 We need to talk about the dread knocks the Australian motorcycle gang was a great enemy for GI Joe as we Revisit the early dread knocks. Let's enjoy their favorite snack grape soda and chocolate cover donuts That is disgusting Hello, everybody hooded co-recommander 788 here. This is the show where we review every vintage GI Joe toy from 1982 to 1994 I'd like to start by thanking a patron. Thanks Sean Beckett for supporting the channel on patreon So I can continue doing these videos. Thanks to Mastichini for the title card image for this video It's very much appreciated great work as always. I love his style He's done several title card images in the past and this is another really cool one. Thank you chaos Destruction and our key motorcycles these are the words that describe the dread knocks as the new GI Joe toy line was starting to take off the creative people at Hasbro We're coming up with a lot of new ideas They often drew on pop culture for some of those ideas Someone at Hasbro had a brilliant plan for a new enemy for GI Joe Ewoks. Yeah, GI Joe almost had fuzzy teddy bears How did the Ewoks transform into dangerous rebel bikers? Grab your grape soda and chocolate cover donuts and join me This is not a very good combo But the best way to enjoy it is to eat the donut first and wash it down with the grape soda Nope, that's still terrible. HCC 788 presents buzzer This is buzzer the dread knock from 1985 this figure was introduced in 1985 It was also available in 1986. It was discontinued for 1987 It was available at some point through the mail from Hasbro direct But I don't have the exact dates for that. There were no other vintage versions of buzzer There were a few post vintage versions in 2004 2005 and 2007 buzzer was designed by Ron Rudat for Hasbro buzzer was one of the first three dread knocks released in 1985 the others were Ripper and torch The dread knocks was a biker gang based on the post apocalyptic Mad Max movies They were led by Zartan the master of disguise released in 1984 You could see the dread knocks as the first sub team in the GI Joe universe They worked with Cobra, but they weren't specifically Cobra agents. They were independent Dread knock is probably a combination of the words dread not and dread lock Though the dread knocks was a biker gang They did not come with motorcycles in 1985 the closest you could get at mass retail was the Cobra ferret Which was an ATV not a motorcycle. There were sometimes depicted riding the ferret They were also sometimes depicted riding the chameleon swamp skier, which was a small vehicle that came with Zartan The chameleon was only available with Zartan So if you wanted a swamp skier for each of your dread knocks You would have to get multiple Zartan action figures in the comic book series at least some of the dread knocks had proper motorcycles The first real dread knot motorcycle was the sears exclusive ground assault cycle, which was included with the ground assault set However, this was just a recolored re-release of the GI Joe Ram motorcycle in 1987 The dread knocks cycle was released. It was a three-wheeled motorcycle which sort of works for a biker gang It's still not the hog. We expected the dread knocks to ride through the years The dread knocks got many non motorcycle vehicles such as the thunder machine and the swamp fire in 1986 and the airskiff in 1987 Larry Hummer the writer of the GI Joe comic book series and the toy file cards tells a story about Hasbro Wanting to do Ewok like figures because of the popularity of Star Wars return of the Jedi Even back then Hasbro was chasing trends Larry urged that this was a terrible idea and pitched the idea of a Biker gang instead someone at Hasbro must have seen the light So they gave us the dread knocks instead of cute teddy bears speaking of file cards The dread knock file cars got a little national attention when they were mocked by Jay Leno on the David Letterman show I will eventually be doing a review of torch and yes I will be making fun of Jay Leno buzzer was sort of the second in command of the dread knocks He often took control of the team when Zartan wasn't around he was the smartest of the original three The other two didn't have a brain cell between them I have a couple of the post vintage versions of buzzer. So let's take a brief look at those This is version three of buzzer from 2005 It was an iconic book three pack with two other dread knocks ripper and thrasher not torch Surprisingly this third version of buzzer had mostly the same parts as version one Just recolored and those colors do look pretty good He also had a new head that's smaller and a bit more proportional with the body This is the 25th anniversary buzzer released in 2007 This is a fully modern GI Joe action figure with updated parts and sculpting and articulation So this is exactly what you would expect from this era He has some updated accessories to including a chainsaw with a flame on it. That looks really cool This is a more realistic chainsaw, but it can never replace that classic vintage accessory He still has a backpack with a gasoline can but that gasoline can is now red instead of silver Let's look at buzzer's accessories and let's start with his most famous accessory his diamond tooth chainsaw This is in silver plastic. It has a grip and a stock like a rifle But then it has that chainsaw blade. It also has a grip on the side for the left hand This is buzzer's signature weapon and he made good use of it in the comic book and the animated series His next accessory is what the card contents call a nunchaka axe, which I'm pretty sure is totally made up This is made of silver soft flexible plastic It looks like a sickle blade on a chain. It does have a little chip taken out of the blade That's a nice touch. This accessory is often forgotten and if this were a real-life weapon It would be incredibly dangerous to the user You would be just as likely to cut your own head off or get it embedded in your leg than to injure an enemy His final accessory is his backpack. His backpack is a rack with a gasoline can on it It is a two-piece accessory the gas can can be removed although it does wedge on there pretty tightly But you can take it off They are both in silver plastic that gasoline can is hollow on the other side and it just pegs onto the rack Very securely. Presumably this gas can is for fueling the chainsaw But there's no obvious tank on the chainsaw to take fuel. With the accessories out of the way Let's take a look at the articulation for buzzer. He did not have the standard articulation for a 1985 Gijo action figure. He had the standard articulation for a 1984 figure. He could turn his head from left to right. He had a swivel head He did not have a ball jointed head. The ball jointed heads were introduced in 1985 But buzzer and the other two dread knocks did not have it This suggests the dread knocks and one other figure from 1985 Toll booth were designed before the other 1985 characters and perhaps had a delayed release He had lift 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 This was an o-ring figure meaning 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 design and color on buzzer. This was a new figure with all unique parts on his head He has blonde hair. His hair is a separate piece with a ponytail He has silver sunglasses and a white paint application on his teeth on his chest He has a sleeveless khaki shirt with an open collar showing his bare upper chest He has a green strap on the right side that detail does continue to the back on that strap He has two green grenades on the left side of his chest He has silver jump wings a silver star badge and silver dog tags. It's very unlikely buzzer earned these for himself He most likely took these off of his victims. His arms are bare There are no additional details on his right arm on his left arm He has a black band around his wrist and he has a black tattoo It's hard to make out exactly what this is But I think it is a dagger and a snake his waist piece is in a base light blue plastic color with a black belt There's a small black pouch on the left side of the belt He has a silver skull and crossbones belt buckle and what looks like a black leather crotch cover His legs are light blue. This is most likely supposed to be blue jeans on his upper front legs He has black armor pieces and he has some tall brown nicely designed biker boots Let's take a look at buzzer's file card and we have several variations. These are mostly interesting variations too They changed the text on some of these. This is buzzer's first file card. It has his faction as the enemy It doesn't say Cobra here, which is correct He does sometimes work for Cobra, but he is not a Cobra agent They did not have a separate emblem for the dreadlocks at the time. So he just gets labeled the enemy There's a portrait of buzzer here painted by the legendary Hector Gerito He is a dreadlock and his codename is buzzer His file name is Dick Blinken in parentheses Richard Blinken Smite This is a bit of a joke with the names on these first three dreadlock file cards If you put the file cards together their names are Tom, Dick and Harry And this is slang for just an unspecified group of people Their last names are Winken, Blinken and Nod, and this is taken from a poem by Eugene Field His place of birth is Cambridge, England. Although the dreadlocks gang originated in Australia, buzzer is British This paragraph says buzzer was an extreme left-wing Cambridge sociology dawn This is referring to the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom, which is also the birthplace of buzzer A dawn is essentially a teacher or a tutor He was a sociology dawn who went to Australia to research the biker gang phenomenon Only to be transformed into the very object of his research Years of intellectual displeasure caused a repressed psychotic anger Manifested in an intense desire to chainsaw apart the expensive gigaus of technological society I can relate to that man. I can really relate This is where we get a change on the variant file cards And I will get to that but I want to finish reading this one first This paragraph says specialty and MO and there's an asterisk MO stands for modus operandi And this could use its own asterisk modus operandi is Latin for modive operation A scavenger of the swamps buzzer can cut through steel, wrought iron and any metal except armor plate With his diamond tooth chainsaw Apparently somebody at Hasbro thought this text needed to be changed And they were in such a hurry they didn't even have time to reprint the cards So they just slapped a sticker over that first paragraph This is buzzer's second file card It is the same as the first file card except this sticker which has a different sentence here It says years of intellectual displeasure and extreme indignation at society's two-faced morality Manifested in the intense desire to chainsaw apart the expensive gigaus of technological society He no longer has psychotic anger now he has extreme indignation I can only guess at the reason for this change They may have not wanted to attribute his change to some kind of mental disorder They might have been a little touchy after the Zartan Schizophrenia debacle buzzer's third file card is the same as the second file card Except that paragraph is no longer a sticker it is now printed on the card buzzer's final file card most likely the card released in 1986 Is the same as the third file card except instead of being printed on a peach background As the early cards it is printed on a gray background The comic book miniseries gi jo order of battle issue number three has an entry for buzzer And it uses the psychotic anger text from the first file card Looking at how buzzer was used in gi jo media he first appeared in the animated series in the miniseries the revenge of cobra part one with the other dread knocks He participated in the rescue of cobra commander from prison He had numerous appearances in the sunbow era of the animated series He was also in the 1987 animated movie That's where his history with the animated series ends He did not appear in the deke era of the series Probably the most remembered animated episode for the dread knocks was cold slither The dread knocks formed a fake rock and roll band Which was a friend for cobra's subliminal mind control device The episode is totally bonkers you should see it buzzer played drums In the gi jo comic book series published by marvel comics He first appeared in issue number 25 along with the other dread knocks It took a little while for the dread knocks to take off But once they established themselves as characters They got a lot of use in the comic book The comic also introduced the trope of the dread knocks enjoying grape soda And chocolate covered donuts Which is probably a euphemism for drugs and alcohol Maybe the best way to enjoy grape soda and chocolate covered donuts Is to dunk the donut in the grape soda That is vile The dread knocks were delightfully anarchistic and destructive They frequently vandalized gi jo vehicles buzzer even took a chainsaw to mutt's dog junkyard Which was not delightfully anarchistic and destructive That was just mean The dread knocks and buzzer in particular appeared on a lot of covers of the comic book buzzer's position as the de facto leader of the dread knocks When zartan wasn't around was established in issue number 35 In that issue buzzer stole zartan's special hologram projecting motorcycle And terrorized gi jo's clutch breaker and rock and roll Looking at buzzer overall I like this figure It's my favorite of the original three dread knocks It has a rebellious anarchistic style that I can appreciate It's a well-designed figure It has many points of interest From the sunglasses to the ponytail To the badges and dog tags on the chest And he's sculpted to look kind of ugly Which is appropriate for a dread knock Gi jo is primarily a military themed toy line And I prefer it that way I can understand why the creative team would want to expand it a bit To broaden the appeal And a motorcycle gang is a reasonable way to do that It's also a way to add some color variety to the line I will always prefer the green and the brown and the black But yeah, you need some other colors too And this is a way to do that The accessories are great Let me qualify that One of the accessories is great I can live without the backpack And the flail chain blade weapon Whatever that thing is But I cannot live without the chainsaw The file card, no matter which one you read Makes him a fascinating character He's one of the most educated characters in the entire gi jo series And he has a dramatic backstory Going from a university dawn to a rebel biker The dread knocks are weird And they are weird on purpose They're not like some of the later joes That were weird but trying to be cool No, the dread knocks are bonkers Not every gi jo fan likes the dread knocks Just like not every gi jo fan likes ninjas in gi jo And I do understand that However, keep in mind It could have been worse We could have had ewoks That was my review of buzzer I hope you enjoyed it I have hated the combination of great soda And chocolate covered donuts However, this time, despite having changed nothing about it It will somehow be better It is not better If you liked this video Please give it a thumbs up on YouTube And subscribe to the YouTube channel I have a huge back catalog of vintage gi jo toy reviews Make sure you check those out You can find me on social media On Facebook and Twitter And I have a website HCC788.com If you'd like to help me continue doing these videos Please support the channel on Patreon Like Sean Beckett You see all the names scrolling on the screen right now Your name could be there Please join me for the entire year of 2022 Celebrating the 40th anniversary Of gi jo or real American hero I'll be back soon with another vintage gi jo toy review And until then, remember Only gi jo is gi jo