 G.I. Joe had many ninjas, maybe too many ninjas, but that wasn't always the case. It all started with one ninja, Storm Shadow. Most G.I. Joe fans remember when Storm Shadow was introduced in 1984. But for younger G.I. Joe fans, there's a different iconic look for Storm Shadow. And that's what we'll look at this week for Ninja Month. Everybody hoody Cobra Commander 788 here. This is the show where we review every vintage G.I. Joe toy from 1982 to 1994. Welcome back to Ninja Month. Why ninjas in the month of October? Well, it is the month of Halloween, but I'm not a big horror fan. Besides, Timmer's channel already has monster month locked up. And some G.I. Joe fans find ninjas pretty scary. In G.I. Joe, there is one ninja that is the most popular and beloved. But only slightly less popular and beloved is Storm Shadow. If you grew up with G.I. Joe in the 90s, your version of Storm Shadow was probably the Ninja Force version. And that's what we're going to look at this week. That's not all we're going to look at, though. This figure was so memorable, it inspired later interpretations at different scales. So we're going to see how this figure looks in three different sizes. HCC 788 presents small, medium, and large Ninja Force Storm Shadow. This is Storm Shadow. G.I. Joe's Ninja Force leader from 1992. This figure was released in 1992 and was available in 1992 only. It was discontinued for 1993. This is the third version of Storm Shadow in the vintage line. Version 1 of Storm Shadow was introduced in 1984. This is the iconic and most remembered uniform for Storm Shadow. When introduced, he was a Cobra Ninja. Version 2 was introduced in 1988. By that time, Storm Shadow had switched sides and was working with G.I. Joe. How did this happen? There were a lot of important events between 1984 and 1988. Version 3, the subject of this review, was introduced in 1992. This figure was part of the Ninja Force subset. Ninja Force consisted of mostly brightly colored Ninja figures with special action features. Ninja Force ran from 1992 to 1993, at which point it was replaced by the Shadow Ninjas. Speaking of the Shadow Ninjas, there was a Shadow Ninjas version of Storm Shadow that was version 4 in 1994. It used the same mold as version 3, but it had the color change gimmick that was standard for Shadow Ninjas figures. There was one other occasion when the mold for this Storm Shadow figure was used in the vintage era. In 1993, it was used to create a new character, Gensu. Gensu was the driver of a vehicle called the Pile Driver. Depending on how you look at it, Storm Shadow was either the first or the second Ninja in the vintage G.I. Joe toy line. Back in 1982, Snake Eyes was introduced as the G.I. Joe Commando. He was masked and dressed all in black. His story was later retconned to reveal he was also a Ninja. In 1984, Snake Eyes was the first character introduced and billed as a Ninja. The Snake Eyes backstory was developed after that and by the time the second version of Snake Eyes was released, his Ninja backstory was fully integrated into his character. We will talk more about the relationship between Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow in the media section of this review. It's important because it explains how Storm Shadow went from Cobra to G.I. Joe. Let's take a look at Storm Shadow's accessories. The all-white accessories give the impression that this figure may be designed for a snowy environment. The 2020 G.I. Joe classified version of this figure was designated as winter operations. We will look at that figure later in this video. Let's start by looking at Storm Shadow's sword. The file card calls this sword a Stainless Steel Ninja Master's Sword. It is white. It has a straight blade, but it has a handle at an angle. This is a bit different from the usual Ninja sword. It is rather plain, but it serves a purpose. You can't have a Storm Shadow figure without a sword. The next accessory is his sickle. This sickle on the file card is called a Fast Grab Battle Double-Edged Sickle. Actually, the file card calls this a Nunchuk Defense Weapon, but I think the arrow is just pointed at the wrong thing. The sickle is in white plastic. This is probably supposed to be a comma, which is a weapon in the martial arts, but the handle is a bit long and the blade looks a bit more like a pickaxe. His final accessory is his figure stand. It is in black plastic. This was standard on 90s G.I. Joe figures. They were not standard in the 80s, and this is, in my opinion, the best innovation in the 90s. Let's take a look at Storm Shadow's articulation. He did not have the standard articulation for a G.I. Joe action figure. His head was on a swivel. He did not have a ball-jointed neck. He could swing his arm up at the shoulder. 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 rest of the articulation at the shoulder is linked to his action gimmick, and this is a good time to talk about it. The card called this real Ninja action the Screaming Whirlwind. When you move one of the arms forward or back, the other arm moved in the opposite direction. This action feature has the best effect when he has both accessories in his hands, so it looks like he's slashing with both his sword and his sickle. He does not have articulation at the torso. He does have pretty standard articulation at the legs, although his legs won't move apart very far. He can 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 Storm Shadow. The overall look of this figure supports the idea that this is a winter operations uniform. Storm Shadow traditionally wears white so any of his uniforms would work for winter operations. In this case he has more black in his uniform than ever before, but enough white to be recognizable as Storm Shadow. Taking a look at Storm Shadow's head, he is wearing a white hood over a black balaclava mask you can see his eyes. This hood is a throwback to the hood on the Version 2 figure, so that makes sense for Storm Shadow, but the addition of black as a secondary color is an innovation. The top half of his chest is white and the bottom half is black, and the transition from white to black looks like dangling icicles and painted dots that look like snow. I think the dots are painted a little sloppily. They almost look like they're hand painted. He's wearing a black shoulder piece with a gold border that goes over both shoulders and around his upper back. On the front, on the right side, he has a couple gold throwing stars, and on the left side he has a couple gold grenades, which the file card calls intense concussion grenades. There are a couple gold canister grenades on the right side of his torso near the center. The file card calls these smoke bombs for fast escape. There's also a sculpted knife on his chest that is almost invisible because the paint just goes right over it. I might have missed that detail if it were not painted in on the Gensu figure. He has a white belt around his midsection that goes all the way around, and on the right side of that belt he has a cloth extension to that belt, and that's pretty cool. The addition of the soft goods belt adds a new dimension to the figure. It's important to point out there is no back hole on this figure, no back screw. The torso is welded together to accommodate the action feature. That means you cannot use a traditional backpack on this figure. His arms are white at the shoulder and black the rest of the way down, including some black gloves, and the transition from white to black is the same transition we saw on the chest. The waist piece is all black with minimal detail other than a few cloth folds since the belt is on the midsection. There's not really much need for detail on the waist piece. His upper legs are black. On his right thigh he has a white pouch and a couple white bands that go around the thigh. On his left leg he has a white knife and a couple bands that go around that thigh. His legs are white from the knees down, and he has wrappings around his legs and his feet. And the transition from black to white is the same as on the chest but in reverse. This is an interesting and creative design. Is it the best design for Storm Shadow? No, but they thought outside the box for this one. The fade from white to black to white with the snowy transition is inspired. The execution is a bit sloppy. It's probably the best they could do for a figure of this scale. Fortunately we have this design on figures of a larger scale so we can see how that turned out. Let's take a look at Storm Shadow's file card. The file card unfortunately has that hot pink background that was indicative of Ninja Force figures. It has a close-up portrait of Storm Shadow here and then it has a full body image of him here with a numbered list of features. I'm not going to read that whole list. I've already referred to it a couple of times when describing the features and the accessories for this figure. His codename is Storm Shadow. He's the Ninja Force leader. Ninja Force was a sub team for G.I. Joe but it was also the label given to all Ninja Force figures in the toy line including the bad guys. His file name was Thomas S. Arashikage and this is the first time on a file card that his actual name was given. Arashikage is a combination of two Japanese words Arashi meaning Storm and Kage meaning Shadow. Primary military specialty covert operations. Secondary military specialty martial arts instructor. Birthplace St. Louis, Missouri. This is the first time on a file card we get the birthplace for Storm Shadow. We knew from the comic book that Storm Shadow was a Japanese American but we didn't know exactly where he was from. His grade is E-8 first sergeant and according to the comic book he does have a background in the US Army. There's a quote here presumably from Storm Shadow himself. It says train hard, fight easy. Thanks Yoda. This paragraph says Storm Shadow is a former US Army LLRP, former Cobra Viper, last Grandmaster of the Arashikage Ninja Clan and sword brother of the inscrutable snake eyes and now the leader of the newly formed G.I. Joe Ninja Force. The asterisk for LLRP is in the wrong spot but that stands for long range recon patrol and that story was very thoroughly told in the comic book. Drawing on generations of secret lore and years of practical combat experience, Storm Shadow imparts to his Ninja Force such esoteric techniques as the cloak of the chameleon and screaming whirlwind. When he's on patrol, Storm Shadow operates the lethal G.I. Joe Patriot. That's a little cross-sell for a vehicle. This file card almost exactly mirrors the story in the G.I. Joe comic book except he was never a Cobra Viper. He did work for Cobra but he was not a Viper. I said this figure was represented in other scales. Well let's take a look at a couple of them now, starting with the Hall of Fame 12 inch action figure from 1993. These Hall of Fame figures were 12 inch action figures that were taking advantage of the nostalgia for 12 inch G.I. Joe in the 60s and 70s as those fans were reaching the age when they would be adult collectors. These have some throwbacks to those old 12 inch figures like the dog tags G.I. Joe in the 60s and 70s had these oversized dog tags, which is why this figure has it. But these Hall of Fame figures were a far cry from G.I. Joe in the 60s and 70s. For one thing, the articulation leaves a lot to be desired. These are very clunky figures. They don't even have articulation at the elbows and at the knees. As for a representation of the version three three and three quarter inch figure, it's all right. It has that white to black to white transition and it looks pretty good. But he also has a lot fewer features than that smaller figure. Now this figure is not complete, but even if it were, it has a lot fewer details than the smaller scale figure. This is the 2020 G.I. Joe classified series Amazon exclusive Arctic Mission Storm Shadow. This is a six inch figure that is clearly inspired by the version three design. This classified figure blows away both the Hall of Fame figure and the vintage figure in the articulation department with tons of articulation everywhere with double jointed elbows and double jointed knees. And he just twists and turns in every which direction. The articulation is excellent. This figure has a lot of familiar features from the vintage figure with a ton more detail. It has the white hood over the black balaclava mask. It has the white upper chest that goes to black with that ice and snow transition from the version three figure looking really good at this scale. It does not have that transition on the legs. So no reverse transition as it goes from black to white on the lower legs. But that's okay. It does have gold as a highlight color as the version three figure did. And I think that looks excellent. The six inch figure has a lot more accessories than the vintage figure. He has the sword as he should. He also adds a bow and a backpack with arrows. He has a sheath for the sword. There are a few accessories I don't have on the figure. I keep them in the box. He has a white arrow. He has a grapple hook with a black line. And he has a sickle that is reminiscent of the vintage accessory. Looking at how Storm Shadow was used in GI Joe Media in the animated series, he first appeared in Revenge of Cobra part one. In the Sunbow era of the animated series, he was an agent of Cobra. Instead of a friendship with Snake Eyes, he had a rivalry with Spirit. Spirit was probably chosen as the rival to Storm Shadow because Spirit was a speaking character. The always silent Snake Eyes wasn't used as often. By the time the Deak era of the series came around, Storm Shadow was in his Ninja Force uniform and was working for GI Joe. He only had a couple appearances in that series. For such a popular character, he didn't show up in the animated series as often as you would expect. In the GI Joe comic book series published by Marvel Comics, he first appeared in issue number 21, The Famous Silent Issue. He was unnamed, of course, because there was no dialogue in that issue. He was tied to Snake Eyes from his first appearance. It was revealed that they both had the same mysterious tattoo. The meaning of the tattoo wasn't revealed until the two-part origin of Snake Eyes series in issues number 26 and 27. Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow served on the same LRRP unit in Vietnam, which also included GI Joe's Ranger, Stalker. After the war, Snake Eyes trained with Storm Shadow's family ninja clan, the Arashikagi. After the assassination of the head of the clan, the Hardmaster, Storm Shadow joined Cobra in an effort to discover the identity of the assassin. Larry Hama, the writer of the comic book series, has said he wasn't happy that the only Asian character in the series was a bad guy. Over time, he slowly bent Storm Shadow's arc to make him a good guy. By the time Hasbro realized what was happening, it was too late for them to change it. To their credit, Hasbro carried this change over to the toy line. Storm Shadow's story has many twists and turns. For a time, he was thought to be dead. He was part of the genetic soup that was used to create the Cobra Emperor, Serpentor. He trained Cobra Commander's son, Billy, in the ninja arts. Eventually, he was assigned to lead GI Joe's ninja force. Storm Shadow is the second most developed character in the GI Joe universe behind Snake Eyes. Looking at Storm Shadow version 3 overall, for a 90s figure, and for a ninja force figure, and for a figure with an action feature, it's not bad. I can live without the action feature. It gets in the way of normal articulation. The accessories are sparse, just a sword, a sickle, and a figure stand. Earlier versions of Storm Shadow were loaded with accessories. Unfortunately, this figure can't even carry a backpack. It doesn't have a screw hole in the back. Those are the bad points. The good points are, the design is creative and unique. It is recognizable as Storm Shadow. The gold highlights are well done. The black adds depth to the traditional white Storm Shadow uniform. There's a divide between 80s and 90s GI Joe fans. 80s fans will always look at version 1 of Storm Shadow as the most iconic look. For 90s fans, this probably was your Storm Shadow. If this is your iconic Storm Shadow, I can respect that. It has a strong enough fan base to demand a Hall of Fame figure, and even a modern classified figure. The love for this Storm Shadow is still alive in the year 2020. That was my review of Ninja Force Storm Shadow. I hope you enjoyed it. If you did, please give it a thumbs up on YouTube, subscribe to the YouTube channel, hit the notification bell, and share this video with your friends. You can find me on social media, on Facebook and Twitter, and I have a website, HCC788.com. I also have a Patreon. I'm not currently accepting new Patrons, but I have to give a special thanks to all the names you see scrolling on the screen right now for their support. They have kept this channel going through thick and thin, and I am very grateful. Next week is the last week of Ninja Month. If you like Ninjas, you may be looking forward to getting another Ninja review. If you don't like Ninjas, you may be looking forward to that being the last Ninja review for a while. Next week, I'll look at a lesser known version of a more popular character. It's Snake Eyes. I'll see you next week. Until then, remember, only G.I. Joe is G.I. Joe. For a fun drinking game, take a drink every time I accidentally said Snake Eyes when I meant Storm Shadow.