 Hello, Joe fans. It's the Faceless reviewer here. It may look like I'm wearing pantyhose on my head, but that's just an illusion. I'm using hypnosis to conceal my identity. You may have thought I was HCC788, but I was the Faceless reviewer. I was the Faceless reviewer the whole time, and you never suspected. Just ignore any continuity to the contrary. This week, we are looking at Firefly. Not that Firefly. Not that Firefly. Not even that Firefly. We're going to look at the Firefly that was also the Red Ninja Leader and the Faceless Master. He could be whatever he wanted to be, depending on how he felt that day. I feel like playing the theme song. Commander788 here. It's time for another vintage GI Joe toy review. 3DJose.com is great. This is not a paid advertisement for 3D Joe's. The guy that runs the site doesn't even know I'm doing this, but I just had to tell you how great 3D Joe's is. There was a piece of information I needed for this review. YoJoe.com didn't have it. The Balomo guy didn't have it. Only 3DJose.com had the information I needed to confirm that Firefly version 2 was released on Firefly version 3's card. That was very important information to me. 3DJose.com is a great website. You can see 3D spins of all of the vintage GI Joe carded figures and a lot of the vehicles as well. Thank you, 3DJose.com, for all you do. We need to give a codename to a new patron. Jason Shetter has added his support on Patreon. This was a tough one. I normally rely on my network of spies to get information about everyone who gets a codename, but my information network hasn't turned up anything. I'm drawing a blank. That's it. Jason, you will be known as the Blank Viper. Thank you for your support, Blank Viper. Let's get on with the review. This is the review I intended to do last week. We have a lot to cover. We're looking at two versions of Firefly. I'm rolling both into one review because I don't think they should really be considered separate versions. I think the 1993 release of Firefly should be considered a variation of version 2. So they're both going to be in one video. The first version of Firefly was amazing and has a lot of fans. Let's see if the second version lived up to the standards of the first. HCC 788 presents Firefly. This is Firefly version 2 and 3, Cobra's Saboteur from 1992 and 1993. Version 2 was introduced in 1992 and was allegedly only available in 1992 and discontinued for 1993. I have my doubts about that. We will discuss that later. Version 3 was introduced in 1993 and was only available in 1993. It was discontinued for 1994. Version 1 of Firefly was introduced in 1984 as the Cobra's Saboteur. He had an awesome gray camouflage uniform perfect for sneaking around urban areas at night. He had awesome accessories too. He had a submachine gun. He had a backpack that opened up to reveal his sabotage tools. And he had a small green walkie-talkie for coordinating with Cobra forces. Firefly was one of my favorite figures from 1984. He looks great. He could be a real threat to G.I. Joe. Firefly wore a Balaclava mask similar to another Cobra figure from 1984, Storm Shadow. Firefly looked a little like a Ninja, but his file card didn't mention any Ninja background. However, in the Ninja craze of the 1990s, they couldn't resist giving Firefly a Ninja origin story. Version 1 was no longer on the shelves after 1985. The next version came out six years later and it was drastically different from Version 1. I'm reviewing both Version 2 and Version 3 in one video because I don't really think they should count as separate versions. I think the 1993 version is a color and accessories variant of Version 2. I'll discuss that in detail. I have the full card back for the 1992 figure, so we can see how that figure was packaged. The 1992 figure was first released on a standard card as part of the main set of figures released that year. The card, this card has much of the front torn away. That's because of how the accessories were packaged. The zip cord that came with the figure was on the package and it went right across the artwork. So it was almost impossible to take it off the card without tearing the artwork. We have some instructions on the front of the card, but a lot of that card is torn away. So let's flip it around to the back and see what the back looks like. We have the cross cell with some other figures that were available that year. They were numbered and Firefly is number 11. There is an advertisement for some of the sub teams that were available at the time. Drug Elimination Force, Eco Warriors and Ninja Force. We have our one flag point and then of course we have our file card which we will look at later. The 1993 version was released on a Battlecore card as many new figures were. Battlecore was new that year. Battlecore was the main line of GI Joe figures. Some of the figures were going to be released with a sound playing technology called BattleScan. The BattleScan gimmick was cancelled, the name was changed to Battlecore and all figures that were not in a subset were lumped into that label, including some reissued figures. This is all very cut and dry. The 1992 figure was released on the 1992 card and the 1993 figure was released on the Battlecore card. But there's one problem with this nice, neat scenario. The 1992 version 2 figure was also released on the 1993 Battlecore card. Thanks to 3djoes.com for having confirmation of the version 2 figure on the Battlecore card. It's amazing how many sites and sources don't have that information and it is important especially for collectors of carded figures. My theory on whether a figure is a variation or a new version depends on what the company intended to do. Factors to determine the company's intention include how much the figure changed and what the packaging says. In this case it's a bit muddled. You have a figure with no change but on a different card. And that card has several differences, not just the Battlecore. He's also number 18 now in the series instead of number 11. And there are some minor changes on the file card. Now normally those would all point to this being a new version of the character. But it can't be a new version if there's no change to the figure. Eventually they did make a change to the figure but the change is minor. They changed one color on the figure and the color of one accessory. That would normally point to this just being a variation rather than a new version. When I look at all these factors I still think these figures are variations. On the figure itself they only changed one color and on the accessories they changed the color of only one of them. The changes they made in my opinion are just not significant enough to call the 1993 figure a separate version. That is just my opinion. I'm sure a lot of collectors would disagree with me. In fact, I think all of the collector websites disagree with me. Let's take a look at Firefly's accessories. The 1992 and 1993 releases came with exactly the same accessories with one difference. The 1992 release had this blade launcher in gold and the 1993 release had the blade launcher in black. That is the only difference. The card contents did not describe any of the accessories. It just says includes figure and accessories. Firefly had a rifle. It is in the same lime green color as the figure. The file card calls this a standard Cobra NA-55 assault rifle. This is a really good looking assault rifle and it is new to this figure. The stock has an extended shoulder rest and it's got this extension up here on top that may be a rest for the chin or the cheek. It has a scope. It's almost a sniper setup, except there's no bipod. As for whether this is based on a real-world weapon, it may be a variation of the L1A1 rifle, similar to the one that came with 1984 ripcord. And you can see there are some similarities between ripcord's rifle and the one that came with Firefly. The lime green color really doesn't help it. It would have looked great in black or olive green, similar to ripcord's rifle. That color would have looked great. And that would have been a nice callback to the olive drab green submachine gun that came with Firefly version 1. And just to reiterate, the 1993 release of Firefly came with an identical rifle. The next accessory, if you can call it that, is the blade launching system. It included this blade launcher, this big box. On the 1992 release, it was in gold plastic. On the 1993 release, it was the same thing, but in black. Is the gold plastic susceptible to gold plastic syndrome? Maybe. For that reason, I will be demonstrating the blade launcher using the black one. The details on the two launchers appear to be the same. I haven't identified any differences. They just put a different color plastic in the same mold. It does have a little bit of detail on it, but not very much. It is basically a box. Sitting loosely in the blade launcher is the blade weapon itself. It is a top, so it will spin on this point here at the bottom. It does have some molded in saw blades around the middle. And it has some gear teeth at the top. That's for the zip cord. We'll look at that in a moment. It is quite large and bulky for an action figure accessory. The final piece of the blade launching system is the zip cord, which is a long, thin piece of plastic with teeth on one side and a ring at one end. And this is what will get the top spinning. To launch the blade spinning top, just take the zip cord and place it in the appropriate shaped hole in the back with the teeth side toward the center and press that forward. Now you're going to want to let the top spin around those teeth as the zip cord comes forward, so you can get the zip cord all the way in and the blades all the way back in the launcher and then you are ready to launch it. There's no real way to aim this thing, so I'm not going to bother to break out Dr. Meinbender as a target. To launch it, you just put your finger in the ring and yank back and that should launch the spinning blade. And here it goes. And here it goes. Alright, this is not working very well. I'm going to try it one more time. Get this in, get the blade all the way back in the back of the launcher with the zip cord all the way forward and this thing really ought to take off. Let's pull it really hard. There it goes. There it goes. See, it does work. And there you have it. Yep, there you have Firefly's secret weapon. The final accessory is the figure stand. They each came with a black figure stand and this is one great thing about the 90s. This is one thing I will never complain about in regards to the 90s. The figures came with figure stands and the 80s figures didn't. I really wish the 80s figures had these. The accessories for the 1992 and 1993 Firefly are a bit of a disappointment. The version 1 Firefly included a really nice submachine gun and walkie talkie and one of the coolest backpacks in the entire line. The version 2 and 3 accessories just don't quite measure up. Though I do like the rifle, I would really like to see that rifle in another color. With the accessories out of the way, let's take a look at the articulation. The articulation is the same for both, so we'll just look at one. The articulation was standard for GI Joe figures by the time, so he could turn his head from left to right and look up and down. He could swing his arm up at the shoulder and swivel at the shoulder all the way around. He had a hinge at the elbow that allowed him to bend his arm at the elbow about 90 degrees. He had a swivel at the bicep so he could swivel his arm all the way around. The figure was held together with a rubber O-ring that looped around the inside. That allowed him to move at the torso a bit. He could move his legs apart about so far. He could bend his leg at the hip about 90 degrees and bend at the knee about 90 degrees. Let's take a look at the sculpt and design and color of Firefly starting with his head. And on his head, he is wearing a helmet and a mask, and there is a mesh texture pattern on both. It almost looks like a fencing mask, except his eyes are exposed. It almost looks like a fencing mask worn backwards. There is a fair amount of detail with that mesh pattern on the head. On the 1992 figure, the helmet and mask were gray. On the 1993 release, the helmet and mask were black. On the chest, he has a lime green uniform with gray shoulder pads, really big shoulder pads. They're not the kind of shoulder pads that like stick out at the sides, but they cover a large portion of his chest and back. The shoulder protection has that same mesh pattern on it that is on the helmet and mask. He has a gray bandolier running over his left shoulder and under his right arm that continues to the back. On the front, it has a couple gold grenades and some explosive devices and a gold pouch. All this is the same on the 1993 release, except where it was gray, it is now black. Those gray mesh pads continue to his upper arms. He has lime green sleeves and he has a red cobra emblem on his left sleeve. That's a bit of a callback to the version 1 figure that had a red cobra emblem on his right sleeve. He has a gold electronic device around his right wrist and he has gray gloves. As expected, those details on the 1993 release are exactly the same except where there was gray, there is now black. On his waist piece, it continues that lime green uniform. He has a gray belt with some pouches and devices on it. Decent detail there. And of course, the same on the 1993 release except black instead of gray. His legs continue that lime green uniform. I'm calling this lime green. It's not quite neon green, but it's still pretty bright and obnoxious. He has a gray pistol holster on his right leg. He has a gray grenade holder on his left leg with three gold grenades. He is wearing tall gray boots and those boots actually have a cloth texture pattern on them. That's a very interesting detail and they also have rope tied around them. You can see the rope is tied at the sides. Very interesting details on the boots. And one more time on the 1993 release, exactly the same details, but with black instead of gray. 1984 Firefly did have a lot of grenades and explosives and his uniform was gray. There are some callbacks to the version 1 figure, so I can't say they completely went off the rails for version 2. However, Firefly was a master at infiltration and sabotage. I can't imagine he would find a lime green uniform useful for anything. His original gray uniform was perfect for his specialty. If I had to choose, I would say I like the 1993 black painted figure better. The black provides a little more contrast against the green, but it still has the green, so it's not much of an improvement. Let's take a look at Firefly's file card. Let's say that five times fast. We have two file cards to look at. Let's start with the 1992 file card. By this time they were no longer doing the file folder shaped file card. This is just a rectangular file card with rounded corners. It has the card art for Firefly here and a closer portrait above it. It has a description of some of the features and I'm going to skip that. I don't usually read through those. It has a Cobra, the enemy logo in the corner here. It has his codename as Firefly. He is the Cobra Saboteur. His vehicle specialty is the Cobra Paralyzer Driver. Enjoy the Paralyzer! Well, that's nice, but the Paralyzer was issued in 1991 and was discontinued for 1992. So it was a little late to cross-sell the vehicle on a 1992 figure card. We have a quote from Firefly here. He says, I came, I saw, I blew it up. The narrative section says, Firefly has been blowing things up for Cobra since Cobra Commander first donned his hood and opened up for business. Since that time Cobra has expanded to include entire battalions of bomb planters, arsonists, and booby trappers. But Cobra Commander still keeps contacting Firefly, the Rembrandt of plastic explosives, when a job needs precision bombing. Firefly constructs bombs protected by cross-wired anti-tampering switches. So complex, they are impossible to defuse. When the time is right, he uses his blade launcher weapon for maximum effect against his unsuspecting targets. This file card isn't actually too bad. Let's see what changes they made on the 1993 file card. The artwork is the same. They even still have the gold launcher. They did not change that to black for 1993. And the descriptions of the features are exactly the same. This top section has changed a bit. It says codename Cobra Firefly Saboteur. Instead of codename Firefly Cobra Saboteur, they've done away with the vehicle specialty, and they also removed the Cobra emblem from the top corner. The quote is the same. I came, I saw, I blew it up. And the narrative paragraph is almost exactly the same. They just changed the last sentence. On the 1993 file card, they removed the sentence about the blade launching weapon and replaced it with no building or mission is too tough for Firefly. I think these file cards are okay. They may not be as fun or as colorful as the version one file card, but they have some merit. Firefly's version one prototype file card gave several aliases for Firefly and indicated he served in the French foreign legion. The comic book completely did away with that and gave him a totally different origin. Looking at how Firefly was used in G.I. Joe Media, in the animated series he first appeared in Revenge of Cobra part one. He had a few appearances in the animated series, but not many. And he rarely spoke. He had the most exposure in the episode Ode Cobra. And that wasn't very much. He did not appear in his version two or version three uniform. He did not make the transition to the deke animated series era. In the G.I. Joe comic book published by Marvel Comics, he first appeared in issue number 24 at the end where he and Wild Weasel found Zartan's shack in the Florida Everglades. And they were quickly captured. He had numerous appearances in the following eight issues, but he didn't have much to do. He mainly got captured multiple times. He escaped Florida with Destro in a stolen killer whale. That was a good moment. He was with Destro and Fred when they attacked Snake Eyes' cabin. He blew up that cabin, but he was injured in that battle. Those issues didn't focus on Firefly. They focused on Zartan, Snake Eyes, Storm Shadow, and others. Firefly was a supporting character. In issue number 43, he was present when the Softmaster and Candy were killed. And he gave the order to kill them. But he didn't actually do the killing. Scrap Iron did that. In a couple issues, he's seen providing security for Cobra's secret base in Springfield, but he was barely more than a background character. He was present at the creation of Serpentor and G.I. Joe's attack on Springfield, but he didn't do much. He was mostly just in the background. He fared a little better in the Special Missions series, where he appeared in the first issue. His mercenary qualities were highlighted. He even got to lead a team in Special Missions number 2. His best appearance was probably in Special Missions number 12, where he steals the Battle Force 2000 vector jet. After that, he made appearances here and there, sometimes as a supporting character, other times just in the background. He did not get the spotlight. Firefly was presumed dead when Cobra Commander returned in issue number 98 and buried all his enemies in a landlocked freighter under a volcano. Firefly was in danger of being G.I. Joe's Boba Fett, a cool-looking character that didn't do much. Until, in issues 123 and 124, Ninja Force encounters a group of red ninjas in the woods of Transcarpathia, led by a guy in a red costume. The red ninja leader is revealed to be Firefly in Disguise. At that point, it had been so long since Firefly was in the comic, issue number 126 pauses to explain who he is. How did Firefly escape the buried ship? He used bats to dig him out. Later in that same issue, it is revealed that Firefly is also the Faceless Master. He looks like he's wearing pantyhose on his head, but of course he isn't, because that would be ridiculous. The Faceless Master was a member of the Koga Ninja Clan. He was hired by Cobra Commander to kill Snake Eyes, while Snake Eyes was still in training with the Arashakage Clan. Firefly didn't follow through. Cobra Commander brought in Zartan, who attempted the assassination, but killed the Hard Master instead. So, Firefly is a ninja now, even though there was never an indication of that in his early appearances. And Firefly knew Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow, even though he encountered both of them, and never indicated he had ever seen them before. At the end of that issue, number 126, Firefly puts on his version to uniform. I'm not going to do a full review of issue number 126 in this video, but I have to say, it is pretty bad. It's almost entirely exposition. It includes multiple flashbacks. It tells several stories, all of which seem implausible and out of character for Firefly. Firefly is introduced as a ninja and a rival to Ninja Force. Even though his figure was not in the Ninja Force line, and there's no hint of a Ninja backstory on his file card. This nonsense goes on for a few more issues. At the end of issue number 134, it is implied that Firefly is killed by Slice and Dice. It's a mercy. Looking at version 2 and 3 of Firefly overall, I do not like them very much. The first Firefly figure was one of my favorites. It was a standout figure in 1984, a year with a lot of great figures. He had a uniform that matched his specialty and reputation. He could creep around the shadows and infiltrate any enemy base. Based on his file card, Firefly's history and identity are shrouded in mystery. At least until they got to the 1990s and blew that mystery up. His file cards were right. He came, he saw, he blew it up. Why would Firefly, an infiltration expert, wear bright green? He's wearing a uniform that would practically glow in the dark. He could be seen by passing planes. He's not camouflaged for anything. I guess you could say this is his Ninja uniform. He is a Ninja now, and Ninjas don't care about concealment, right? The Ninja backstory is a retcon. It feels shoe-horned into the story. Was Firefly originally intended to be the faceless master? I doubt it. If the plan was to make him a Ninja, why isn't it mentioned on his file card? On any of his file cards, including the file cards that came with these releases. Why wasn't he included in the Ninja Force line? It takes more than a Balaclava mask to make a Ninja. Beachhead is not a Ninja. As far as the accessories go, I like the rifle, though I wish it were in a different color. I like the figure stand, of course, but I can live without the blade spinner. If I'm forced to choose, I'd say I prefer the 1993 release. I like the black a little more than I like the gray, but there's not much difference. That was my review of the 1992 and 1993 Firefly. I hope you enjoyed it, and thanks to 3djoes.com just for being awesome. Just a reminder, JoeFest is coming up soon, June 21st and 22nd in Augusta, Georgia. I will be there. I would like to see you there, too. If you like this video and if you like GI Joe, please consider subscribing to the channel and hitting the notification bell. That notification option really helps small channels get noticed, so thank you to everyone who does that. Please give this video a thumbs up on YouTube and share it with your friends. I am on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and I have a website, hcc788.com. Thank you to all my patrons, including the blank viper. You guys really make these videos possible. I really couldn't do it without you. If you like these videos and you'd like to support the channel in that way, please check out my Patreon. You can find out how to decode the secret messages you see in videos, and you might even be able to get your own codename. I'll be back next week for a special video that also happens to be somebody's birthday. I'll see you then, and until then, always remember only GI Joe is GI Joe. Because that would be ridiculous.