When I was in fifth grade my brother and I were obsessed with shockwave. One night while creeping around the house, we were kicking open doors and clearing out rooms. Well, I guess my parents didn't account for this because when I yelled "clear the way!" And kicked open their bedroom door I was met with "get the hell out! and my mom pulling a blanket over them both. Knowing is half the battle, but that night I knew too much.
kero wack , I got this for my birthday in 1989... unfortunately, mine was short his pistol... it just wasn't in the package. I still have this guy (with the others) .
Awesome review for a great character, I had Shockwave in 88 and I'm happy to have him now, the reason Beacheads features are clearer beneath his balaclava is cos the material isn't as thick as on Shockwaves 🎼🎶
shockwave was a total badass. loved this dude when i was a kid. to a certain extent...i could see the joes recruit from non service areas given their nature and type of missions. as a kid when i played with him...he was essentially a contracted mercenary....and boy did he break lots of doors when i played with him!
okay, i just got chills. Shockwave is in my top 10 Joes. tho there are some flaws, the overall design of this character covers them up. I bet this review was a hard one. so easy to find the greatness, nd hard to find the flaws. i didn't like the Mac-10 it was too fragile a design and no place to stick that 1911A. other than that no other faults. okay, I 'll watch the video now.
Shockwave was definitely one of my favorite joe figures, ranking up with tunnel rat, dusty, hit & run, stalker v1, flint, and spearhead* *i know he's very orange, but he is otherwise awesome... and his color scheme could work in certain deserts.
i always hang a little peace of robe around the knife clips on the backpack. Real commando style. It was one of my favorite Joe's. Always hanging add the robe of a doorknob. Protecting the base (my bed) from my brother base (his room). The doorway was the battle arena! GI Joe so many nostalgia. Also one of my favorite Joes.
Great video. I believe shockwave was one of the last Joes I got as a kid. After this year Gi Joe went crazy! I've still got him with all accessories intact. He's a Great Figure!
Awesome job on the video and review. Barbeue would have been another member to join from the streets. Shockwave's nemisis would have to be alley-viper hands down. Law&order, junkyard&mutt, Chuckles, and bullhorn would be great paring with shockwave. Even beachhead would be a compliment to shockwave in the Swat role. Glad to see no animals were harmed in the making of this video. Keep up the great work HCC788
Thank you! There were a few Joes with law enforcement or urban combat roles. I see them as the lead squad in an invasion of Springfield. When Cobra is going to defend their territory room by room, these guys can clear it.
Night Force Shockwave is pretty amazing. Of course, Shockwave v1 has pretty good night-ops colors. But in general, Night Force recoloring is pretty great.
I'm from Michigan and was in a choir when I was in 4th, and 5th grade...I've always liked this figure because of the urban style blue camo. No , I was never in a SWAT unit...but I did swat a few flies and mosquitoes in my day... But, I never sang about it....🎶🎤 "There's a Skeeter on my....knock it off....!"...🎶🎙️🎸
just subbed, have lately gotten back into gi-joe (last time was in 1986 i think) buying back my childhood figure-by-figure. please keep up making videos. saw that you were struggling recently. i have also struggled with anxiety and depression (i think we bear the burden of being intellectual children) keep up the good work and bear in mind that you have likeminded people out there who understand and accept who you are no matter what. greetings from norway:-) by the way, here its called "action force" ;-)
Thank you! I was out of G.I. Joe before the 90s, so I will be looking at some figures that are new to me, too. It will be a fun adventure to learn about what came after I was gone.
The term "choir practice" has two distinct meanings in police slang. It can mean the lineup at the beginning of the shift where the sergeant gives the daily briefing to patrol officers, and he sees to that their uniforms and equipment are in good order. The second is that of after-shift activities at a local watering hole, "If anyone asks, I'll be at choir practice," possibly stemming from the TV series McHale's Navy, where various nefarious activities were covered as meetings of the Glee Club. It is the second sense of this that led to a late 1970s movie, called The Choirboys, which was about various hijinks of off-duty police officers blowing off steam at the end of their shifts.
Things had gotten a little strange by 1988. Even in the really wacko years, in the 90s, there were a few gems. But they went from 'a little weird' in 1986 to 'we really want to be Power Rangers, but we're still calling ourselves G.I. Joe' by the 1990s.
If there is a Tier above TOP TIER that would be where Shockwave is placed for me. Possibly the top member of my Joe team for the entire run of the toyline and beyond! When this figure came out in 1988 it was the first of the series I had to have and the only one I bought twice (Due to breaking the stock on the first SMG) and I have bought later carded versions etc recently due to my love of this charachter. He had the look and feel of the urban SWAT teams during the 1980's deep in cities like my hometown of Los Angeles and is very loosely stylized to the LAPD SWAT BDU of the time. Its also a privilege for me to be the 41st "Like" to this review as in LAPD nomenclature 41 is the Metropolitan division that SWAT and K-9 are the key components of. I have always been on the fence over the Version 2 Night Force Shockwave and wished you had given it honorable mention here. Also the thing with the name that due to the continued use of the Transformer as Shockwave Hasbro changed our Joe to Shockblast on more recent remakes that I love as well as they were as close a homage to the 1988 version any of the remakes have been to an original figure. Great review of a favorite figure. Mine sits on the rear of the Desert Fox vehicle. The Choir member reference might be a reference tot he Joeseph Wambaugh book "The Choirboys" a story of the antics that go on with a very tight team of LAPD officers on their off hours yet they stay a highly effective team while on duty.
Thanks! There was a reference to Night Force Shockwave that didn't get included in the final edit of the video. I'm not sure why they went with Michigan rather than Los Angeles. This was pre-Rodney King, so LAPD wasn't quite a bad word yet. Maybe there's a Detroit reference that I'm not catching. Thanks for watching!
LAPD has never been a bad word! And as a point of fact LAPD was the originator of the SWAT concept in the late 1960's that has been the formula for SWAT worldwide to this day. However even in 1988 Detroit was the urban warzone that became the poster-child for a dysfunctional crime ridden US city. I mean come on that was right at the time of Robocop depecited as Detroit no less! Even though those movies were shot in Texas. So by virtue of the fact he would have been an eager enough Detroit PD officer to become the youngest on the SWAT team means he would have a devil-may-care attitude to take on the harshest environments and would be a logical substitute to military service to arrive on the Joe team. That is one thing that set Shockwave apart to me was that he was able to make it to the Joe team based on civilian service that actually mattered. Not just because he was a Football player or some other gimmick to get on the Joe team!
Loved this figure, hated the coloring! The Night Force version looked a lot better to me, but I don't remember owning it. Really liked the storage of the knife, and actually liked the tetris camo pattern that came with Shockwave, Storm Shadow, and Repeater! There were more, but they sick, so who cares? Just kidding! I just can't think of any besides Capt. Gridiron, and he wasn't the best character! Thanks for sharing your videos with us HCC!
cool T shirt. Shockwave is defo one of the coolest looking figures in the line and his card art is awesome. I do think Hit and Runs bag with knife holder beats Shockwaves backpack knife holder though
Haha..I wrote Law but I meant Shockwave. But I did have them both as a kid back in the US and they did work as a team. But only Shockwave made it over to Sweden. I always thought Law looked funny with that highly unfortunate face-sculpt! But the overall look of the figure is excellent in my opinion. I've been watching your reviews for about a year now and they are always funny, well executed and highly informative. Watched your review of Ice Cream Soldier again yesterday and laughed my ass off!! What were they thinking??;D
Shockwave looks good with the arms and legs of either a Dark viper or a cobra trooper. I used to have a ton of customs and I really like Shockwave but I'm not keen on the light blue bits.
This was my favorite character and figure to play with, I had all three versions of shockwave, the original, night force and DEF, I had many fun adventures with shockwave, I think I liked the night force more cause his all grey and black makes him look bad ass, he looks like he came from the delta force movie
Although some say the sun was setting on the GIJRAH line by 88, this year and 89 (and even much of 90) had some excellent toys. A lot of the figures from these years were loaded with cool accessories, and, although there were silly experiments like 'Battleforce 2000', there are lots of conventional/sensible (or passing for it) military character designs. l actually find that my list of favorite toys from the line favors these three years (slightly) over earlier ones. Go figure. I hope to see more reviews of the standout items from these years.
I'm always curious as to why and how kids faded out of playing with toys. I never anticipated it and suddenly felt a little embarrassed buying them, although later than most. I wonder if the lack of a continuing Sunbow cartoon had anything to do with it. The Dic series made it all look silly, even though it was a time there was some cool stuff coming out for GI Joe. I could easily ignore what I didn't like (Battle Force 2000, Cobra La, figures like Raptor) and just stick with doing what I liked: Soldiers, armored vehicles and aircraft with guns and missiles, and there was still plenty of that. It should be noted that in the late '80s, home video game systems made a comeback with the Nintendo Entertainment System, and pop/rock music was skewing younger in a way, so kids were more likely to buy music and video games. After 1986, I was usually the only kid I knew still collecting and playing with the stuff.
Thank you! I'm glad someone thought it was funny. :) We're starting out 2017 with some top-end toys. There are some stinkers coming up later in the year. Hopefully those will still be fun.
Used to be one of my favorite figures. Probably still have it someplace in my parents' attic. Just be careful with yours, HCC. Looks like his right elbow joint is developing a crack.
Loved this guy and his uniform. Hated that his secondary military specialty was choir. The only issue is that he’s redundant: the Joes all use special weapons and tactics. If he was to join the military, he could not benefit from his law enforcement training due to the Posse Comitatus Act.
What a fantastic review of a fantastic figure. Man I love this fig. Amazing weapons and I really like the blue colors. That intro was awesome!! This is one cool Shockwave. Still like the Transformers G1 more though :-p Take care and keep these awesome reviews comming
Thank you! The Transformers Shockwave had a mystique about him. He didn't have any knives or pistols, though. It's even money whether he could survive in my house.
Haha. He doesn't need guns my friend. One of his Arms is a gun and not to forget he transforms into a futuristic gun. But he probably still wouldn't survive in your house lol. Both Shockwaves are awesome. Just like your videos. Have a great week buddy. Roy
Interesting that he's from Dearborn, MI which has a population that's "ethnicity" is "Middle Eastern" in someway that's @50% (give or take, depending on which statistics you go by) and his last name is "Faria".
Kudos to you for an action figure review well done (except for the drama skits). Shockwave should have been an Urban Warfare Specialist (like Cobra Alley Vipers) instead of a civilian SWAT specialist. Joining the G.I.Joe team without formal military training should be acceptable in Shockwave's case because of his Special Weapons and Tactics training. Questions: did Barbecue's recruitment had military training before joining the Joe team? I'm not sure firefighting was a military job. Shockwave's recruitment makes perfect sense considering Cobra is usually presense in urban environments must of the time (at least on United States soil). He's like the Joe liaison to local law enforcements. He's one of my favorite figures when I collected them. As from some of the unpainted details, during that time peroid, toy manufacturers train of thought was: kids first, collectors second. Kids are not concerned with details as much as collectors are because its an action figure, not an static display. Keep up the great work you do on this channel!!! Hail Hooded Cobra Commander 788!!!!
