“UNWRAPPING NOSTALGIA: RELIVING THE BEST G.I. JOE CHRISTMAS HAULS MY TOP 4 WEEK #4!
Welcome to the Outpost. Merry Christmas, I hope everyone is blessed today and every day. This month I’ve been taking a look at my best Christmas GI Joe hauls from 1982 – 1994 ranking my personal Christmas hauls from not the best to the greatest ever. So I went over my 9 less favorable years for Joe hauls the last 3 weeks. Every year has a special place and I would have loved to be a 10 year old on any of these years receiving some Joes. I hope I was able to spark some memories of a much easier time. Remember these are only based on my personal hauls for each year, it doesn’t have anything to do with figures or vehicles produced these years. 1988 was a grand year for me.
My mother was a saint and was able to snag 8 vehicles and 12 figures for me and my brothers. Most of which although a little beat up, are still in my collection. The Warthog, Skystorm, and Phantom x-19 are 3 of my favorites along with Iron Grenadier, Voltar, and the First Storm Shadow I ever had as a kid. The Tiger Fly was one of my favorites from this year and got a ton of play time. Although I don’t have a lot of Tiger Force vehicles today I do love this line and would have loved every single one as a kid. 1987 was another stellar year for me, my mother god bless her, and my grandparents for helping her out, rip
. This was a year we got 15 vehicles and 20 figures. My biggest haul because, by the time the 4 of us got done opening presents we didn’t know who’s was who’s so we just put them all together and shared. Cobra Commander, Falcon, and Jinx were my 3 favorite figures and along with Wolf, Mamba, and Maggot, we got 2 Mobil Command Centers. For the life of me I don’t know what happened to them, but I was able to find one floor and a bunch of parts but all the other levels disappeared. This was an awesome vehicle though. 1986 was a special year for me. I had been waiting a long time for some Joes and this year did not disappoint. 10 vehicles and 13 figures.
It was so exciting to get some of my favorite characters from the cartoon like, Low-Light, Mainframe, and Zarana but my favorite from this year is Dr Mindbender with General Hawk a close second. I also had that Serpentor dude lol, guess he is third in line. I never did get my Night Raven, but the Conquest, Havoc, and Tomahawk put that at ease for the moment. Overall these were all great years, but nothing compared to 1982. It’s amazing how a thought can bring you back 41 years and make it feel like yesterday. I had grown up sending 12 inch Joes on missions. I think I used the jeep to steady myself when I was learning how to walk. Many hours were consumed gearing them up and dreaming up special dangerous missions for them. My most magical year for GI Joe was 1982.
If I had only had the foresight to save the boxes. Figures like , Rock ‘n Roll, Short-Fuze, Breaker and Flash were among the few we got along with the Vamp, MMS, Jump, Hal, and Flak. I remember it so well the pure excitement. The cries of joy among me and my brothers. They were just so cool and at the time we didn’t know we were getting a toy that would become the most iconic toy line of our time, we didn’t know that people would be collecting them 40+ years later, we didn’t know they would be worth a lot of money some day. We just knew we had something awesome and we were living in that moment. What is your favorite from these 4 years? I hope you all enjoyed my list and I hope everyone had at least 1 great year and 1 favorite Joe Christmas Haul. Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.
