#947 POWER COMMANDOS - FIGURES FROM WAVE 1 (1992)

I have known this series for a long time because it is one of the most thoroughly reviewed in the "bootleg" list of yojoe.com. I considered I knew a lot about Hasbro´s G.I.Joe: ARAH bootlegs, but I had not seen these anywhere else.

In ten years I only saw them very few times on eBay, and I got to buy two of them loose without accesories.

Fortunately, around three years ago, many lots of blister packs were sold by a Mexican seller, and I got a complete set for a relatively small amount of money. I didn´t ask him, but it looks like he found old stock somewhere and put all that for sale, either the figures in blister packs or loose (probably because some cards were too damaged for collectors). I recall that the description also stated that some blisters might present damage of some kind, so receiving the blister cards in perfect shape was a nice surprise.

Information about Lucky Bell and the Mexican importer

Copyright Notice

The Power Commandos by Lucky Bell are interesting for a series of reasons. One reason is that some body parts are very similar to others from original G.I.Joe and Cobra characters (for example some arms are just like 1986´s Vipers). Another one is that some characters vaguely remind of other from the Hasbro´s toyline, although the heads are all new, original sculpts, and third, because the weapons are quite imaginative and some are also bootlegged from Hasbro.

Other positive points for the line is the quality and durability of the figures and also the nice packaging art, also inspired by Hasbro. I like that some details of the figures are painted gold and also that the accesories come in different colours, but I dislike the colour combinations of these first 6 figures, all trousers are either light brown or blue, all torsos are either blue or red and the details are also blue, red or green, so all six figures look somewhat similar to each other.

This small flaw continued in a second series of figures, which are much rarer, but was corrected in the third wave which is ultra-rare and from which only a few pics have been seen so far. We will come to this later.

Another flaw is that in six figures we find only three different models of each body part: three torsos, three waists, three legs and three arms, all doubled, but six different heads, some of them very cool! This is not rare in G.I.Joe bootlegs, see for example The Corps or Kaido.

The character´s names are quite good, as we will see next, and they came with a filecard each with some bio-facts. Unfortunately they are written in poor English and the texts are rather simple and plain, not to mention the tag "Those guys from another galaxy", that actually reminds more of Masters of the Universe than G.I.Joe. The birthplaces of each character is not a real one (for example: "South of Arenia")

The figures were sold in couples, being one of the characters always a Power hero and the second one an evil villain. Note that the file cards have different colours and one is marked "Power" while the other is marked "Terror". Since these words are placed below the picture (that's where the affiliation of  G.I.Joe characters was indicated in the filecard), I would suggest the the good guys are the Power Commandos, and they fight an evil corporation or entity called Terror. Why not?

There were three blisters available:

1. Condor Strike
2. Red Raven

3. X-Ray Eye
4. Submarine

5. Mummy Mask
6. Metal Hawk

The blisters originally had its own artwork depicting both characters in action.

BLISTER 1: CONDOR STRIKE + RED RAVEN

BLISTER 2: X-RAY EYE + SUBMARINE

BLISTER 3: MUMMY MASK + METAL HAWK

Wave two figures are similar in colours but are made out of different parts/new sculpts, also inspired by G.I.Joe. The blister back showed all 12 figures in action, but the rest of the package is very similar. Of course the artwork was new and represented the new characters.

Wave 3 figures were sold individually and the package had brighter colours, maybe following the trend started by the G.I.Joes from 1992, 1993 and 1994. The text Power Commandos is written in yellow, the card frame is bright pink and the figures themselves are mostly pink, bright green and purple... this time the artwork is recycled from series 2 and the figures are also made out of parts already used in waves 1 and 2. Maybe I get these figures someday so I can take pictures and show them here.

FACTS AND FIGURES:

• Name: CONDOR STRIKE, RED RAVEN, X-RAY EYE, SUBMARINE, MUMMY MASK and METAL HAWK
• Toy Line: Power Commandos (Wave 1)
• Year: 1992
• Company: Lucky Bell (Hong-Kong)
• Size of the figures: Around 9.5 cm

#34 GODDESS OF THE ULTRA COSMOS – GODDESS OF STIBNITE (1992)

When can we call a toy a knock-off? Most of the people I know would call this “Goddess of the Ultra Cosmos” a knock-off: it’s very similar to popular toy lines like She-Ra: Princess of Power (Mattel) or Golden Girls (Galoob), but this one seems to be of worst quality, and is made by an unknown toy company in Hong Kong.

The manufacturer of these dolls is Lucky Bell, but this figure is a re-edition. The same figures were packaged and sold a few years earlier by Agglo, another Hongkongese company specialised in low-cost toys and knock-offs of famous toy lines. That year was 1985, the same year in which the “She-Ra: Princess of Power” line was released by Mattel.

The package is poorly illustrated, and I guess it didn’t take much time the designers to create the story behind these goddesses (read it on the cardback, that text in the "Star Wars" style: "Long long ago, and far far away"). Each goddess reigns in a planet and three of them had the evil idea of conquering the other three due to the scarcity of natural resources in their home planets… poor against rich.

Unfortunately, I can’t write much about this figure, it is almost impossible to find information about the line, further than that the whole collection are 6 figures, and that each figure came with a “marble” horse. The same figures were also available without the horse (like this one). If you check the other figures, you’ll see that all of them include a cloth cloak, a mask, a shield and a sword, just like many She-Ra figures.

Even though I would also agree to call this collection a knock-off, I have to admit, that this is well done and is still a quality toy, the bodies of the figures have different casts and different hairstyles, the weapons are all different, they include a cloak made of cloth (presumably hand-made or at least hand finished). If I found any of the other 5 figures, I would buy it.

 

In Spain, this kind of figures was not sold in toy shops, but in street markets. Everywhere where a celebration, fair or procession was going on, came those vans full of cheap toys and candies for the children. Maybe that’s why some of this knock-offs are extremely difficult to find, maybe it’s just that there were only a few thousands of each made (in comparison to the millions of She-Ra figures, for example). With the time, some hard-core collectors of similar lines interest themselves for those bootlegs, and, as they are so difficult to find, the price raises a lot.

 

Please leave a comment if you want to add something or if you liked (or disliked) this article!

FACTS and FIGURES:

• Name: GODDESS OF STIBNITE
• Toy Line: GODDESS OF THE ULTRA-COSMOS
• Year: 1992
• Company: Lucky Bell (Hong Kong)
• Size of the figures: 5½’’ or 12 cm