ToyFare 003 (November 1997) 1.0.0

There was a brief time period in the late 90s where I got back into buying toys (as opposed to when I was a kid).  I remember being excited by the G.I.JOEs featured in this issue.  The  JOE toyline had gone down the crapper and disappeared a few years earlier (one of their final waves of figures was a true jump-the-shark crossover with Street Fighter), but it was the older figures from the 80s I collected as a kid that interested me.  And this new line of Toys R Us exclusives were all repaints of the old 80s characters and vehicles using the original molds.  Pretty cool, I thought, and I bought them all.  Unfortunately, the production quality wasn't quite up to snuff and they didn't look as good as the prototypes.  The Cobra Rage in particular was a total disaster - it's pictured in this issue in a respectable dark blue and black color scheme, but the actual product that shipped was molded in aqua blue and light gray plastic.  It was so ugly I actually repainted the entire thing before assembling it, like it was a model or something.  I've never gone to such lengths before or since, but I suppose it's nice to have a one-of-a-kind collectible that looks nice (probably with zero resell value, but I swore off eBay for good decades ago, anyway.)