 Black Viper is the Viper for me, Blue Missiles in the shape of AV, Yellow Airplanes on his right man boob, That's true I love you but make that helmet blue. Commander788 here, this is the show where we review every vintage GI Joe toy from 1982 to 1994. The action figure for this week was chosen by voters on Patreon. It was our closest vote ever. For the last couple days of the poll, we had a three way tie. Then at the last minute, Black Viper won. This is the figure that looks to me like it's wearing overalls with one strap undone, which is why I'm in this get up. 2020 is the year of the 90s. We're looking at a lot of 1990s GI Joe toys through the eyes of this 1980s GI Joe fan. Every years have a reputation for being a little weird and having gimmicky accessories. Does Flak Viper fit that stereotype? Yes, HCC788 presents the Flak Viper. This is Flak Viper, Cobra's anti-aircraft trooper from 1992. This figure was first available in 1992 and was on the pegs in 1992 only. It was discontinued for 1993. There were two versions of the Flak Viper in the vintage era. Version two of the Flak Viper was issued in 1993 and reused the same mold as version one, but with different colors. As Cobra's anti-aircraft trooper, he has the same specialty as GI Joe's backblast in 1989. Despite the size of backblast's missile system, the missiles did not really shoot. Flak Viper has two missiles that will really fire. Viper is the general term for a Cobra trooper. The basic Cobra Viper was introduced in 1986. Most specialized Cobra troops have their specialty tacked with the Viper suffix. Flak refers to anti-aircraft fire. It derives from the German word Flughabwerkannone, which translates to anti-aircraft gun. German viewers are welcome to make fun of my pronunciation. There isn't much information about Flak Viper in any of the guides or online resources. Nobody seems to care about this figure, except for my patrons who wanted me to struggle through this review. Thanks, guys! I do have the full card back for Flak Viper, so let's take a look at it. Unfortunately, some of the artwork is torn away. Also torn away is the number six. Flak Viper was number six in the 1992 series. The front of the card shows how to operate the missile launcher backpack. The missiles in the drawing are a bit different from what we got on the toy. It advertises missile launcher shoots, battle stand included. Flipping the card around to the back, we see the cross-sell with the other figures that were available at the time. It looks like the kid who bought this figure was checking off the other figures that he got. Looks like he got the entire 1992 series, except for Roadblock. Down here we have another cross-sell for some of the subsets that were available at the time. We have an advertisement here that says, Watch the new TV adventures of G.I. Joe. This is referring to the animated series produced by Deke. We have one flag point in the 90s style. And then we have the file card. We will be taking a closer look at this file card later. On this file card, as with a lot of other 90s file cards, there is a list of the features on the figure and the accessories. I will be referring to this when I talk about some of those accessories. Let's take a look at Flakvipers accessories starting with this rifle. This rifle, the file card calls a long barrel laser rifle with many machete bayonet. It is in blue plastic. It is quite long. Looks like a sniper rifle. It has a scope, but is that scope on backwards? It looks like the magnifying end ought to be on the front end, but you know, whatever. The description doesn't make a lot of sense. It says it's a laser rifle, but it has a magazine like a firearm. The machete bayonet is either too short or it's clipped onto the rifle in the wrong place. It doesn't stick out far enough to stab anybody with it. It is a machete bayonet, so I guess you could hack at the enemy with it. But this would make a decent sniper rifle. Instead of having a useful bipod, it has a useless bayonet. And now we get to the big one, the missile firing backpack. The file card calls this an electronic firing dual missile launcher backpack. It is exactly what it sounds like. It's a missile firing backpack. The backpack itself is in green plastic with some decent technical detail on it. It has blue triggers on the bottom and it fits two blue missiles. It is spring loaded, so it really does fire. The missiles are really long. They stick up half the height of the figure and they are angled, so they make a long V. They look kind of like rabbit ears. If you adjust them, you can tune in your favorite UHF channel. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Almost there. Almost there. Almost there. There it is. I'll demonstrate how to use this backpack and yes, we will be taking a shot at Dr. Meinbender in a moment. The backpack came with two of these long blue missiles. You just press the missile into the holes in the top with the notch on the missile facing the back. Press in until it clicks. And of course, since you have two missiles, you have two shots. So press both of those in until they click and you just aim. With this guy, he's supposed to fire at aircraft, right? So he's just supposed to shoot straight up like he's holding a Roman candle on his back. But in this case, he's going to have to bend over to fire at Dr. Meinbender. You have two blue triggers in the back. For each of those triggers, you press down to fire the missile. So let's give it a shot. Fire one. Meinbender was too close to the back wall, so he didn't fall over. Let's move him a bit so we have a better shot of knocking him over. Fire two. The spring on this backpack is a little weak, so you may have an example of this backpack that has a stronger spring. Unfortunately, this one was not quite powerful enough to knock over Dr. Meinbender. The final accessory is always the best accessory on these 90s figures. It is the figure stand. It is black. It is standard. Nothing special about it. But 80s figures did not include figure stands, and 90s figures did. So that is an improvement. Let's take a look at the articulation. On Flak Viper, he had the articulation that was standard on GI Joe figures well before 1992. 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 that allowed him to swivel his arm all the way around. This was an O-ring figure, so 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 look at the sculpt design and color of Flak Viper and let's start with his head. On his head, he has a blue helmet, which the file card calls a cerebral helmet with aircraft detection analyzer and night vision goggles. The helmet covers his entire head and chin. He has a black visor over his eyes. His mouth is exposed. He has Caucasian skin and he's sculpted with a cartoonish grin. On his chest, he has a green undershirt and a gray leotard sort of thing with a strap that goes over one shoulder, only over the left shoulder. And he has a blue shoulder pad on that shoulder. This gray cover all sort of thing has vertical stripes sculpted on it, which to me makes it look like it's knit wool. He has a yellow tampo on the right side of his chest with aircraft kill marks. Looks like this guy has shot down five aircraft. That's not G.I. Joe aircraft, just the occasional Cessna and a couple TV station traffic helicopters. But hey, a kill's a kill, right? This whole torso is bizarre. I don't understand what they were going for. Why is his gray outer, whatever it is, only covering one shoulder? To me, it looks like overalls with one strap undone. On his arms, he has green upper arms, then he has blue elbows, then he has green long gloves that cover his forearms with a couple sculpted and painted straps over his elbows. The file card calls these anti-radiation sure grip battle gloves. What kind of missiles is he firing if he needs anti-radiation gloves? Again, I don't know what they were going for here. The arms alternate between green and blue and none of it feels unified. The waist is entirely gray with those vertical sculpted stripes we saw on the torso. At last we get a piece that is one solid color, but it needs something else. There is no belt. This gray thing covers his whole waist and crotchal area like some kind of weird ballet outfit. Finally, we get to the legs and the craziness just don't stop. He has blue trousers that are mostly covered by gray chaps. The file card calls these protective non-corrosive leg shield slip-ons. Whatever they're chaps. The chaps are sculpted to look very loose over his black boots. He has a green pouch on the right leg with a green strap that goes around the thigh. The file card calls this a side pocket ammo holster. What kind of ammo exactly? He has a laser gun, so it must hold laser beams. I honestly don't know what they were going for here. The colors are broken up and balanced and the color choices are not bad. The colors are actually pretty good. And there are details. I can't criticize this figure for lack of details. But the details are so strange. Overalls, chaps, airplane marks like little gold stars on his chest. One detail that is missing is a cobra emblem. There is nothing on this figure to indicate it is a cobra trooper. Except, of course it's cobra. This guy is too bizarre for GI Joe even in the 1990s. Let's take a look at Flakviper's file card. And as with many 90s file cards, there is the full artwork in this panel and then a close up of his face above it. His code name is Flakviper and he's the Cobra Anti-Aircraft Trooper. In this section, we have a quote presumably from a Flakviper. It says, we could positively max out our high score if only we had turbo joystick controllers. This quote sets the tone for the rest of the file card, unfortunately. I thought turbo joystick controllers was just a made up thing for this file card. But there was a quick shot to turbo joystick video game controller in 1985, so this may be a reference to that. This paragraph says, Flakvipers have a passive infrared targeting and siting system built into their helmets. Of course they do. This allows them to fire extremely accurate tail biter missiles at GI Joe aircraft with absolute impunity. Tail biter missiles, that's what they're trying to call these blue missiles. It's not the most intimidating name. Moving on, it says, these are dedicated and motivated troopers. To maintain maximum level of effectiveness, Flakvipers spend long hours every day practicing simulated missile engagements using a program cartridge that plugs into their helmets. It would be like playing a portable video game for 10 hours straight. These guys get a kick out of roaming the battlefield in the Cobra Parasite while picking off incoming enemy aircraft. Flakvipers recruited gamers to shoot down airplanes, and they attack their enemies with impunity. Just like on the internet, they ride in the Parasite, a 1992 Cobra vehicle, and shoot down enemy aircraft. You know what would have been just as effective? Put an anti-aircraft missile on the Parasite. You don't need a guy with a backpack to do this. Looking at how the Flakviper was used in GI Joe media, they had very few appearances in the Dieck era of the animated series, but they had almost no impact on the series at all. They were mostly in the background. Looking at the comic book series published by Marvel Comics, I was able to find a few appearances of the Flakviper. They appeared in issue number 127, where one of them shot at the Tomahawk with a rifle. They were in issue number 130, where they were part of Cobra's attack on GI Joe headquarters. In those appearances, they did not have their rocket firing backpack. Looking at the Flakviper overall, what the damn hell is going on with this figure? I know Flakviper has fans. I've read blogs that praise this figure. If you want an inexpensive Cobra army builder, this figure is good for that. There's not a lot of demand for this figure, so you can still pick up a bunch of them for pretty cheap. It is not a figure I will be army building. The colors are good, especially for a Cobra figure. I can legitimately praise the colors. But this figure can't decide if it wants to be primarily green or blue. It just flip-flops back and forth with swishes of gray all over it. He needs a Cobra emblem. It would have been easy enough to give him one, but instead he has little airplanes on him. Little golden airplanes. He's dressed like a toddler. The missile firing backpack is bonkers. It makes less sense than 1992 Duke's crotch rocket. The missiles stick up so far, the backpack is unwieldy in any circumstances. The rifle almost looks good, except it has a bayonet that's too short to be a bayonet. I know 90s GI Joe fans watch these videos and think, oh there goes Hoodie again hating on these 90s figures. Just doesn't give these 90s figures a chance. Just doesn't understand what makes them so great. I am trying to say nice things about 90s figures I am trying. But when you give me gray overalls guy with rabbit ear backpack, what can I do? Just not notice those things? Maybe I could try doing reviews with my eyes closed. That would make it easier sometimes. But in the end, my preference doesn't decide if this is a good or bad figure. Your preference decides that. That was my review of Flak Viper. I hope you enjoyed it, or at least I hope you didn't hate it too much. There's something I should have done with this video, but I didn't. A lot of these 90s figures had later releases that were just the same figure, but recolored. I've been trying to combine those into one review. And Flak Viper version 2 really should have been reviewed in this video, but I didn't think of it until I was done. So later in this week I will post a video that is a brief review of Flak Viper version 2. With an addendum to this video. Thank you for watching this video. If you enjoyed it, I'm making more like it. So please give this video a thumbs up on YouTube, subscribe to the YouTube channel, hit the notification bell so you don't miss any future videos, and share this video with your friends, that's what helps this channel grow. You can find me on social media, on Facebook and Twitter, and I have a website hcc788.com. If you want to know if I've already reviewed a vintage GI Joe item, that's a good place to check. Special thanks to all my supporters on Patreon, including the names you see on the screen now. Support on Patreon helps keep this show going. So if you like this show, and you'd like to support this show in that way, please consider checking out Patreon. You can get some special rewards, including early access to reviews, and you can find out how to decode the secret messages you see in these videos. Thank you for joining me on this adventure of collecting vintage GI Joe toys. I'll see you next time, and until then, remember, only GI Joe is GI Joe.