On to wave two! G.I. Joe Classified is my current figure obsession, so I was very happy to see that my pre-order ship date was adjusted forward to this month from November. I’m still out there hunting Cobra Troopers like a crazy person, so it sure is nice to get the new wave delivered to my door, no muss, no fuss. Let’s take a look at Gung Ho!
The box is a pretty funny reminder that we are still super early in this line with Gung Ho being figure number seven. The illustration presents quite a stunning scene of Gung Ho in the the thick of it. I think it’s interesting that his Joe-Pro and laser gun have more color detail, he is wearing a shirt, and his vest has a lot more of a blue tone to it. Have I mentioned I miss the file cards? Because I do.
Gung Ho comes with three guns, a backpack, and a hat. The pack has three clipping areas, so you can hook the guns onto the pack, though three at a time doesn’t quite work. The shotgun looking gun can attach a couple different ways, but I found that the more stable configuration is on the left side with the handle out. The Machine Gun looking weapon attaches best to the right side and the grenade launcher can hook onto the bottom when the shotgun isn’t in the way. It can also hook onto the right side pretty well too. I did find that I was knocking the guns off the pack often when I was posing the figure, so it’s not perfect, but I do appreciate the effort to create weapon storage.
The guns are all cast in a silver plastic with some embedded metallic flakes They have no paint detail and look fairly plain compared to the wave one weapons. I wouldn’t mind this as much if they were black, but the silver looks a little lame. I’m not one who needs realistic military weapons, so I like the sculpting on the guns and the variety of functions (I assume).
The grenade launcher looking weapon is a little tricky to get into the figure’s hand because it has a guard around the trigger and it is somewhat of a tight fit on his hand. The other two guns fit better, though the machine gun looking weapon does have a really large stock that can make it tricky to fit under Gung Ho’s bicep in a firing pose. I do really like that the clip for this gun matches the clip that is attached to his arm guard.
Gung Ho also has some removeable gear including a right arm guard, a left elbow pad and a left leg grenade pouch. All can be slid off the figure, including the vest, but stay in place pretty well.
The hat also comes off, which is not a feature I need, but I’ll take it. I’ve seen a lot of talk about the hat being inaccurate to Gung Ho’s branch of the military and while I don’t really have that background knowledge, I can see how it doesn’t really match the familiar design.
Sculpting is pretty nice on this figure, though I do have some concerns about proportions. The figure re-uses Roadblock, and while in general I have no problem with re-use (especially thinking back to the original 13 figures) I never thought of Gung Ho as this big of a guy. He’s buff, sure, but not overly tall, so he seems really large here.
But I’m flexible, this is a new interpretation, so he can be taller. Even then I still have a bit of a problem with the size of his noggin relative to the body, especially in comparison to Roadblock, as Gung Ho’s head is pretty enormous. I think he works well on his own, but when in a group, the massive head stands out.
I think this would work better for me if the entire thing was shrunk down a percentage to match Duke’s height or if the head was a little smaller. The head sculpt itself is pretty nice and I love all the details on the vest including the different textures to the armored vest and the straps and grenades. The articulation all moves pretty well, though the more I mess with figures with this base body, the more I notice that the shins on the boot keep the ankles from hinging as forward as I would like. Articulation includes:
- Ball and socket head, neck, and waist
- Swivel/hinge shoulders, hips, wrists and ankles
- Single hinged pecs, mid-torso, and neck
- Double hinged knees and elbows
- Drop-down hips
- Bicep and thigh swivel
Paint is okay, but lacking in parts like the weapons and costume details. I’ve seen some speculate that the reduced paint from wave one to wave two is the result of fan complaints. I’m not sure that timeline tracks, but Gung Ho does have a more muted, real-world military color scheme than the wave one figures. He’s less colorful than his box art as well. I personally wanted to see some blue in here, so that’s a little disappointing to me.
The tattoo is one aspect where paint bothers me as the tattoo is such a harsh black that it looks like a temporary tattoo. I would have preferred they went with a more blue tone. I’m not sure why they couldn’t use the symbol from the ’80s, but I wish they would have and made this a bit bigger too because small and black like that, does call to my mind a Nazi symbol more than the Marine Corps.
Something I didn’t notice until I was looking at larger photos is that the mustache paint doesn’t follow the sculpted lines of the stash under the nose. Otherwise the face printing is pretty good here. One bonus that may be of interest to Marvel collectors is that the Reese head sculpt that came with Skullbuster fits on Gung Ho perfectly.
Overall, while I like this figure on it’s own merits, I feel like he stands out as being a bit off in the group shots. G.I. Joe is a team, and he needs to look good with his partners, so that’s a problem for me and I would love it if they went back and started this character over from scratch next time.
