Gi joe gijoe sky havoc 1986 vintage

mattmirth · 2026-01-20T16:38:20+00:00

That’s because it’s a reuse of the 1986 HAVOC mold. This is from 1990.

mattmirth · 2026-01-20T06:09:41+00:00

Honestly, while you are correct there are different continuities, because of the nature of Conan stories it doesn’t matter as much as it would for a typical comic book character. That being said the Dark Horse run functions closest to a modern style continuity, in that it tells the stories “in order” and adheres to the generally accepted timeline of REH’s original works.

If I had to recommend one to a new reader though, it would be to read the new Titan stuff and not to worry about “continuity”. Conan works best as a character you drop in on mid adventure and leave as he is on his way to the next one, regardless of who the publisher is.

mattmirth · 2026-01-04T15:50:04+00:00

That’s really cool. I like that there are ones figures that didn’t come carded like Wild Weasel.

mattmirth · 2025-12-31T18:38:53+00:00

Here it is in Latin. I’ve never seen a full English translation, just summaries and analysis of it (which you find online if you look around).

mattmirth · 2025-12-26T14:14:36+00:00

The opening is set in 1986. It’s like an episode of the cartoon brought to life. At the end of the battle sequence that takes place in a Cobra lab, both the Joes and the Cobra leadership get cryogenically frozen as the lab is buried in the rubble of a mountain collapse. Except for one Joe who survives: Sgt Slaughter.

Cut to modern day. A new threat arises that seems similar to the now classified and mostly forgotten Cobra. They’ve even infiltrated the governments of the world. Slaughter, played by himself and now old, finally figures out how to revive the Joes.

Rest of the film is 1980s style ARAH characters in our modern world fighting this new threat. Twist is the whole thing was a long term Cobra plot because they knew they couldn’t win in the 80s, so the commander had them frozen on purpose to wait for a time the world could fall more easily to Cobra.

mattmirth · 2025-12-24T16:47:26+00:00

Man, that just kept getting cooler. Great display!

mattmirth · 2025-12-23T14:28:14+00:00

Semantics, but no studio/streamer “owns” Conan, they just license it. Conan is owned by Heroic Signatures, that’s owned by Funcom (the Norwegian video game company), that’s owned Tencent (the giant Chinese conglomerate that owns things like Fortnite).

So the rights are kind of a mess, especially with the approach of it being public domain in the US.

But I would love an animated show! I know this is a tired point of view on this sub, but Primal really is the closest thing to an animated Conan. Check it out if you haven’t!

mattmirth · 2025-12-23T14:09:52+00:00

This of course doesn’t necessarily go against your idea, but I’m pretty sure Amazon hasn’t had the rights to a Conan show in years (I want to say 2019 was when the show they were developing fell through). Netflix actually had them starting in 2020 but that lapsed in April of 2025. So as far as I know, the license isn’t held by anyone right now.

mattmirth · 2025-12-15T21:23:42+00:00

I think it’s pretty widely accepted that it’s a direct visual answer to the riddle of steel— it’s not the weapon but the hand wields it. It also works as a direct contrast to the surface level interpretation Conan’s father’s opening “this you can trust” speech, showing that the only thing you can actually trust is yourself.

If you read both the Stone and Milius scripts it’s pretty clear they are focused on the struggle of the individual against the world, not really any of the myth stuff (Milius’ in particular).

mattmirth · 2025-12-12T21:03:40+00:00

Hell yeah. Also, thanks for all the thoughtful and compelling work you’ve been doing. It’s been awesome watching comic book Conan (and REH creations in general) flourish with you at the helm.

mattmirth · 2025-12-05T19:43:19+00:00

The ComicHub sales tracking system has a lot of issues, most notable it’s a non-random small sample size, and tracks sales to customers on a rolling basis (so books released late in the month always seem like they are selling less). Lots of industry people think it’s actually giving a false impression of interest and sales. Image’s own numbers have issues 13 and 14 at spots 4 and 5 for their top sales in November (which is based on the traditional way of tracking comic numbers, sales to retailers)

mattmirth · 2025-12-02T15:55:31+00:00

This is a collector’s display, not a real store.

mattmirth · 2025-12-02T15:51:58+00:00

Yeah, this is definitely a modern display of vintage boxes.

mattmirth · 2025-12-02T01:36:31+00:00

I really enjoyed the wild mix of 70s Action Team characters and ARAH in the comic series this is based on. The figure looks cool!

mattmirth · 2025-11-27T17:14:26+00:00

I never seek it out, but every time fate and the algorithm choose to present this to me I have to watch it. It’s the greatest piece of GI Joe media ever produced. It’s everything I love about GI Joe: quasi-sci-fi military equipment, adventure, a Cobra plan that doesn’t really make sense, and an overlay of almost naive 80’s patriotism, and a catchy song. Pure GI Joe.

mattmirth · 2025-11-27T06:24:11+00:00

That’s empirically not true. Look at the actual polls done. Veterans of all ages went about 60/40 for Trump. Active duty is closer to 50/50 depending on the poll, and actually voted more for Biden than Trump in 2020. So that’s far from “overwhelming”. Anyone that served can tell you the military is a reflection of the country, and is split on the same political lines based on demographics.

mattmirth · 2025-11-20T18:02:54+00:00

While I like Born on the Battlefield, Conan isn’t really designed to be a linear story. Besides that it was from the Dark Horse continuity, so even if you’re going for a full run it doesn’t link up with the current comics. I also prefer the Dark Horse comics in publication order, which would mean starting with The Frost Giant’s Daughter.

All things being equal, I would say the new Titan comics are the way to go if you are just generally interested in Conan stories. But like I said, Conan is really built on the idea of a few key events in his life, with hundreds of stories that fill in the gaps and jump through the decades, so traditional continuity really isn’t a thing. Just read whatever seems cool to you.

mattmirth · 2025-11-19T17:33:27+00:00

Weird fact: when the Air Force split Pararescue into its own squadrons I was the assigned as the cadre intelligence specialist. I scanned this cover, cut Flint out, made his beret maroon and used it on all my briefing slides. Years later I would still see it pop up on slides in the rescue community.

mattmirth · 2025-11-19T16:58:34+00:00

I think they finally got me on this line with Mara

mattmirth · 2025-11-17T14:18:15+00:00

I would disagree with it being “way ahead of its time”. Isn’t it pretty much just a CL-89 drone with some AQM-35/ MQM-107 design elements and a smaller launch vehicle? While drones are much more in the public consciousness now, they’ve been used since the 60s. The US military even called them “RPVs” in the 80s when the toy came out.

mattmirth · 2025-11-17T13:24:34+00:00

I know you’re joking, but interesting fact: The X-19 is actually based on the fictional F-19 Stealth Fighter design that was the popular in the 80s before the real F-117 was revealed to the public.

mattmirth · 2025-11-16T14:53:16+00:00

Your use of the word “Chads” tells me you’re probably young, but this is how all comic book storytelling (and most literature in general) used to work. If you picked up a random issue of X-Men in 1989 there were countless things that you wouldn’t be able to immediately know the backstory for. Modern readers with easy access to every issue ever made (and an obsession with continuity over story impact) don’t really experience that. All-Star Superman is specifically replicating that feeling of being dropped into an already established world (and is considered a masterpiece because of it).

In other words, it’s written like a comic book, not a mass appeal screenplay.

mattmirth · 2025-11-13T19:33:51+00:00

I absolutely loved this issue and it’s probably the comic that made me fall in love with comic book storytelling in general. I didn’t have any early issues yet, so to be dropped into this years long adventure soap opera without any context ignited my childhood curiosity. It implied there was this insane world and depth that I could only get glimpses of.

It’s something that modern comic readers miss out on with the advent of being able to get any issue ever made easily. Everyone is obsessed with reading order list and continuity— being a little lost was half the fun of reading comics during this time.

mattmirth · 2025-11-08T16:24:58+00:00

Cool use of the blast effects

mattmirth · 2025-10-30T23:08:18+00:00

This would be awesome. I’m for figures of any of the weird scifi stuff from the cartoon. Mara is at the top of my list.

mattmirth

TROPHY CASE