MOS: Infantry
SMOS: Medic
WAAAAY back in the day, there was a summer when a friend in the old town brought Falcon home, and I was SO wanting that figure! Falcon was one of the more "army looking" Joes I had seen up to that point. I had a good amount of figures, but Low-light was probably the most military looking of them all. But something about the all green camo on Falcon made him all the more appealing to me. The rather awesome backpack with the sweet knife and antenna really upped the appeal to me, as well.
Of course that friend didn't want to trade.
One comment that I remember another friend making back in the day was that Falcon was just a rip-off of Flint. I can see that, being a figure with a beret and a shotgun. But also at that time, even into 1988 (maybe even 1989...) it seemed like GIJOE cartoon reruns were still going on TV. So we all probably still had Flint fresh in our minds, as well as that 1987 GIJOE the movie.
I do have Falcon now, though. And I can't remember where I got him. I'm really guessing I bought this guy from an online store, and I'm guessing sometime in 2004 was when I bought him.With my small team of GIJOE figures, the aspect of rank became a sort of criteria that I considered. Up until a early 2011, I had a whole bunch of officer rank Joes. There were other Joes that were also considered to be a part of my small team, but when it came to a toss-up of indecision, I didn't want to be too officer-heavy on my 28-man team.
This is my old command staff:
Major Storm and Bulletproof were often used figures (and missed...), as were many, and Capt. Grid-iron was even fairly close to making it to my 28-man teams officer slots.When it came down to it, Hawk was going to stay (an original character/ figure from my original playing days). Hawk is my GIJOE commander, even though in my ARAH-Joeverse he comes in at an impressive O-8 Major General rank! That's high, and realistically no officer would likely be hanging out with my small 28-man team in the field, but this where my imagination is trumping any resemblance of reality.
With the small team of 28, I started to think about how my team would divide down, and essentially it came to two-13-man teams led by 2 officers, and then from there I could make one enlisted "leader" in each 13-man group. And then two more enlisted NCO-type roles if I wanted to divide the 13-man team into two-6-man teams. And no doubt this is confusing to you, the leader....
Anyway, through my over-analyzing, I was thinking about the "first sgt." role, or essentially what Duke would have been. He's not an officer in my ARAH-Joeverse, he is an E-8. But, I didn't want any one "top kick" to overshadow the other, I guess, senior enlisted Joes. (Like Beachhead or Stalker)
So considering all that, I felt like I only needed one officer to "top-off" my two-13-man squads. So with those 26 enlisted Joe operators, and with Hawk as the head honcho, I needed essentially an executive officer as I saw it. (A Riker to my Picard (Hawk)?)
Essentially that left Falcon for me. An officer, but not ranked overly high in the stratosphere.
Falcon is a good looking figure and as a character he still feels like a somewhat of a blank-slate to me.
I will say that as much as his shotgun looks good, I really prefer Muskrat's shotgun when it comes to playing.
There's always other options, though. However, I like a little stock to help "straighten" out the weapon being held.
Other than Capt. Grid-iron or Duke, I think Falcon will work out great in my small 28-man team. Not only as the X.O., but also as an important addition to the team as a Green Beret!Falcon's class of 1987:
