In 1988 kids across the country saw a G.I. Joe TV ad stating that Destro, growing tired of the bickering between Cobra Commander and Serpentor, started his own army, The Iron Grenadiers! With a striking black, red, and gold motif, they looked ready to beat the crap out of Joe AND Cobra! Rather than releasing this new gold-masked Destro on a single card (unless you lived in Brazil), Hasbro decided to release him with The Despoiler! This was a new small vehicle enabling Destro to hover over the battlefield and lead the charge! This beloved set has now been updated and released in the G.I. Joe Classified line!
The Despoiler is sort of a flying contradiction, if you will. It’s a boxy yet sleek, light yet heavily armed aircraft. After all, Destro is an arms dealer! The original toy seems a little too small and makes Destro look a bit like an Ed Roth Rat Fink model. The Classified design team made it look a little more like something that might actually hover in real life. In comparison to the original, I like the longer wings, the red seat, and all the missiles. As cool as the Despoiler may be though, let’s be honest. We’re buying this for Destro.
Destro is a slight step up from other Classified figures with a completely new sculpt! We usually get Destro figures with his standard stoic expression, but this figure finally gives us a 2nd head with a screaming face! It’s perfect for telling Cobra Commander what he really thinks! Where the original Iron Grenadiers Destro carried a simple sword/sheath accessory that was molded together in one (odd) piece, this version gives us a removable sword just like we’ve come to expect from the Classified line. We get some nice shiny pauldrons for a more battle-ready look and the cape is also removable this time around! Maybe you think it gets in the way! Maybe you want to have it ripped off for a photo shoot! Maybe you just don’t like it! Being able to remove it is a nice option we didn’t have with the original figure.
For accessories he’s got a gold long barrelled revolver with holster, a shield with his face on it, much like the Iron Grenadiers logo–How vain ARE you, Destro!?–and a HUGE Conan style longsword. The Despoiler has 10 removable missiles.
We already had several Iron Grenadier characters produced, so it’s nice to finally have a Destro figure that goes along with them! Another nice touch on this figure is the thigh-swivel joints! Instead of a clean cut line across the thigh like most modern 1:12 scale figures, this figure cleverly hides the joint with it’s thigh-high boots, or chaps, or whatever is goin’ on there! I may be incorrect but I don’t believe we’ve seen this type of design on a Classified figure yet! It really classes things up a bit!
So with so much good to say about this figure what could be bad!? Remember two weeks back when I talked about certain figures needing vertical jointed wrists? Well, characters who use swords definitely need them if you want to pose them in a stabbing position or just have them point their swords forward. Even the $10 Masters of the Universe Core line I’ve been posting about has done this with every figure. Hasbro tooled up a new sword just for Destro, but they gave us two horizontal jointed wrists. WHY!?
My other two points are nitpicks. The original figure has asymmetrical boots. He actually seems to have some sort of boots over his boots, or maybe they’re very long spats, or weird slouch boots… Whatever the case is, one seems folded halfway over. In this modern version of the figure they’ve opted for some pirate boots. That makes a little more sense but I always found the asymmetry to be interesting, so I was slightly disappointed with that design choice. My other issue is actually with the 1988 design and a missed opportunity. An iconic part of the original 1983 Destro figure and character design is his wrist rockets. The character has 3 small heat-seeking missiles on his right forearm which often provide a fun plot device in G.I. Joe media. The designers chose to drop this from the sculpt of the 1988 version but in the Marvel comic series, at least one statue, and other pieces of G.I. Joe art, Destro is shown using the wrist rockets while wearing this Iron Grenadiers outfit and dammit, is it cool! It would’ve been nice to see the Classified design team make this addition, especially with all of the other easter eggs they throw into this line!
All things considered, it’s a fine figure and a great representation of the character! The $109.99 (U.S.) price point seems a bit much until you consider all of the original tooling that went into this set and see just how big they made the Despoiler. Don’t get me wrong! I’m not saying the price is great–everything is expensive now–but it is consistent with other items in the line. I’ve seen some fans online say that the Despoiler doesn’t need to be this big. That’s a perfectly reasonable argument as this is much bigger than a simply scaled up version of the original. In any case, this is what we got!
Thanks for reading! Be sure to come back in two weeks for Transformers: Age of the Primes BRUTICUS and other goodness! Until then, keep an eye on that pre-order debt!