TFW2005HisstankTokuNationToyark
HissTank › G.I. Joe Cartoons › Page 3

under G.I. Joe Cartoons

After quite a while, Hasbro has applied for a G. I. Joe related Trademark at the United States Patent And Trademark Office.

The requested trademark is a tagline so familiar among the ARAH Sunbow Cartoon crowd. At the end of each episode (on the PSA segment) we would always hear…

“Knowing Is Half The Battle”

Trademark details:

  • Trademark Name: KNOWING IS HALF THE BATTLE
  • Trademark ID: 87364420
  • Trademark Owner: Hasbro, Inc.
  • Filed Date: Mar. 14, 2017
  • Trademark Description: Toy action figures and accessories for use therewith; toy vehicles and accessories for use therewith

We currently do not know why Hasbro applied for the trademark. It could very well be to keep the rights with them or it can be for new animated series. Only time can tell.

under G.I. Joe Cartoons

Hasbro 2016 2nd Quarter Financial Conference Call was concluded few moments ago and there were several interesting management remarks. During the Q&A Session, a journalist raised a question regarding the future of the newly acquired Boulder Media Animation Studio.

Hasbro CEO Brian Goldner told the press which included us that Hasbro will be developing future animated series based on already established Hasbro Franchise Brands and future brands.

“We see an opportunity as we develop new brands and new stories within our franchise brands. It’s an opportunity to expand Boulder [Media Studio]’s capabilities and to continue our content capabilities as a company.”

At the moment, Hasbro will continue working with Animation Studios who are already partnered with the company.

Hasbro’s franchise brands are named as Transformers, My Little Pony, Littlest Pet Shop, Monopoly, Magic: The Gathering,  Nerf and Play-Doh.

On a sad note, Hasbro will no longer be making toys for the Jurassic Park Franchise:

“In a movie year Jurassic [Park franchise toys] does about a $100 million. We have half that to do when compared to 2015. We’ve made a decision that at the end of 2017 we will no longer handle Jurassic Park [franchise].We had a great relationship with Universal. But we will no longer handle Jurassic Park [franchise] because we cannot hold a mutually beneficial financial arrangement on that brand.” 

[Read more…]

under G.I. Joe Cartoons, G.I. Joe Movie

Following the acquisition of Backflip Studios which led to the creation of G. I. Joe: Strike, Hasbro has acquired another major company. This time it’s from the field of Animation.

Via a press release sent to us, Hasbro has stated that they now own Boulder Media Animation Studio who created several hit series including Danger Mouse and The Amazing World of Gumball.

“At Hasbro, we’re building our brands through storytelling, and today, we’re telling richer stories across more platforms than ever before,” said Brian Goldner, Hasbro’s Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer. “We are also reinventing traditional modalities of animation production, both creatively and financially. With Boulder, we will deliver the highest quality animation that will engage our audiences with deep storytelling and great characters in a very cost-efficient manner.”

What’s so special about the press release is the fact that after many years the word “G. I. Joe” is back on the “About Hasbro”section. This is the first time the name appeared prominently after the hype of G. I. Joe: Retaliation and G. I. Joe: Renegades.

We don’t know what this means for the future, but now that there is a new G. I. Joe Animated Series down the line, this could be it.

Check out the full press release, after the jump.

[Read more…]

under G.I. Joe Cartoons

AKA, the music of your Saturday morning cartoons is getting a release soon!

Allspark member DM has been in touch with the composer of the original Generation 1 Transformers score, Robert J Walsh, and brings some excellent news – Sony Records are finally releasing the score to a slew of Sunbow cartoons, including Transformers, G. I. Joe: A Real American Hero, Jem and the Holograms, and My Little Pony.

Fans have waited a long time to add the score of the original G. I. Joe to their collections, and after a decade of legal wranglings and speculation, it looks as though Summer 2016 is finally the date when we will get to own the score of the original show that started it all! There is talk of including DVDs with the albums with interviews of cast and crew and original artwork and some video footage. It’s also stated that the original master tapes were in great condition, and everything is being mastered for 5.1 stereo sound.

Check out the original report on the Allspark with Mr Walsh’s quotes here.

under Compatible Military Toys, G.I. Joe Cartoons, G.I. Joe Comics

BAIT Footwear had teamed up with Hasbro to bring New Balance 580 “Arashikage” Pack featuring Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow  shoes.

Press Release:

BAIT X HASBRO’s G.I. JOE X NEW BALANCE MT 580 ARASHIKAGE PACK – “STORM SHADOW” & “SNAKE EYES

BAIT is back again with Hasbro’s GI JOE and New Balance to incarnate Storm Shadow and Snake Eyes into the classic MT 580 model. The rivalry within the Arashikage clan is split between the all lush off-white suede upper on the Storm Shadows and the beautiful combinations of Black textures on the Snake Eyes. The MT 580 “Storm Shadow” features subtle heat-debossed tonal branding, while the midsole is hit with a vivid red gradation and speckles to depict blood spray. The leather lining is also splattered with blood as the all iced outsole reveals Storm Shadow’s signature camouflage.The “Snake Eyes” combine several different textures of black with ripstop nylon, wolverine suede, rich box leather, and reflective 3M. The Arashikage Red is implemented across the shoe with the stitchings, branding, and the classic RollBar of the MT 580. Both designs feature the iconic Arashikage symbol on the lace locks and heels.

To celebrate the 3 year anniversary of BAIT, this 3 way collaboration pack is a global exclusive to BAIT and releases on October 10th, 2015 in all 7 BAIT chapter stores and BAITme.com for $160 each. Very limited pairs will be released. Register HERE to enter the online raffle to purchase. https://baitinc.formstack.com/forms/bait_x_gijoe_x_new_balance_580_stormshadow_snakeeyes

Check out the images, after the jump.

under G.I. Joe Cartoons, G.I. Joe Movie, G.I. Joe Video Games

T. J. Fixman, who is most famous for writing the story for the award-winning video game Ratchet & Clank has been hired by Hasbro to be a Creative Consultant at Hasbro Studios.

Mr. Fixman’s job is to build stories (or we call them ‘World Building’) for Hasbro’s Portfolio Brands (title usually refers to Transformers, Nerf, G. I. Joe, Monopoly and My Little Pony) across all platforms, including film, television and digital.

We wish him all the very best for his tasks ahead.

under G.I. Joe Cartoons

Back in April, we reported that G.I.Joe A Real American Hero and G.I.Joe Renegades are coming to Vimeo. That wait ends now, as G.I.Joe ARAH is now available!

In case you don’t have the set on DVD, for $40.00 you can download the entire ARAH series, which you can both stream and permanently download all of the episodes for your personal collection. How can you beat that? Check it out below, then join us after the break for discussion already in progress!

under G.I. Joe Cartoons, G.I. Joe Renegades

Deadline has reported that Hasbro will be bringing its entire library of classic animated series to Vimeo. While the 1st series to come will be Jem & The Holograms and Transformers Generation 1, more series will follow later this year, such as GI Joe A Real American Hero & GI Joe Renegades! More information:

Individual episodes will sell for $2.99 and rent for 99 cents. Entire series can be purchased for $40. Eventually, hundreds of episodes from 13 franchises will be available this year on Vimeo. Other series include My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, G.I. Joe, Transformers: Rescue Bots, Transformers: Prime, Transformers: Robots in Disguise, G.I. Joe: Renegades, Kaijudo: Rise of the Duel Masters, Littlest Pet Shop, Pound Puppies, The Adventures of Chuck & Friends and B-Daman Crossfire.

under G.I. Joe Cartoons, G.I. Joe Resolute

Can you believe it? This week marks the 6th Anniversary of G.I.Joe Resolute!

 
G.I.Joe: Resolute was an animated series that offered viewers a much more mature take on the G.I.Joe franchise. The series originally debuted on the internet, as clips that aired on Adult Swim Video. With a Content rating of TV-14V, it was clear to see why this series was a hit with fans, as it gave us all the “big kid version” of G.I.Joe that many of us had been waiting for. I’d even go as far as to say G.I.Joe Resolute is the best G.I.Joe movie out there to date.

Resolute spawned a line of figures, from single carded offerings, to comic packs and multi packs. This included Modern Era “Resolute” style figures of Cobra Commander, Cobra Trooper and Duke (single carded). A five-figure “Resolute” box set was also released, with Cobra Commander, Cobra B.A.T., Cobra Officer, Cobra Trooper and Duke, repainted in colors from the cartoon series. Two “Comic book 2-packs” were released, one with Destro and Shockblast, the other with Storm Shadow and Tunnel Rat. Both comic packs included Resolute comic books, with new stories by Mr. Larry Hama. The following year, in 2010, a Joe and Cobra Multi pack were released, giving fans many characters that may have not seen the light of day otherwise.

Head on over to the HissTank.com Database to check out the entire line of G.I.Joe Resolute Figure Offerings.

under Around The Site, G.I. Joe Cartoons, G.I. Joe Movie, Joecon

G.I. Joe State of the Union JoeCon 2015 Edition

It has been sometime since I have felt a good positive vibe for G.I. Joe and it’s core group of fans. With all the ups and downs that we in the G.I. Joe fandom endure, it has been very hard for all of us to see the light at the end of the tunnel, and the respect for the brand that we all expect as collectors. After this weekend I really feel we are finally going to get the solid commitment to G.I. Joe that we have been waiting for.

To bring everybody up to speed on the current overlords of G.I. Joe, we will first need to start with Derryl DePriest: A long time G.I. Joe fan with a collection that would shock any G.I. Joe fan. He is a dedicated player, knows his G.I. Joe history, and has done a lot of work for the collecting community, tracking down lost tools (toy molds) that were at first thought to be extinct, along with constantly pushing for MORE surrounding the G.I.Joe Brand as a whole. He gets a lot of respect from me just on the effort he puts into his work, and I know he wants G.I. Joe to succeed.

Next up is G.I. Joe Brand Manager Mark Weber who is fresh off of the Transformers Generations line, coming from a brand that has proven itself time and time again to be a winner, Transformers. I had a very in depth conversation with Mark and I can tell you we are lucky to have him. Not only is he a life long collector of 3 3/4 he knows his G.I.Joe and reads up on his comics. It was nice to see a G.I. Joe brand manager who could keep up with me on IDW comics.

Now that we know who controls our fate over the G.I. Joe brand let’s breakdown all the information that I could gather, and put it all into what I think we are going to see in the future for the G.I. Joe brand. I was able to talk to both Mark and Derryl on a very real level. I didn’t hold back at all, the line of questioning was at times respectfully aggressive, and I feel because of that we received some real answers.

To understand what it looks like Hasbro is about to do with G.I. Joe you must first examine what has been going on with the Transformers Brand and how that has been working out for the collectors. First off, Transformers fans are reading IDW comics religiously, and enjoying the awesome benefits of doing so. Not only does IDW listen to what the fans want, they are also getting a ton of product including new characters made into new Transformers toys that directly tie into the comics books. IDW lives off of the feedback and keeps improving Transformers comics, keeps growing the fan base, and helping that brand become even stronger with fan driven product that also has kids appeal. It’s one of the BEST CASE SCENARIOS that we could hope for the G.I. Joe Brand.

The problem is the G.I. Joe toy collecting community is NOT reading G.I.Joe comics. I was shocked to see how many people at JoeCon 2015 have never read G.I. Joe Cobra, or are not reading G.I. Joe comics at all. This is a huge problem, especially now, knowing that Hasbro is shifting gears to bring kids back to the brand. The best chance we have of getting G.I. Joe content, new characters, toys connected to good content, that we as adult collectors will enjoy is IDW G.I. Joe comics. You can expect a renewed effort from HISSTANK.com to get people reading again! I really think this is the only way we will receive the level of story telling we expect from the G.I. Joe brand. All these awesome Marvel movies we are getting were at one time awesome comic books. If you want the G.I. Joe brand to be strong, it’s going to start with the G.I. Joe comics.

So this brings us to the Movie – Cartoon cycle that Hasbro uses to keep the fan base engaged. A new G.I. Joe movie is on it’s way and will most likely kick off the new cycle. Not much was said on that front, but they did hint to some of the rumors out there about G.I. Joe 3 may have some truth to them. It could be the rumor that D.J. Caruso will be the next director, or that awful idea of including Matt Trackker into a G.I. Joe film. Nothing was confirmed but the fact that G.I. Joe 3 is in the works.

The one thing that was clear at the Hasbro G.I. Joe booth is that kids engagement will now be the main focus for the G.I. Joe brand as it should be. What this means for most of the core base, 40ish year old toy collectors, is be ready for change, because it’s not going to be what we want on a G.I. Joe Resolute scale. I don’t think we will ever see that level of G.I. Joe again in cartoon form. The next cartoon series and direction is going to be kids focused and marketed to them, not us. This is some of the best news we could have expected to hear out of JoeCon 2015. If kids start to buy into G.I. Joe, all those closed doors will open up for the G.I. Joe brand. Hasbro is going to face huge obstacles on how that is done, and I wish them the best of luck on that front.

Where does the G.I. Joe Club fit into all of this? Well it looks like Hasbro has surrendered the rights to do the rest of ARAH to the Collectors Club. If your looking to continue to collect the figures that come from ARAH the Club is going to be the main outlet for those Characters and Vehicles. If Hasbro wanted to continue doing ARAH at retail they just had a huge opportunity to offer us a chunk of what was missing from your ARAH collection, but they have chosen to produce what was in the Hasbro G.I.Joe case at JoeCon 2015 over old school classics. To me this was the best option Hasbro had to still have ARAH figures available to the core G.I.Joe collecting base.

To round all of this up is not easy, Hasbro is going to make that effort to ignite the G.I. Joe brand again. G.I. Joe has the potential to gain back the respect it deserves. We all have a chance in the collecting community to be a part of that trip, but it all hinges on the ability for Hasbro to deliver a G.I. Joe Movie that keeps up with all of it’s competition: Star Wars, Marvel Movies, Transformers, DC – Batman and a host of other pop culture titans that will be releasing films over the next 10 years, right along side any potential G.I. Joe film.

We as fans are going to need to adjust and let the kids G.I. Joe programming be what it is. Most likely we are not going to like it, and that’s fine because it’s not going to be produced for us. Same goes for some of the toys that will show up for that kids direction. The pay off comes down the line when the G.I. Joe team gets a much larger budget to produce G.I. Joe items that are aimed directly at the core collector market. My best example would be the Transformers Masterpiece Series, Transformers Generations, Black Series 6″ Star Wars and Marvel Legends with Build-A-Figures. All have large collector base followings, with kids focused product sitting along side of what we look at as collector driven product.

Bottom line is G.I. Joe is far from finished at mass retail. ARAH will still be around via the G.I. Joe Collectors Club. And fresh new ideas are going to flow into the G.I. Joe Brand. How Hasbro gets to that middle ground that they have achieved with their other brands like Transformers is yet to be seen. Lets hope and pray it’s a smash hit and there is a new school generation of G.I. Joe collectors that crashes the G.I. Joe brand.

We hope everybody enjoyed HISSTANK.com’s coverage of JoeCon 2015. We worked very hard to bring you up to the minute information from the showroom floor and panel rooms, for all of you that could not make it out to the show. We hope all of you take the time to sound off on the HISSTANK.com forums and let us know how you feel about our JoeCon 2015 State of the Union write up. See you after the jump!