G.I. Joe
The G.I. Joe story began in 1963 when a marketing man
approached the Hasbro toy company with the idea of creating a poseable
soldier to promote a television show called The Lieutenant.
Although the company didn't take the deal, they decided to create a
soldier-based action figure anyway. Designers at Hasbro developed a
12-inch figure whose 21 moveable parts allowed it to take on a variety
of lifelike poses. They named the finished doll G.I. Joe after the
film The Story Of G.I. Joe.
In 1964, G.I. Joe hit the toy market like a howitzer
shell. The initial line of toys contained 75 different items that
covered four different types of recruit - soldier, marine, sailor and
pilot. Toy buyers were impressed by these ambitious toys and began
snapping them up like mess hall hotcakes as Hasbro continued to flesh
out the G.I. Joe toy line with new soldiers and accessories.
New soldiers from this time included the Green Beret
and the Deep Sea Diver. There was also a G.I. Nurse, which did not
sell well during its release but is an in-demand collectible today. As
for accessories, there was no shortage of cool items like the Five
Star Jeep and the Mercury Space Capsule. By 1968, there were even
talking G.I. Joe figures.
The sales of G.I. Joe began to falter as the 1960s
neared their end, and Hasbro decided to rework the line to stay
current with the times. Due to the Vietnam War, soldiers were no
longer hip in the public eye, so the G.I. Joe shifted from 'soldier'
to 'adventurer'. G.I. Joe's adventures took him to a variety of new
places: the jungle, the hidden tombs of mummies, even outer space. He
explored these new realms with four new compatriots that were
collectively known as the Adventure Team. This team also boasted its
own cool line of vehicles with a distinctive "AT" logo, the coolest
being a Jeep with a working winch that allowed the Jeep to tow other
vehicles.
 The
public took to the new Adventure Team, skyrocketing sales to a level
that even the original G.I. Joe toys didn't reach. To keep up with
sales, the folks at Hasbro continued to add new items and cool
features.
One of the most beloved features added during this
time was the famous "kung fu grip." Basically, all this meant was that
the figure's hands were flexible rubber, but the feature's cool name
ensured that every male kid added "G.I. Joe with the kung-fu grip" to
his Christmas wish list.
Another cool feature introduced around this time was
"life-like hair," tiny fibers that were painstaking stitched into the
figure's head in place of the traditional painted-on hair. The only
problem with this hair was its tendency to fall out after enduring
enough wear and tear. Today, collectors can turn to special toy-repair
services to get new hair patched into their classic G.I. Joes, but no
such thing existed for kids back in the day. Thus, the owners would
either have to paint on new hair or learn to live with their
now-mangy-looking G.I. Joe.
During the mid-1970s, G.I. Joe sales began to dip
again. Hasbro counteracted this by borrowing from the television hit
The Six Million Dollar Man to create a bionic warrior called
Mike Power, Atomic Man. He was half-man and half-robot, complete with
a mechanized arm, a mechanized leg, and a "flashing atomic eye".
It was a hit with toy buyers, notching up a million
sales in less than a year. Other new characters introduced in the wake
of Atomic Man included Bulletman, the first superhuman G.I. Joe
character, and Eagle Eye, a figure with eyes that could move. These
new heroes needed a new set of enemies, and they quickly received them
in The Invaders, a nasty group of aliens with "crusher grip" arms.
 The
new Adventure Team toys did not sell as well as Atomic Man, and the
G.I. Joe toy line ran into further trouble when the Arab oil embargo
of the mid 1977s made the large amounts plastic to make G.I. Joes very
costly. Hasbro dealt with these problems by discontinuing the
Adventure Team toy in favor of a new line of 8-inch toys called Super
Joe. These figures had a science fiction theme, complete with
reptilian alien enemies and spaceship-style figures. They were
well-designed but did not catch on with the public. By 1978, the lack
of big sales and the rising price of plastic caused Hasbro to stop
making G.I. Joe toys.
The 1980s saw G.I. Joe make his triumphant return. In
1982, G.I. Joe was reintroduced in a smaller, molded-plastic style.
These toys hit it big with toy buyers, helped in part by a popular
G.I. Joe cartoon series and a new comic book from Marvel Comics.
These smaller G.I. Joe toys continue to be made today, and their
enduring success led to the revival of the 12-inch figures in the
mid-1990s.
The G.I. Joe Classic figures were introduced in 1992
and became an instant success with the baby-boomers who treasured the
original G.I. Joe toys. They continue to be made today and sell
steadily at toy stores, proving that G.I. Joe is still the king of
action figures.
|
