Had my total "geek out" moment yesterday.
I grew up with G.I. Joe. Great toy line, loved it to pieces (literally, with some of the figures). Hasbro is going great guns with a whole new line of G.I. Joe toys. It's been a huge success for about 5 years now. Things is, though, it's so darn difficult to find, at least in Canada. Either it's really popular, or it's not being distributed that widely in Canada.
So I show up in Cold Lake, home to CFB Cold Lake, the largest air force base in the country. On the base is the department store called Canex, run by the army for the soldiers. I've browsed through it many times, and found it to be one of the best places I've found for G.I. Joe toys. We're talking the newest of the new; the stuff they show off in ToyFare that I thought I'd never find.
I was browsing through Canex the other day, and I found the Holy Grail of the new G.I. Joe toys.
G.I. Joe: Ninja Battles
This massive boxed set contains 5 G.I. Joe ninjas: fan favourites Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow, Snake Eyes' new apprentice Tiger Claw, Storm Shadow's new apprentice Shadow Strike, and the evil Black Dragon.
Besides these five figures, you also get a kick-ass display base to show off all five figures (complete with a freaky-cool torii), a DVD with all these characters in action, a comic book reviewing the origins of Snake Eyes, Storm Shadow, and the history of the Arishikage ninja clan, and a buttload of weapons for them all!!
Oh.
My.
Goid.
I want it. I want it so bad.
But it's $30. That's an awful lot, considering I went completely ape-snit last month on quite a few action figures. Plus, I'd probably want to tear it open so I could watch that DVD.
After I wiped the drool from my mouth, explained to the clerks that I was quite all right, and left the store, I immediatly started wondering if I should go back for it.
It's just so freakin' sweet.
But so darn expensive.
If you haven't read today's FoxTrot, please do so. It's hilarious. It's a wonderful tie-in adding to all the Episode III hype.
You know, for as long as I can remember, FoxTrot has been doing tie-ins to all the big "geek" movies, thanks to main character Jason Fox being a geek. The earliest one I can remember had to be all the way back in 1989. It was around that time that I discovered that newspapers had comics every day, and thus I began reading the newspaper every morning. Around that time, FoxTrot was a fairly new addition to the Edmonton Journal's comics line-up.
Now, as I mentioned, this was the summer of 1989...the summer long remembered by pop culture historians as "the summer of the bat." Yup, the first Batman movie came out, and you just couldn't escape from it. As Kevin Smith commented, "People were shaving that bat-logo into their heads."
And thus began what had to be FoxTrot's first movie tie-in storyline. Jason Fox was all hyped to see Batman, and, in what has now become a common character trait for him, made himself a Batman costume and was ready to see the film in full costume. Now, Jason's brother Peter got saddled with the job of taking Jason to see Batman. Naturally, Peter was very embarassed at his brother's behaviour. They get to the theatre, the watch the movie, and Jason convinces Peter that they should hide under the seats so they can see it again. Because there's no reasoing with Jason, Peter sighs and plays along. 8 hours and 4 viewings of the movie later, Jason and Peter come home. Peter comes bounding in in a full Batman costume. Seeing the movie so many times had made him a bigger Batman geek than Jason.
Other FoxTrot movie tie-ins I remember vividly:
Jurassic Park (1993) - Jason and his friend Marcus are in the front row of the theatre, wearing very elaborate paper machie dinosaur masks. Marcus: "Do you think that maybe our expectations are too high?" Jason: "I don't follow."
Star Wars Episode I (1999) - Peter's summer job was working at the movie theatre. Peter: "Mom, I would like it...but this is the summer that the new Star Wars movie comes out!" Jason: "Ahh, yes. We'll be watching your career with great interest."
Peter at his job. Presents a trayful of snacks to a nerd dressed as a Jedi and says, "That'll be $8.75." The nerd does the "Jedi mind trick hand gesture" and says, "I believe $1 will do." The rest of the strip is a word-for-word recreation of the Qui-Gon Jinn/Watto scene.
The Matrix (1999) - Jason and Marcus are suspended in mid-air, recreating the Neo/Agent Smith final battle. Marcus: "The fishing line is REALLY starting to dig in." Jason: "Maybe this wasn't such a good idea."
Harry Potter vs. Lord of the Rings (2001) - In a week-long storyline building up to the release of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.... Jason's nemesis Eileen shows up to school in a full Hogwarts school uniform, saying that she's getting hyped for the release of Harry Potter. Jason spends the whole week teasing Eileen, going on and on about how Harry Potter sucks and that Lord of the Rings is going to be the better films and so on and suchforth. The final strip came out the day after Harry Potter. Jason's mother is on the phone: "Oh, hello Eileen. No, he went to see a movie. Which movie? Why, only his new favourite. He's seen it six times since it came out yesterday." Final panel. Mom: "And then your friend Eileen wouldn't stop laughing." Jason, in a full Hogwarts uniform: "WHAT DID YOU TELL HER??"
Lord the Rings: The Return of the King (2003) - Jason's big sister Paige hustles Jason and Marcus out the door, telling Mom that she's taking Jason and Marcus to see Return of the King. Mom comments that it's the third time this week that Paige has taken Jason and Marcus, and Paige says she doesn't mind. In a theatre full of teenage girls, looking at the screen and swooning, Jason, looking very angry, turns to Marcus: "Orlando Bloom has ruined everything."
I swear, they've got to do a book of all the FoxTrot movie tie-ins.
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