Serpentor???
Posted: 22 Sep 2003 22:56
Okay this a complete guess but I have to wonder if Palitoy and not Hasbro had continued with the Action Force line, whether one of their next releases would have been Serpentor. For those of you who don't follow the GI Joe saga, Serpentor is a creation of a top Cobra scientist called Dr. Mindbender who raided the tombs of historys greatest leaders/soldiers (and worst despots!!) and then using advanced cloning technology blended their dna together to create the ultimate soldier (and leader) in Serpentor.
I say this because toy companies generally work pretty far in advance of their release schedules, I'd lay good money that Hasbro for instance already know what they plan to release and in which months as far ahead as 2006. So keeping this in mind Palitoy would likely have had plans for the next wave of AF releases which then got scrapped when Hasbro stuck their oar into the mix and took over.
Now bear in mind the later Battle Action Force stories and that they generally had a pretty good ongoing continuity and see if you agree with where things were going:
1. Dr. Mindbender - Easy to add in a new character but not one that was actually needed as Cobra Commander (aka Baron Ironblood) already was a genius in the field of cloning tech having made an army of Krakens whilst with his old outfit. Still unlikely that CC would make someone to replace himself, so Mindbender (hopefully with a new name, and maybe a redone figure cos his is awful, looks like areject from the Village People) could well have been another addition to Cobra ranks.
2. Need for a new leader - At the end of the Deep Cover saga CC completely lost it, shut himself in his command bunker and went well and truly off his trolley. So cobra was in need of a new, and much improved commander. True several of the high command would have had designs on this post themself which would make for some interesting stories in Battle no doubt. However they would have realised that if they fought each other than the only winners would be AF, so I think they would have been ameanable to the idea of creating a super soldier to lead them to victory knowing that there would be plenty of spoils for them allonce Af were annihilated.
3. School for Snakes - In this story we can already see Cobra experimenting with trying to create a generation of super genius leaders. Now given that the filecards were extensively changed from the US to European lines, how about Serpentor in reality being Krano, the eldest and most dangerous of the serpent students who is the sole survivor of the schools destruction and vows that the world has not seen the last of him. True it does away with the whole cloned from worlds leaders bit, but would fit with a re-imagined origin for Serpentor.
I just see a sorta pattern emerging, maybe I'm grasping at straws but I think that the Battle writters would at least know something about what releases Palitoy had planned for the forthcoming year. It's a shame we'll never know for sure though.
Having said all of that, if Palitoy had continued the line, I would definately have liked to have seen them launch a redone (fully articulated) range of Red Shadows to give AF & Cobra more/different foes to fight. Though this is mainly cos the Black Major was a great character (before he went totally nutso that is).
I say this because toy companies generally work pretty far in advance of their release schedules, I'd lay good money that Hasbro for instance already know what they plan to release and in which months as far ahead as 2006. So keeping this in mind Palitoy would likely have had plans for the next wave of AF releases which then got scrapped when Hasbro stuck their oar into the mix and took over.
Now bear in mind the later Battle Action Force stories and that they generally had a pretty good ongoing continuity and see if you agree with where things were going:
1. Dr. Mindbender - Easy to add in a new character but not one that was actually needed as Cobra Commander (aka Baron Ironblood) already was a genius in the field of cloning tech having made an army of Krakens whilst with his old outfit. Still unlikely that CC would make someone to replace himself, so Mindbender (hopefully with a new name, and maybe a redone figure cos his is awful, looks like areject from the Village People) could well have been another addition to Cobra ranks.
2. Need for a new leader - At the end of the Deep Cover saga CC completely lost it, shut himself in his command bunker and went well and truly off his trolley. So cobra was in need of a new, and much improved commander. True several of the high command would have had designs on this post themself which would make for some interesting stories in Battle no doubt. However they would have realised that if they fought each other than the only winners would be AF, so I think they would have been ameanable to the idea of creating a super soldier to lead them to victory knowing that there would be plenty of spoils for them allonce Af were annihilated.
3. School for Snakes - In this story we can already see Cobra experimenting with trying to create a generation of super genius leaders. Now given that the filecards were extensively changed from the US to European lines, how about Serpentor in reality being Krano, the eldest and most dangerous of the serpent students who is the sole survivor of the schools destruction and vows that the world has not seen the last of him. True it does away with the whole cloned from worlds leaders bit, but would fit with a re-imagined origin for Serpentor.
I just see a sorta pattern emerging, maybe I'm grasping at straws but I think that the Battle writters would at least know something about what releases Palitoy had planned for the forthcoming year. It's a shame we'll never know for sure though.
Having said all of that, if Palitoy had continued the line, I would definately have liked to have seen them launch a redone (fully articulated) range of Red Shadows to give AF & Cobra more/different foes to fight. Though this is mainly cos the Black Major was a great character (before he went totally nutso that is).