I already posted these on-site at Joeintel.com, but wanted to bring it up here because I think you guys would like to see the crazy customs that they came up with in Japan way back then.











I love the accordion man. My grandfather passed away earlier this year. He was always a big proponent of the accordion even though I never saw him play. He used to say "you take your fun with you." lol

How that custom was inspired I have no clue.

I really wish I could ID all these parts.

Great. Now I need a Joe scale accordion.

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That's awesome! I love old catalogs...makes me feel like I'm a kid again.

Gotta laugh when I think of the accordion as an accessory. Can you see that on the packaging? "Duke...with backpack and ACCORDION!"

Thanks for uploading!

I need one of each of those last 7. They're 100% pure awesome.

Some of these look like the ancestors to Nemesis Enforcer, IG Destro and Montezuma's Skeleton.

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I bet a custom accordion could be made out of a bendy straw, one of those hard plastic kinds you get with sports bottles.

I'll probably end up making myself the Dreadnok. I managed to set my photobucket to allow a larger pic:

http://i117.photobucket.com/albums/o58/notpicard/1987takara_customsLG.jpg

Can we get a parts ID? I assume they use only the parts from figures that Takara was making.

Cobra-La dude:
head:?
chest: ?Zartan?Major Bludd?Tripwire?
arms: ?
waist: ?Breaker?
legs: ?Breaker?

Mail man?
all Roadblock?

Destro:
all Destro v1

Firefly:
all Firefly v1

Rob Halford + Gene Simmons
head:?Breaker?
chest: Torch
arms: Torch
waist: ?
legs: ?Zartan (upper), Ripper (lower)?

Skeleton
head:?
chest: ?
arms: ?
waist: ?
legs: ?
Torpedo sanded down seems likely.

Accordion dude:
head:?Buzzer
chest: ?
arms: ?
waist: ?
legs: ?Duke

Cobra-La dude? Looks more like someone tried to turn a G.I.Joe into RODAN to me.

I once had this idea, in one of my less sane moments, of assembling a band, that would be the single most annoying band on the face of the planet. The instruments used would include a banjo, a ukelele, a recorder, an accordian, and a set of bagpipes. The band's name would be PLEASE GOD MAKE IT STOP! The band's greatest achievement would not be a Grammy, but if it could get classified by the Geneva Convention as a form of cruel and inhuman torture.

Fortunately for humanity, I never did anything with this idea.

For some reason, Japan never really embraced G.I.Joe. It didn't have a very long run there. I'm not sure even all the figures shown in these pictures came out. One thing is it's a shame these pictures don't show the package design, which was extremely cool! I had a couple of carded Japanese Joes for a while.

GI Joe probably never caught on in Japan because unlike in the US, there wasn't anything revolutionary or new about GI Joe. You've got to remember, it was Japan that created the O-ring equipped fully poseable 1/18 action figure. Microman debuted in the 70s, a good ten years before GI Joe. However, one thing that's interesting to note here is that they seem to be promoting a similar concept of customization with the Joes that they did with Microman in its later years. You want to see some absolutely badass cool customs, you should track down their old Microman flyers promoting the line's custom potential.

All the customs, though, appear to be made entirely from a single figure.

So, ID the visible parts and you've got the figure ID'd.

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Actually, looking at the bigger picture, the head on Accordion looks like a Baroness v1 with the glasses filled in and hair removed.

For the last picture, figures 5 and 6 look like Johnny Lawrence and a friend of his from the Cobra Kai dojo who chase Daniel-san when he is disguised as a shower, from The Karate Kid.

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Can anyone say what the context of those shots is? Why were they included in the catalog?

- R

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I think they're Takara's examples of the things you cab make with Joe parts. I bought a ton of Mega Man figure kits from Japan and a bunch of them included pamphlets with pictures of customs made from the figures. I'd imaging this is the same deal. Pretty cool really. Wonder whatever happened to those figures?

I don't think that's totaly right.

Cobra La looks to be all Rock N Roll
The Mailman is all Roadblock,
Destro is Destro
Firefly has muddy boots.

"Rob Halford of KISS" clearly has Torch's arms...but what looks to be Major Bludd or Cobra Commander's Legs.

I think the Skeleton is a full Torpedo figure

Accordian guy seems to be made of the baroness...not sure on the arms as they look to be flesh-tone.

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