Need a little "JOE" help

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Ironman1188

SO BE IT
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I grew up with the original 12" GI Joes. I was pleased (until I saw them) when hasbro decided to revive the line in the 90's. It also got me out of Joe as more and more companies made better and better 1:6 figures.
Anyway, I wound up watching the RAH animated cartoons over the years, mostly out of curiousity from the hasbro revival, and recently saw the RoC film with my son.
I have since been "reviving" someof my old figures and redoing them as I would like to have either seen them done originally or how I would envision them today.
OK, to my point, who were the "real-life" persons in GI Joe?
I know Sgt. Slaughter was in there, and William Perry. Were there others? Or characters from other shows/films?
Thanks!
 
www.yojoe.com is a good resource for pictures and trivial information. some characters were designed in honour of real people, but not so much designed in their likeness.
 
The only two real life people who had an 80's figure made of them were Refrigerator Perry and Sgt. Slaughter.

Tunnel Rat was made in the likeness of Larry Hama (author of the Marvel run of comics).
 
ROCKY . . . Rocky Balboa.

Seriously.

Let me explain.

Marvel Comics published GI JOE: Order of Battle that was basically a compendium (at the time) of all characters (JOEs & COBRAs) and vehicles in the comics (at the time). One of the issues featuring GI JOE characters showed Rocky. IIRC . . . it was not an official or sanctioned character bio/profile.

Rocky was supposed to be a guest trainer for GI JOE team showcasing endurance and stamina.

I believe in the end Marvel Comics had to post a retraction or something like that and purge him for the GI JOE Order of Battle TPB that they published shortly sometime after.

Rocky's association with GI JOE was only through the character bio/profile in the GI JOE Order of Battle compendium limited series and AFAIK never a 3.75" figure.
 
I don't like to think that gi-joe are connected to real people.
For me it's like sideshow modernize their joe like firefly.

I think they become "regular soldier"
For me what make the fig is that they have a bit of reality but at the same a bit of fiction.

ANd that's what makes the fig stand out more.

Sorry for my bad english again! lol
 
I don't like to think that gi-joe are connected to real people.
For me it's like sideshow modernize their joe like firefly.

I think they become "regular soldier"
For me what make the fig is that they have a bit of reality but at the same a bit of fiction.

ANd that's what makes the fig stand out more.

Sorry for my bad english again! lol

I get that. My idea though, was to redo them with "real-life" sculpts where I could. So if any joes were actually based on someone or real world persons were made a part of Joe or COBRA then it would just be easier.

BTW, there used to be a joe group on AOL that was dubbed "the sandbox" and primarily dealt with the 12" joes, does anyone know if it still exists? I know it had changed hosts back when AOL dropped its discussion groups.
 
Scoop is based off a reporter at NBC and Sneak Peek named after Stephen King's son. Pretty sure Heavy Duty is name after a Hasbro employee as well.
 
Supposedly Sneak Peak is based on Stephen King's son. Outback seems based on Chuck Norris. Not supposed to be those exact people with the same names, etc., though. (edit: I guess Sneak Peak was named for King's son. . .)

There are probably others, but most are probably just guys who worked for Hasbro or their friends/family. I can't think of any others off-hand.

Regarding DeltaForce's post, there was a prototype of a Rocky figure made, but they could never get the rights worked out.

https://www.yojoe.com/archive/unproduced/rockybalboa.shtml
 
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I imagine in theory it was similar to the match up of Serpentor vs. Sgt Slaughter but on a smaller scale. I mean both Sarge and Serpy came with small scale vehicles, and both had their own tie-in 3-packs (Renegades and the Cobra-La set).
 
Pretty sure they went with Rocky because they wanted to make a Rambo figure, but Coleco held the rights.
 
Rowdy Roddy Piper is now a part of the Joeverse. At the Atlanta con in 2007 he was a figure created to be the trainer for Destro's Iron Grenadiers. He was also a guest at the convention.

Sgt. Slaughter was a guest at another con, nice guy. Really enjoyed hanging out with the collectors.

The figure Law was sculpted to be Kirk Bodigan (spelling?)

John
 
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