Bro here!
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