Burger King G.I. Joe AWE Striker with Snake Eyes Vehicle Burger King, 2014
Day #1,427: April 22, 2016
AWE Striker with Snake Eyes So Much Neon
G.I. Joe Burger King Kid Meal Premium
Item No.: No. 10740 Manufacturer:Burger King Includes:n/a Action Feature:Swappable, launching nose area Retail:$4.99 Availability: November 2014 Other: If G.I. Joe had a G2, This Is It
For its 50th anniversary, G.I. Joe was basically shelved. Toys R Us had a few exclusive items and that was about it outside convention exclusives - except for the bizarre choice to include the AWE Striker with Snake Eyes toy as one of three nifty little so-bad-they're-good toys in Burger King kid meals. I frequent fast food places and most of the time it's some newish thing I don't know about in there, back in 2014 we saw things like Tom & Jerry for no readily apparent reason. The items are labeled "Jun-Sep 14" and they didn't hit until November as far as I know, so this was a surprise on so many levels.
Movie-based toys would make some sense as a late, late delivery. But this? This feels like it was left over from the early 1990s. Hasbro was mildly obsessed with bright neon colors in those days, leading to the infamous (and wonderful) Transformers Generation 2 in addition to G.I. Joe lines like Eco-Warriors and the like. So now we've got this item, which is sort of an AWE Striker combined with a Roadster, looking like it was designed by me on a dare. The purple front section launches off the yellow back part, and it's swappable with a HISS Tank and a SHARK sold separately.
The 3 1/2-inch long vehicle has no real paint to speak of, other than the dedicated (read: not removable) figure of what I'm guessing is supposed to be Snake Eyes hunched over the driver's seat. He has a painted visor. Heck, maybe it's a masked Cobra Trooper of some sort. Either way, it's sorta neat and has a small sticker sheet that was better planned than most of what Hasbro does for labels. (This isn't meant as a catty joke - Hasbro's Joe stickers are often a little too big or oddly sized for the placement on the instructions. It's an obnoxious shortcoming on what was otherwise one of the best action figure lines of all time.)
The action feature is bizarre on all fronts. The purple chunk launches off when you push down on the black driver, but why? I have no idea. It just does. It can swap with the other vehicles in the promotion, but again, why? It feels like something you'd have found at Burger King in 1992, but weirder.
What you see is largely what you get, except that the fake wheels mask the fact that there are three very small real wheels underneath that actually roll fairly well. For fans of the 1990s and Hasbro's more bizarre turns, this represents a fantastic "What If?" and provides the Joe convention people with another bizarre repaint for a future boxed set. Or rather it would, if it didn't look like the convention and club were on their way out. This item should not exist, at all, and now I have one! I'm sure it will be a forgotten footnote in Joe history, and this is certainly the wackiest of the set. Get it if you can - and if you can't, keep an eye on flea markets and Goodwill.
16bit.com is best not viewed in Apple's Safari browser, we don't know why. All material on this site copyright their respective copyright holders. All materials appear hear for informative and entertainment purposes. 16bit.com is not to be held responsible for anything, ever. Photos taken by the 16bit.com staff. Site design, graphics, writing, and whatnot credited on the credits page. Be cool-- don't steal. We know where you live and we'll break your friggin' legs.
RSS 
