 Hello everybody hooded Cobra Commander 788 here and I'm back with another vintage GI Joe toy review. Last time we looked at Cobra Commander, the leader of GI Joe's enemy. So this time we're going to take a look at one of the leaders of GI Joe and depending on your point of view he was THE leader of GI Joe. Of course I'm talking about the 1983 and 1984 GI Joe 1st Sergeant Duke. I just had to fit that in, I promise to never use that gag again. Here he is the man of the hour. This is Duke. He was first released in 1983 as a mail away offer, he was not sold in retail stores. He was then released in 1984 as a carded action figure for sale in retail stores. He was also sold in 1985. He was discontinued in 1986 when you might say he was replaced by version 2 of Hawk. We got a second version of Duke in 1988, the Tiger Force Duke, and Tiger Force Duke was the same action figure pretty much except with different coloring, and most conspicuously they changed the hair color from blonde to brown. Duke's leadership role in the GI Joe universe is a little bit muddled. In the cartoon he was introduced as the first leader of GI Joe, but in the comic book of course Colonel Hawk was the first leader of GI Joe. When Duke was introduced in the comic book he became the field commander of GI Joe when Colonel Hawk was essentially booted upstairs. When Colonel Hawk became General Hawk in version 2 he then again became the field commander of GI Joe. Let's take a look at Duke's accessories, and he came with a lot of accessories. First let's look at his firearm. This is essentially a green version of the same gun that came with the 1982 and 1983 stalker. When it came with stalker the card described it as an M32 pulverizer submachine gun, but on Duke's 1984 card it was just called the M32 submachine gun. The closest real world approximation to this M32 submachine gun would be a folding stock variant of the Heckler & Koch MP5 with a straight magazine and an elongated barrel. The gun is very nicely detailed and it has a very interesting looking curved stock. Duke also came with a pair of binoculars that had a strap to fit around his neck, and the binoculars had kind of a curved design here, which I think if they're viewed this way have sort of a periscope effect so you can look over cover at the enemy. These straps are very thin and pretty easily broken. I have another one here with a broken strap. So if you're getting one of these watch out for that, these straps can break. The strap is slightly curved in order to kind of fit around his neck and hang over his chest, but despite that curve it still sticks out pretty far. Duke came with a helmet. It was light green, and the earliest versions of this helmet had no holes in the side, and that was a variation from the standard GI Joe helmet which had holes in the sides. Those holes were for clip on items such as visors like hawks here. Later versions of this helmet actually did have holes like the standard helmet. It was the standard helmet only a lighter green for Duke. Duke was one of two action figures to have this no hole variant in the standard helmet. The other one was the 1984 roadblock. And finally Duke came with a backpack, and his backpack was actually a remold of the 1983 Airborne's backpack, and as you can see these backpacks look almost identical. There are some differences though, mainly the color. The color on Duke's backpack is very slightly darker to match the khaki color on his shirt, whereas Airborne's backpack is very slightly lighter to match the lighter color on his arms. The male away version of Hawk came with an accessory that did not come with the carded action figure, and that was a very tiny American flag sticker which was supposed to be a patch that you would put on his arm. Usually you would put that on his right arm. Now that was a very very tiny sticker, and this one's kind of faded, so you have to look very closely. It's very tiny, you may have a hard time seeing it, so look very very closely. There is no sticker, I'm just kidding, I do not have the American flag sticker for Duke. Some poor schmuck is going to be replaying the video over and over, looking close to see if you can see that sticker. There is no sticker, just a joke. Let's take a look at Duke's articulation. Duke had the typical articulation for the 1983 and 1984 G.I. Joe action figures, which meant that he could turn his head from side to side like that. He could lift his arm up about so far, and he could swing it all the way around. He had a hinge at the elbow, so he could move at the elbow about 90 degrees, and he had a swivel at the bicep, so he could swivel his arm all the way around. This was a new feature introduced in 1983, and it allowed the figures to hold their weapons with a two-handed grip. He was held together with a rubber O-ring that looped around the inside, which allowed him to move at the torso a little bit. He could move his legs apart about so far. He could move his leg at the hip about 90 degrees, and he could bend at the knee about 90 degrees. Let's look at the sculpt of Duke, and Duke is made up in almost entirely of reused parts from other action figures. His arms, his back, and his waist piece are all from the 1983 G.I. Joe. Back, waist piece, and arm. There is a variant of Duke where he has long sleeves and a different waist piece, but I do not have examples of those variants. His upper legs are from the 1983 and 1984 Major Blood. You can see the same pistol there, same upper legs. His feet were reused from the 1983 Gung Ho. You can see the same boots and the same knives there. That means Duke had only two unique parts, his head and his chest piece. The earliest versions of Duke's head when he was a mail away offer had a simplified hair. The hair did not have much detail, it was a different sculpt on the hair. Now when he was released carded, he had more detailed hair. You can see lines in the hair there. Now I have three Duke action figures, and one day when I was changing out O-rings, I noticed that my third version, which is the more detailed hair version, actually has different colored hair. I did inquire as to whether or not this is a known variant. I don't have a clear answer though, but these are three different heads, but as far as I know, there are only two known variants of Duke's head. So I don't know exactly where this one comes from. Duke's face is sculpted with kind of a smirky grin, and I think that is to match the art on his card, which shows him kind of with that same smirky grin. And I'm actually not a big fan of when they sculpt expressive faces like this. I actually don't mind when they have the faces kind of neutral, because as a kid, I would just pretend that they were expressing whatever feeling or emotion that I wanted to at the time. But when you start sculpting in expressions like this, you end up with travesties like lift tickets, really goofy smile, and a mutt who looks like he's trying to squeeze out a big poop. Let's take a closer look at Duke's chest piece, which was his other unique part. He has two colored shirts. He's wearing a green shirt underneath a khaki shirt. He's got some nicely sculpted pockets, some nice detail there. He has this gold badge, which is supposed to be US Army Airborne Jump Wings. You can get a better view on his card art. You can see those are jump wings there. He also has this green strap that he's kind of famous for. There's a buckle and two pouches and a grenade on there. But one thing that bothers me about that is that this green strap does not continue to the back. It disappears on the back, and that's of course because he was reusing Doc's back piece. And maybe this shouldn't bother me, but it does. I've said before that I like it when the sculpting on the action figure matches the accessories, but his strap just kind of ends at the back. And the backpack I guess is just supposed to attach to his shirt. I don't know. But there just should be a strap back there, and it just drives me crazy that it isn't. Despite the disappearing strap, I really do like the sculpting on this chest piece. I think it's detailed, it looks nice. And of course it's iconic, you know, that you can't mistake it. This is Duke. Let's look at the coloring on Duke. I did mention that he has this gold badge on here. And that is the shiny gold paint that Hasbro used, which rubs off very easily. As you can see, this one has a lot of the paint rubbed off. So if you're looking for a Duke action figure and you want it to be in good shape, you know, take a look at that gold paint and see if that is still there. We have a khaki shirt with green pants, and I really don't mind the mismatch. It is reasonably military looking, and of course this is Duke's iconic look. Duke's lower half was molded in this light green plastic, and at the time Hasbro had a lot of trouble with this light green plastic. It was extremely fragile. It would break if you just sneezed in its direction. No, I didn't break it. Duke number three has a busted crotch, but it does illustrate how fragile this green plastic is. You find a lot of Duke's with some part of the green plastic broken, either the crotch like this or one of his heels. This Duke's crotch has been repaired by a delicate operation that I call the bobbit. Let's take a look at Duke's file card. Now, when you got Duke as a mail away in 1983, the earliest versions of his file card would have had a plain back like this and kind of a close-up portrait on the front. When you got Duke in 1984 as a carded action figure, his file card was printed on the back of the packaging. You can see the front of the packaging there, and the portrait was not quite so close up. The text on the file card was identical, though. You can tell this was a 1984 file card, because it is still advertising swivel arm battle grip. Later file cards did not advertise that. This one is an advertisement for the triple win game. Up here it says his title is First Sergeant, and First Sergeant is a pretty high-ranking non-commissioned officer. A First Sergeant in the US Army has vital leadership and training roles. It says his code name is Duke, and that is probably intended to evoke John Wayne, who was also called the Duke. His file name is Conrad S. Houser. His primary military specialty is airborne infantrymen, which accounts for his US Army airborne jump wings. His secondary military specialty is artillery and small arms armorer. His birthplace is St. Louis, Missouri, and his grade is E-8 in parentheses, Master Sergeant. Now, Master Sergeant is not the same thing as a First Sergeant, but their rank is equal. It says here Duke was fluent in French, German, and English, of course, English, when he enlisted in 1967. That means that Duke enlisted in the Army and volunteered for service in Vietnam. He graduated top of his class at Airborne School, Fort Benning, that's Fort Benning, Georgia. He opted for US Army's special language school, specialized in Han Chinese and Southeast Asian dialects. Went special forces in 1969, again right in the middle of Vietnam. He worked with tribesmen in the boonies of South Vietnam, ran four different special forces schools, turned down a commission in 1971. Commands by winning respect, current assignment acting First Sergeant GI Joe team. The section down here says, statement after declining commission, and this is a quote from Duke, so I have to do the voice. They tell me that an officer's job is to impel others to take risks, so the officer survives to take the blame in the event of total catastrophe. With all due respect, sir, if that's what an officer does, I don't want any part of it. That was not Duke's voice at all. In the GI Joe cartoon, Duke was romantically linked with Scarlet. But in the comic book, Scarlet was romantically linked with Snake Eyes, and I much prefer the comic book version. I just don't think, based on Scarlet's personality, that Duke would appeal to her a great deal. The reason I say that is because Scarlet would see these macho alpha males 10 times a day every day of the week. But Snake Eyes is mysterious. And I think that that would appeal to Scarlet much more than Mr. Perfect Teeth here. Looking at Duke the character overall, he's just really annoyingly perfect. He's one of those frustrating overachievers. I mean, he's got the good looks, he's got the strength and the skills, and in the GI Joe universe, language skills is kind of a proxy for intelligence. So he's smart too. He's just one of those guys who seems to be perfect in every way. He strikes me as the sort of guy who, if he sees you jogging down the sidewalk, he's gonna join you just so he can show you that he can run faster than you. I mean, it's just unfair to us regular guys that somebody should be this flawless, that he should just look so good and have all the skills as well. It's just so frustrating. God, I hope he has a small penis. That was my review of the 1983 and 1984 Duke. I hope you enjoyed it. And if you're thinking of getting a Duke action figure, I hope you found this video informative. If you liked it, go ahead and give it a thumbs up. But whatever you do, make sure you subscribe because I've got a lot of great new GI Joe action figure and comic book reviews coming up and you do not want to miss them. Thanks for watching and I'll catch you all later.