Well, whaddya know? It’s another GI Joe review! For those of you who don’t like adolescent karate reptiles (you absolute monsters), this should help satisfy your army doll cravings.

Today I’m looking at a figure that came from the large carded lot I bought at an estate sale a while back. I’ve only dipped into it a little bit so far, but this yellow-vested weirdo has been calling to me like a plastic Siren of ancient myth.

So let’s crash into the rocks and look at GI Joe’s Beach-Head from 1994!

The Trial of 1994 GI Joe Beach-Head

I never owned the Battle Corps Beach-Head figure as a kid– either the 1993 original or its 1994 repaint, which we’re looking at today. My friend across the street had the 1993 version, though, and the figure positively baffled me in every way imaginable.

I knew who Beach-Head was in 1993. I was in third grade when this figure came out. I was far too young to catch the original 1986 Beach-Head toy on the shelves, but I knew the character from his media appearances.

By 1993, I’d already rented 1987’s GI Joe: The Movie on VHS many, many times. Beach-Head was a standout character in the film. He was a grumpy, mean, gruff, no-nonsense drill instructor who put our New Recruit Heroes through their paces. I loved his accent and his hostile demeanor. Even more than that, though, I just thought he looked very cool.

The green ski mask (which army nerds call a balaclava) covered his entire face and made him instantly more mysterious and interesting to me. Now this was a regular military guy I could get behind! I didn’t even blame him for constantly getting mad at my boy Lt. Falcon (Miami Vice Era), as I could easily see his perspective on that gold-plated goof-off.

I was very excited when my friend across the street called me (RIP landlines) and told me he got a Beach-Head figure. We both loved the character and we were excited to add him to our GI Joe adventures. I immediately ran across the street to see this new Beach-Head.

And boy oh boy, dear reader, was I ever confused.

First I was greeted with the card art. It shows Beach-Head screaming under his mask. You can see his whole entire cavernous mouth. It does not make any sense at all. He is more ski mask than man, dark and twisted. Like some sort of eldritch sock puppet come to life.

My childhood brain could not figure it out. Did this dude just have a green face? Was he wearing sheer green pantyhose over his mouth? Did a wizard curse him, turning his body into knitted cloth and dog toy stuffing? I had no idea at all. When I looked at the figure itself, I could see there was some cloth texture sculpted onto his mask, but I could also perfectly see the outline of his entire lower face through it. That didn’t seem right.

And it just didn’t seem like the cool, featureless ski mask-clad hero I knew from the animated movie. I didn’t mind the colors of the overall design, but his face itself was just very confusing to me.

On top of that, he came with the weirdest GI Joe gun I had ever seen. We’ll talk about it more later in the review, but it made no sense to me at all. My friend, however, absolutely loved his new Balaclava Golem figure and its weird gun.

We used it all the time, despite my reservations.

Years later, during the advent of home internet and YoJoe.com, I gained a new appreciation for the figure. It was easy to see that he was just wearing a helmet over his balaclava. And when I saw the original 1986 Beach-Head, finally, I realized we had it pretty good back in 1993.

Remember how I said I loved Beach-Head’s look in the cartoon? Well, in my mind, that figure has none of its animated appearance’s charm. He has a huge balloon head and you can clearly see all of his facial features beneath his mask. It just did not fit my image of the character at all. He was similar to Snake Eyes v2 in that way– awesome in the cartoon, comic, and card art but disappointing in plastic form.

Now, I appreciate both the original and the 93/94 version of Beach-Head. They’re both good in their own way, even if they’re not exactly what I want.

Not everyone felt this way about the 1993 and 1994 GI Joe Beach-Head figures as I did, of course, just as a lot of older fans always loved the 1986 figure.

In the spirit of fairness, I asked my Mutagen Men Toycast co-hosts about their childhood experiences with Battle Corps Beach-Head. Both Eric of Toys and Tomfoolery and Luke aka Video Dracula both really enjoyed this figure as kids, and I’ll let them explain why.

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Photo by Eric

Eric: This was the only Beach Head I knew, back in the day. My friend had him, and while I usually played Cobra, we would team up sometimes so we could both be heroes on the Joe side. The Beach Head with the black vest was the one my friend had, and that one was a frequent main character and total badass. I mean LOOK at him! Look at that face! He was the only guy who could match up to Snake Eyes in badassery, and his big torso made him seem like a real bruiser, so he often took the fistfights. For this reason, that Beach Head stood out in my mind as a major character to get after I did my initial hunt for Star Brigade figures. Beach Head was THE MAN.

Photo by Eric

Luke: Beach-Head is a mystery to me in many ways. For example, I had this toy (the V2 version with the dark vest), and made him one of my main Joes, but I couldn’t tell you why. His file card basically says that he’s a jerk who smells bad. He looks like he’s wearing goggles over green pantyhose. And heck, the name was even confusing to me. What the flip is a “Beach-Head,” anyway? There was no Google in 1993 to ask, although I’m willing to bet my war history-obsessed dad was able to explain it to me. I think it comes down to the accessories. The big yellow rifle with the bayonet and the twin pistol thingie were bright and cool and weird enough that it felt like Beach-Head could handle some serious Cobra punishment. Like many Battle Corps figures this guy got kicked to crowd filler duty once I found the older version of him but it remains true that he stood tall in my early 90s Joe team for a while.

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Now, with my childhood bias out of the way, let’s move on to the actual review.

1994 GI Joe Beach-Head Review

The second version of Battle Corps Beach-Head was released in 1994 in the main GI Joe toy line. The figure was largely the same as the 1993 version, but was updated with yellow paint on its tactical vest instead of the 1993 version’s black paint.

There are two versions of the card, and I believe the one I have is the earlier version with the full-size file card. This one came from King’s Department Store, which was one of my favorite local toy destinations as a kid. I am keeping this card forever.

I still really like this packaging. The blue lasers and border really make it pop. I still think the card art itself is hilarious, even if the illustration itself is well done. No idea what the artist was going for with the face on this one.

The file card itself doesn’t really mention much of the character’s personality, unlike the 1986 file card. Beach-Head was originally described as a guy who “doesn’t get mad.” Maybe enough kids had seen the Movie and Sunbow cartoon at this point that Hasbro knew you could not reconcile the animated character with how his file card described him, so that was omitted. Who knows?

Beach-Head also came with a pretty fun little mail away pamphlet. With enough proofs of purchase and a check from your parents, you could send away for either a Hall of Fame or ARAH version of GI Joe himself, Joe Colton.

My friend had the ARAH version when we were kids and we both liked it. I own that figure now and am still quite fond of it. The photography in the pamphlet (note the not-at-all-ominous-or-jingoistic “Military Power” book) makes the HoF version look quite nice, too, and I’d like to own it some day.

These price and proof of purchase requirements probably seemed pretty steep in 1994, I imagine.

And just in case you don’t understand how spring-loaded launchers or figure stands work, Hasbro included some instructions on the card back, too.

Anyway, here’s the figure!

1994 GI Joe Beach-Head’s upper body was made from all new parts in 1993, and this is a repainted version of it. His legs come from 1988 Shockwave. There’s an interesting construction difference here, but we’ll get to that in a little while. Please bear with me.

The sculpt on Battle Corps Beach-Head is actually very good. I don’t love that you can fully see his lips through his mask, but that was pretty common in the vintage GI Joe line. He’s wearing a black helmet with goggles over the mask, which adds a new element to the character while still tying it back to the original version.

I actually like the look of the yellow vest, even if the paint is just a bit sloppier than what you normally see with 90s GI Joe figures. Yellow is a great color for action figures, and it really pops against the rest of the figure’s more muted tones.

The rest of Beach-Head’s colors are pretty good, too, even if their layout is a little weird. His mask, bottom vest layer, and pants are a nice kind of aqua/teal color, while his shirt collar and sleeves are a blue that matches everything else pretty well.

The boots, helmet, holsters, belt, and gloves are painted black, which gives the figure plenty of added visual interest. Say what you want about this toy, but it does not look bland.

He has a pistol holstered on each leg, which seems fitting for a ranger like Beach-Head. He also has a boot knife and a weird pouch on the inside of his left lower leg, where he presumably keeps his venison jerky and Pokemon cards.

On the front of the figure, the yellow works pretty well for the grenades and other details. It washed them out a bit, but you can still tell what’s there. The back is similarly detailed, but you can see a bit more of the paint slop here.

Now onto the Shockwave legs themselves. With a decade-defining Bold Move, Hasbro decided to switch Shockwave’s lower legs around for Beach-Head. Left is now right and right is now left. I have no idea why this happened. You can switch them back yourself, if you like.

This figure (and its 1993 counterpart) has just a bit of trouble standing up perfectly straight, which might be because of the leg switch. It also has just a tiny bit of an “o-ring pull,” which makes some poses a little difficult. The 93 version also seems to have that problem. I was honestly surprised to see this, as that’s something you usually encounter with Repaint Era and factory custom GI Joe figures– not with ARAH originals.

In any case, it’s not much of a problem, but it is worth mentioning.

Now, let’s look at a couple more comparisons.

Here he is with the 1993 version of the figure. As you can see, only the color of the vest was changed.

Here he is with the 1986 Beach-Head. You can see where some of the design inspirations came from for the 90s figure. Other than the weird switcharoo, I think the Shockwave legs were a pretty good choice to represent Beach-Head’s traditionally baggy-and-saggy ranger trousers.

L-R: 1986 Beach-Head, 1993 Beach-Head, 1994, Beach-Head, Russian Funskool Beach-Head, 2004 Night Force Beach-Head

Here are all of my ARAH-style Beach-Head figures. If you take a look at the 86 original and the 93 version, you can see that the colors are actually kind of close. I think the Battle Corps version is a pretty worthy update when you put it into perspective like this. It’s a fairly natural evolution.

Onto accessories!

(RIP my trusty Tamashii Stage, which broke at the clip portion right after this photo was taken. You have served me bravely for many years and I will miss you dearly.)

All of Beach-Head’s accessories, minus the missile launcher, came attached to a plastic weapons tree. He includes a modified version of 1988 Spearhead’s rifle, 1988 Shockwave’s pistol, 1989 Recoil’s gun, two missiles, a knife that was new for 93 and 94, and a figure stand, all cast in yellow plastic.

He also includes a black missile launcher with a yellow trigger.

This particular weapons tree was unique only to both versions of Battle Corps Beach-Head. This exact weapons loadout was never featured with any other figure. The same is true for the missile launcher.

Let’s begin with the Spearhead rifle. Beach-Head’s version of the weapon omits the rifle’s sling/strap, which gives it an entirely different look. Unlike many Joe fans, I actually really like this weapon and see it as this figure’s default weapon. The bayonet and suppressor give it a very mean look, and the dual magazines give it an air of mystery. I like to assume each magazine carries a different kind of ammo– maybe one is regular and ne is incendiary. Use your imagination!

Next up, we have the pistol. This has always been an awful accessory, even when it was included with 1988 Shockwave. The vintage GI Joe line did not include many handguns, and this one (in black) was one of the only ones I had as a kid, but I hated it. The grip is just too thick for a figure to hold convincingly– it’s always pointed at an awkward angle, no matter what you do.

Next we have a knife! Beach-Head needs a knife, so this accessory is just fine with me. The sculpt on this one is decent. It’s nothing special, but it gets the job done.

Next up, we have this thing, which Recoil’s original packaging just listed as a “pistol.” It is a bizarre, baffling contraption. Even with GI Joe’s sci-fi and fantasy trappings, I have no idea what this thing is or how it works. It looks like a pistol with a brace that extends both into an impractical stock and an underslung shotgun. That’s my best guess. I don’t love this weapon, but I can’t say it’s not thought-provoking or visually interesting. So extra points for being weird, I guess.

Now we come to the launcher. I like that Beach-Head gets a unique spring loaded missile launcher, and this one does look really cool. But, because of the handle shape and size, the figure really can’t rest the weapon on his shoulder. In fact, right out of the package, the figure’s hands were too tight to hold the launcher at all. I had to stretch out his hands with that awful Shockwave pistol.

The weapon shoots nicely– clear across the room, which makes me happy. There is one more feature I like on the launcher. There are three little “vents” on each side of the weapon. When the launcher is loaded, they are yellow. When the launcher is empty, you can see through them. It’s not a big deal, but I think it makes the weapon more fun than it would be otherwise.

Despite my misgivings with the launcher, you can work it into a few convincing poses with a little patience and faked perspective. If the handle was a little bit better, I’d say this was one of the better Battle Corps missile launchers.

While the accessories are somewhat questionable (and most Joe fans probably hate the yellow, which I actually like), you can still get some fun accessory combinations and poses out of the figure.

Despite its flaws (imperfect paint, lower leg issues, o-ring pull) and strange accessories, I think this figure has a lot to offer. It can work as an updated Beach-Head for sure, but I don’t see it that way. I already have a few other options for Beach-Head, after all, and the Battle Corps figure gets my mind running in a different direction.

I think it was Mike T. of Forgotten Figures who suggested using this figure as a maritime or naval commando. In that regard, the colors on this toy work very well. Plus, it’s nice to have some Navy troops who aren’t just Shipwreck, Topside, or people wearing diving gear.

This figure would look excellent in the Shark 9000 (a vehicle I has as a kid and long to re-purchase someday). I find he also looks great alongside other GI Joe sailors and divers. He’s a natural fit in a Devil Fish or on the WHALE, too. The 93 version is great for this purpose, but I find the yellow vest on this 1994 figure makes it work even better.

I don’t see this figure as an army builder, really, but as a Navy commando entirely separate from the Beach-Head we know and love. He boards enemy ships, raids their maritime outposts, and helps defend vessels like the Flagg from enemy attacks. He rescues hostages on oil rigs and sabotages Cobra Moray hydrofoils.

He’s not quite a SEAL and is definitely not a diver, but he can fulfill most of the functions that Beach-Head or Stalker might– just in a more water-based environment.

I do think this is a credible version of Beach-Head himself, though. The colors, especially on the 1993 version, are realistic enough to work in that way. The yellow just adds a bit of fun 90s flair.

He looks good alongside other 90s updates to classic characters like Bazooka, Dial-Tone, Stalker, Roadblock, Gung-Ho, Leatherneck, and Wet-Suit. He’s a very 90s figure in design, but I also feel like he’s an essential part of the Battle Corps roster.

To me, there’s never been a Very Good representation of Beach-Head (the character as I see him) in the ARAH line. But both this mold and the 86 mold are fun figures in their own way, even if they don’t suit all of my needs. I see the 86 version as the Beach-Head character, but I think this figure is just as good as that one, as far as being a fun toy and/or cool action figure goes.

This is a very fun 90s Joe. If you don’t have it in your collection, it deserves another look.

Overall: 1994 GI Joe Beach-Head isn’t perfect, but it is a great ARAH-style action figure. The colors are a bit odd, but they work well together. The weapons tree and missile launcher are unique to the figure, even if they’re not anything spectacular. The sculpt is also very good. The toy works as an update to the classic Beach-Head character or can fill a variety of other roles. Despite some weird (but minor) construction issues and imperfect paint, 1994 Beach-Head and his 93 counterpart are Recommended.

Additional Resources:

• 1994 Beach-Head at 3DJoes
• 1994 Beach-Head at Forgotten Figures
• 1994 Beach-Head at Joe A Day
• 1994 Beach-Head at YoJoe

Closing Thoughts on 1994 GI Joe Beach-Head

Thanks for joining me! Next week is a busy one for me, but I hope to have something small ready for Tuesday. It should be at least partially GI Joe related.

I had a very fun time posing this figure for photographs. The yellow vest really makes it pop and I am still full of ideas for figure and vehicle pairings for this ski masked Battle Corpsman. I just didn’t have time to take all the photos I wanted to.

As a quick side note, I realized this figure reminds me of later versions of Cybor Trooper from Lanard’s The Corps! Although poor CT doesn’t have the cloth texture on his face. So he does have a green face, even though Lanard wants you to imagine it’s a ski mask.

Anyway, what do you think of this figure? What’s your favorite version of Beach-Head? Let me know in the comments!