A few years ago when Hasbro announced that they were going to get into the brick business (presumably to get a share of that sweet Lego revenue), we all rejoiced that we might get some really cool small-scale Joe figures.  Instead, we got “Kre-O”, a blatant ripoff of cute little Lego minifigures and grossly under-scaled (even by Joe-standards) brick vehicles.  This type of figure just didn’t translate well for Joe, as they lacked the rugged personality of their 4″ predecessors, and they didn’t possess the adorable charm of their Transformers Kre-O counterparts.

Ultimately, the results were underwhelming at best for fans and retailers, and the Kre-O line died a swift death in the clearance isle.  Many fans held out hope that maybe Mega Bloks (who was doing amazing work on small soldiers with the Call of Duty license) would get a chance to take a shot at Joe.  And then Mattel bought Mega Bloks, killing any such dreams.  There would never be Mega Bloks Joes.  🙁

Never fear, that’s what custom toy projects are meant to do: fill in gaps in existing toylines or simply make something you wish existed that isn’t going to happen at mass market retail.  So the great Mega Joe project of 2016 began, initially as some simple LBCs (lazy-bastard customs, i.e. parts-swapping of existing figures).  But it quickly grew (scope creep!) into a massive endeavor to recreate all of my favorite Joes and Cobras in excrutiating detail, plus a few vehicles… because I am a glutton for punishment.  I’ll get to the others in future posts, but here is the Joe team, grouped roughly by release year of the ARAH counterparts.  Yo Joe!