GI Joe was one of the lines that defined my childhood same with Star Wars and Transformers. I wish Hasbro would grow a set and get Joe back into stores.
Gotta add - huge money making to new movies there. While I’m not versed in the finances, I would actually think toons are more effective in pushing toys, can give more focus to more characters and keep them top of mind for a longer period of time.
Unfortunately that doesn't seem to be Hasbro's way of thinking. They've become gunshy to GI Joe for a bunch of different reasons unfortunately and now feel they need a successful film franchise to be able to market GI Joe.
They can be but as much potential as Renegades had, it was on a channel Hasbro hyped up but ultimately most people didn't seem to care for. There's usually arguments for substantial change, real-world parallels, whatever. If they want to make something new, just respect the source material and build from there, especially with the timeless characteristics. If they become too reliant on movies(which they have been), they get tied down and held back by actor commitments. For example, GI Joe 3 was supposed to have been out not too long after Retaliation. The Rock got occupied with a bunch of other projects. GI Joe isn't at retail anymore. That's what happens when you throw all the eggs into a movie basket. Given that the Snake Eyes movie is already rebooting the series, might as well jump on that as a fresh start but I wouldn't limit any prospective toylines just on that movie and it's success. I would definitely buy a retooled ARAH Night Raven that could seat 2 modern joe figures into the cockpit, Crusader shuttle and others. If nothing happens, I'll just buy and customize older vehicles and buy some MTF figures to customize.
You can blame the channel but the channel didn't stop Prime from getting three seasons or MLP from nine. And I don't think Hasbro has much choice about the movie basket. It's the only thing that might convince retailers to carry the line. Retailers don't want Joe. Toys R Us was the only one who could be convinced to risk it and they didn't even want vehicles by the end.
TRU had vehicles at the end, they had the Cobra Wolf, HISS Tank and black Skystriker. I don't blame the channel but Hasbro's insistence to only show Renegades on the channel.
That's a reasonable assumption but I don't know if that's why they didn't pick up the proposed Crimson Rattler set
But did it really? Part of me feels like the best thing about Renegades was that it wasn't Sigma 6. The animation was okay, character designs were fine, but I don't know if they really could have built a continuing series out of where they ended. That TFP/BW approach to cast was really irritating to me, even using the same archetypes. It kind of worked with the A-Team formula they appropriated for the episodes we got, but I feel like they would have continued to use that limited cast approach even if the main characters had been absorbed back into GI Joe proper. I like GI Joe with a large cast of specialists, who then do things that are related to their specialty. None of that was in Renegades. Even the one clear specialist they had, Tunnel Rat, did he ever do anything related to that? I remember they all went down into some sewers together, but that's nothing. They all just did random things that could have been done by anyone. I kind of liked Renegade's take on COBRA. And I liked the twist they put on Tommy's story. But other than that...? I was not disappointed at all it got canceled. Not happy, but definitely not disappointed.
My biggest problem with Renegades is that rather than be GI Joe they tried to make the Joes the A-Team. The take on Cobra was fine and I like the idea of a counter-intelligence unit working to unmask Cobra, but the whole hunted by their own government angle never sat well with me.
And they're also "re-imaging" in homage to the original toys. AKA, the club had no budget, so they had to reuse, reuse, reuse.
This is my take as well - a revolving cast of Joes that vary depending on the mission, basically what M.A.S.K. and to a degree the classic Joes used to do. I honestly wish someone at Hasbro would try the same thing for TFs, it really helps with the world building, and I'm pretty sure it'd help sell more toys if more characters got to show up and get airtime, even if it was on a rotating/limited time basis. I mean, c'mon it worked back in the 80s.
Can you still find the kit that turns Retaliation Roadblock into Sargent Slaughter anywhere? It looks like the seller is no longer on ebay?
