The Transformers Viper is a cool little toy. While not a straight up G.I. Joe vehicle, the colors and insignia are a great homage to the Cobra Rattler. Its a small figure, measuring about 3 1/4" tall at the top of his robot head. The transformation is relatively simple but there are a few weak spots make the vehicle mode a bit "fiddly". First the legs/tail section doesn't snap together very well causing the legs to come apart easily. Also the hips don't lock either so the tail isn't very sturdy in vehicle mode. And finally the wings don't peg into place so they can easily be mis-aligned when playing with it. However its not all bad. The arms peg into the bottom of the wings, the nose/cockpit/head sits in place really well and the overall silhouette is very nice.
The robot mode is where this figure really shines. First he's got Wild Weasel's helmet for a face and is a very nice touch. Viper has lots of great articulation for such a small robot. Ball-hinge shoulders, hips and knees, swivel neck, hinge elbows and ankles. There is no waist nor wrists but the other articulation makes up for these omissions. You can get lots of great poses and expression from him and the joints are tight and hold well. Viper is really well balanced too. I didn't have any trouble with him standing on his own in most poses.
Viper is mainly colored primarily in a nice dark blue that I think you'll find matches the classic Cobra Rattler really well. I don't have mine easily accessible at the moment so I can't compare but it looks really close. His other main color is a nice gray for his arms an upper legs with red and silver accents breaking up the darker main body colors.
He doesn't come with any accessories beyond the instruction sheet and a collector card. His hands look to be what I think is the standard Transformer 5mm peg hole so if you have other Transformers I'd imagine he could use their weapons. A pistol of his own would be nice but I don't know where it would store in his vehicle mode (a feature of many Transformers from what I can gather).
Overall, for the $11 I paid for him he's a lot of fun, more in his robot mode than vehicle mode but still very cool. He looks good and the crossover Decepticon/Cobra symbols and other markings make him a great addition to my Joe collection.





