Everything You Need To Know About JoeFest 2026 | G.I. Retro

My brother and I were on the floor at JoeFest 2026 in Augusta, so here's everything you need to know. We break down the whole show: what we saw, what we thought, who we met, what we walked away with, and a little bit of news we caught about one of the toy lines. Footage throughout so you can see it right along with us.
Cons like this are one of the best parts of this hobby, and getting to cover one with my brother made it even more special. If you were there, tell us what YOU found in the comments, and if you couldn't make it, consider this your full rundown, and encouragement to come in the future!
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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Yo, Joe, and welcome everyone back to GI Retro, where we are coming to you from Joe Fest in Augusta. And I am so happy and proud to welcome as my very first guest on GI Retro, very fitting, my older brother Jesse. Jesse, welcome to GI Retro.

SPEAKER_01 0:19

Thanks for having me, James. This has been one heck of a trip. Got a lot of exciting things to talk about, a lot of experiences, a lot of great buys, some lost out on deals, and a few crazies, but it's been wonderful.

SPEAKER_00 0:31

Yeah, some stuff that we learned, but it's been it's been a great experience here. Both of our very first Joe Fest. So Joe Fest 2026 is in the books, and we wanted to bring you some coverage, report on everything that we experienced with Joe Fest. So, you know, for me, uh, it hearkened back to like the very first Comic-Con I ever went to, very similar feeling stepping in there for the first time. And uh, you know, I've been out of the game for a little bit, so to speak. It's part of what sort of drew me back and how I decided upon coming to do GI Retro is the great GI Joe community. So stepping into Joe Fest, very reminiscent feelings to that very first Comic-Con and everything like that to my former life. But what was it like for you?

SPEAKER_01 1:17

I mean, I've probably similar that overwhelming feeling of literally it's like you're having your whole childhood thrust back into your face, immense overload, sensory overload of toys everywhere, box toys, your old favorites, uh, some ones that you never ended up having, but now as an adult with adult money, you can buy them. Um, it was an incredible experience. Uh again, I'm already signed up for Joe Fest 2027.

SPEAKER_00 1:44

Yeah, God willing, so am I. And as many years moving forward as possible. And a big thanks uh to you know, everyone that puts on Joe Fest, all the great employees and you know, the organizers for having us out here and letting us cover Joe Fest like this has been awesome. So, yeah, the experience stepping in is great. I encourage everyone, if you are a fan, you know, obviously if you're watching, you're a fan of G.I. Joe in some way, shape, or form, or is this a really odd, strange form of ASMR or whatever. So uh thank you. Well, however you found me, I'm I'm grateful. Uh but yeah, it's so I encourage you all that you should come at least once. And I know, you know, we came all the way out from California, which turned some heads, you know, but like that was it definitely felt like sort of a pilgrimage that we needed to check off, you know.

SPEAKER_01 2:34

Uh agreed. I mean, and then you know, it's turned our heads in those seats that we had on the way over here. You know, we we suffered to be here. But it was it wasn't that bad. Nonetheless, it was worth every bit of it. Um, and I do it all over again. Uh, it's just such a wonderful toy show, especially in comparison to the ones that we've been to in California.

SPEAKER_00 2:56

Well, I mean, I do think we've got some, we've got some good ones. Like we went to StocktonCon together, and that was that was very good, and we got some good finds there. But I mean, this is the name on the marquee and everything like that. I have yet to, you know, I'm I'm looking forward to hopefully getting to the next SoCal Joe show as well and checking that out. I know a buddy of mine uh down in Southern California, he just went and had a great time. So looking forward to to getting out there too. But so yeah, overwhelming nostalgia, you you mentioned it, sensory overload, those are all very much so the same type of feelings that happened for me the first couple of Comic Cons I went to and and everything like that. So it's like you never forget your first your first one, any of those type of shows. So definitely come out for Joe Fest. But you are the more sort of ardent collector and and recollector. I I'm yeah I'm I'm here re-watching the cartoon. Jesse very much so is re-collecting the the toys. So uh yeah. I'm from recollecting to recollecting, I'm trying to got it covered.

SPEAKER_01 3:58

I'm trying to preserve a very precious childhood memory. And so I'm treating my collecting like that. Um, you know, I would love to say I'm recreating all my Joe battles and playing with my figures. That's not happening, even though it'd be kind of cool to do that once again. But I'm preserving everything as much as I can in acrylic. I've shied away from some grading stuff, but I've also accepted some in, and I've just been learning along the way. I've really started this roughly a year ago. Um, and even within a year, I've built up a pretty sizable collection that I'd save of my childhood favorite toys.

SPEAKER_00 4:36

So we both had a list of things that we were going to be looking for coming out here. I shared a couple on the last episode. Uh, we'll get into that in a in a little bit. You had a much more extensive list. I did. And you and it sort of evolved as we were planning and and everything like that, getting ready for the show. And so I kind of wanted to start getting into some of your the things that you found if you're if you're good with that.

SPEAKER_01 5:01

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, my list, I I had a list coming out here. It changed almost the moment I walked in the door because I started seeing things I didn't think about. You know, some of the things I was looking for, either the prices were far too high for my taste, um, or I just found things that were just so much better. And again, I'm trying to preserve a memory, encapsulate it. Um, and I found some really cool pieces to I think to do that.

SPEAKER_00 5:29

Uh well let's should we should we start with Where do you want me to start? Let let's let's start with the dragonfly, if if you don't mind.

SPEAKER_01 5:35

So this was my first buy.

SPEAKER_00 5:39

Just save that one for later. Don't break it.

SPEAKER_01 5:43

So this was my first buy of the show. Um, and so we had a little bit of early access, uh, and I saw this dragonfly uh inbox, also within a protective sleeve. Guy was asking 300, I believe.

SPEAKER_00 5:58

Yeah, 300 or 320 or something like that.

SPEAKER_01 6:01

Um, and so I offered him, I think I asked, you know, 200 at first. He got me up to 225. James tried to outbat me. Yeah, I said I'll take it for 226. Um, but I got it at 225. It's immaculate. It's literally uh has absolutely everything in it, the blueprints, the sticker sheet, wild bill, all the parts are working, nothing's broken. Um and it was just a great find. But side note on that.

SPEAKER_00 6:30

It it was a great find. I just I mean, what a great way to start. You know, that was one of the things that you were talking about the very most in coming here was finding that dragonfly.

SPEAKER_01 6:39

And I found it in the first 20 minutes.

SPEAKER_00 6:41

Yeah, and so that's that's one thing definitely as we go along. Like you can do the the VIP, the one hour early entry. Definitely recommend doing that. If nothing else, to get your lay of the land and just sort of having a moment of relative stillness compared. I mean, every you know, there's tons of people that get the VIP access as well, but not everyone does it. So you you definitely get to sort of take it all in a little bit. And you found that.

SPEAKER_01 7:04

Yeah, so that was so one of my thoughts coming out here was everyone says wait till the last day. That's when you're gonna get your best deals, things like that. But and we'll go into this later. But one of the things I definitely found after the end of this show is you know, if if it's a key piece to you, don't wait. Don't wait because it may not be there at the end. Because so when I bought this, apparently there was a man standing behind me.

SPEAKER_00 7:30

Yeah, so this is how this is how you know he got a great deal because yeah, go on.

SPEAKER_01 7:35

And he I turn around and he starts talking to me. He says, he says 300. I'm like, oh no, no, I I didn't pay 300. He's like, no, I'll give you 300 for that. Uh and I started, we walked on to explore more of the show. The guy started following me at other points and then offered me at 400. He wanted that dragonfly.

SPEAKER_00 7:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:53

Um, but again, if I had sat and waited, it would have been gone.

SPEAKER_00 7:57

It'd have been gone. It absolutely would have been gone. And the guy with the guy who ran the booth, such a nice guy. Yeah, and I mean, and most everyone that were running these, you know, booths and the vendors and stuff were all great. And because I think there is that shared love for all this stuff for the most part. But yeah, I think I mean, really, like that's why I gotta give you your props that you've got such a great deal because you you had another fan that he he wanted it so badly. But yeah, I mean, what just number one with the bullet, one of the things that you were talking about the most, and you found it immediately. And I think, you know, for for us coming all the way out from California, yeah, you don't want to wait for certain pieces. There are some where I think you can. You have to you have to weigh it out, and this added great energy going into it. Oh, no doubt. Yeah, it's it was a phenomenal point. It was the the tone setter for Joe Fest. Absolutely. So uh I guess the let's let's go ahead. You got a really uh really pretty one there. It might not show up the best on camera, but I'll do some pickup shots because we don't we want to keep it pristine, but what are you holding here? Or what are we holding?

SPEAKER_01 9:01

It is a storm shadow version one graded at an 85. I didn't come out here planning to get this, but I saw it and the price to me was reasonable. Um, I didn't pay for what they were asking. I think they're asking $675, and I paid six. But he's such an iconic character. He's probably my favorite G.I. Joe figure of all time. One of the biggest problems, though, is any collector will know that getting him white is almost impossible now. He yellows over time very quickly, but this guy's pristine white, he's graded, he's encapsulated. So even if his O-ring breaks over time, which all G.I. Joe's will, uh because of the grading and the way they package it, he will stay in place, will not fall apart. So it was a more expensive buy than I was planning on doing. And like I said, I never planned on buying Storm Shadow while I was here, but I saw it, it was such an iconic piece, I could not pass it up.

SPEAKER_00 10:04

Yeah, and we both love Storm Shadow. There's a there's an episode of G.I. Joe coming up. Uh, I'm not gonna say what it is, but there is a shared memory between Jesse and I in terms of you know, you when you're kids, you have those playground arguments of who would beat who in a fight and stuff like that. And and Storm Shadow has one of the greatest demonstrations, just like the Trump card of all trump cards of demonstrations in the cartoon. By the way, if you uh if you're looking for an Easter egg at home, I did put on uh deliberately the episode Money to Burn as the starter episode playing to find us. So yeah, but nice find, incredible. Uh I'll I'll just run through quickly a couple a couple of the things that that I found. Um your classic Firefly, I know you said Storm Shadow is one of your all-time act favorite action figures. He's one of my favorites too, but my very favorite is is Firefly.

SPEAKER_01 10:51

One of the best action figures ever made in any line is Firefly. And if you can get that Cobra logo clean on the side of his arm and his little green micro or green telephone and green gun and the backpack piece, you're golden.

SPEAKER_00 11:06

So I I'm sort of toying with the idea that you know, I'm not gonna collect in the same way that you do. Sure. Um, I've just everybody's different. I've got I'm select how you want uh at capacity, uh a little bit. In fact, there's things that I'm I'm looking to get rid of. But uh I love Firefly so much that I I I might just go ahead and just start buying uh, you know, if I see a Firefly that I don't have or haven't re-collected yet, I might just grab. So I got uh version two here, not everybody's favorite. No, it wasn't our favorite growing up.

SPEAKER_01 11:37

I mean, yeah. But as getting older, you start to appreciate the things that you didn't recognize when you were a child. Uh the sculpting, the excess the accessories and things like that, which we're sure we'll talk about more accessories later. Uh, but just on card, beautifully unpunched on or no, is it it's punched. Oh, it's punched. Doesn't matter. But has also one of our favorite markers, the Toys R Us Price sticker.

SPEAKER_00 12:07

Honestly, that's what put me over the edge is the Toys R Us sticker on it. It would do it for me too. Yeah, so let's go for that. So yeah, I think I think I might just be a Firefly collector. Let's let's because you got two things in here. So let's let's talk about let's talk about this.

SPEAKER_01 12:21

Okay, so um it's a little bit of a long-winded story, but I had initially saw a uh repaint of some other toy line of an F-22 painted like a G.I. Joe Sky Striker. It was a gorgeous piece. Uh guy wanted 160 for it, but unfortunately, he didn't have the missiles, but he was gonna mail them to me, and this will go into kind of our tips and pointers if you're gonna go on toy hunts at uh other uh conventions and festivals. And the canopy didn't operate. So I came and I I offered him 140 for it, and uh he wouldn't budge. But I had saw this one, the Storm Eagle, earlier on. Granted it's got some yellowing, um, but the guy had a stick on it for 25 bucks. And I had a plan that, you know what, I'm gonna paint this. I'm gonna take the time to learn a little bit of painting and make it an you know an X23, the way I would have done it. Um, I even bought a custom canopy for it, uh, but got it for not 25 bucks, got it for 20 bucks. It's actually one of my favorite buys of the show. Who who is in the cockpit right now? So this is, and a lot of people don't know this, and I didn't know this till just a few weeks ago. This is an international version of Spirit. And we saw him complete at other booths running for $375. I think the cheapest we saw was $275. Um, and granted, I'm a big spirit fan, but the original figure, but I like the color scheme so much, I was like, you know what, I'll get one if the price is right. I wasn't willing to spend almost $400 for him. But as James and I were walking along, uh James spotted out of nowhere a spirit hanging on the the wall. Yeah, granted he didn't have his gear, um, but spotted him for 60 bucks, snapped him up like that.

SPEAKER_00 14:19

I almost didn't say anything to you, too. I'm glad you did though. Because I noticed he didn't have any of his equipment. So I was like, ah, he's probably not interested.

SPEAKER_01 14:26

So I've got all his gear already, multiples of his gear. Um, granted, it may not be the exact color scheme, but uh I've got multiple uh of his his spirit animal and um freedom. Freedom. Uh and so it was a great buy for me. So I got him for 60 bucks, and you saved me from having to go buy at least a $300 variant of it. So this was enough for me. Nice.

SPEAKER_00 14:50

All right. Uh let's see. I guess this is as good a time as any to talk about one of my favorites.

SPEAKER_01 14:56

To me, so I vote this one the best find of the show for many reasons.

SPEAKER_00 15:01

It's it's neck and neck with the dragonfly. Dragonfly was good. In my opinion.

SPEAKER_01 15:05

But this one, with everything we saw, this I was shocked when we saw it.

SPEAKER_00 15:11

So I'm a huge GI Joe fan, obviously. I'm also a huge pro wrestling fan. So Sgt. Slaughter exists right at sort of the apex of both my fandoms. Uh, I've you know met him briefly a couple times in passing, you know, through various media things that I've done. Always such a nice guy. Um, but this, I'm not even sure if I mentioned it in the in the mail call, but this was one of the ones that, you know, in talking about coming to JoeFest was always right near the the top of my list. It's a San Diego Comic-Con 2010 exclusive.

SPEAKER_01 15:44

With the belt.

SPEAKER_00 15:44

With yeah, and so with the belt. Yeah, the the to me, one of the coolest things about it is it comes with this WWE style, WWF styled G.I. Joe title belt within it. So awesome. Uh, and he's in the he's in the OG USA tank, which I really love as well. Um, and yeah, just the detail on him is is really cool. So when we walked in, um Sergeant Slaughter was here at Joe Fest. I think he comes almost every year. Super nice guy. We got to meet and interact with him a little bit too.

SPEAKER_01 16:13

How cool is he with the fans? Like it doesn't matter who you are, he just totally puts out 120% for the fans.

SPEAKER_00 16:19

Yeah. Every time. One of my favorite things was, you know, as we were cruising around, just seeing how he was with all the fans coming up, and just, you know, the the love that he sort of reciprocates back to them is is really great to see. And he's got time for each and every one of you.

SPEAKER_01 16:35

There's no ego there. Yeah, he's he's there for the love of G.I. Joe and the love of what he did in his career and the people that supported him all the way.

SPEAKER_00 16:44

Yeah, he's he's awesome. So this this was one of the things that I really wanted to get. I didn't uh, you know, I've been going to Comic-Con for a long time. I this one I actually missed that it was even an exclusive. So tell somehow.

SPEAKER_01 16:55

So tell your fans what we found at the show. Like, I mean, because it was a little bit disheartening at first.

SPEAKER_00 17:02

Well, yeah, so I had so there's also a Black Tank came out the same year. So I have that one already. Uh, this was the main one I wanted, even beyond that. Uh, so when we get there, your grail piece. Yeah, we see at uh you know, at Sergeant Slaughter's like like around his booth, like there's a lot more Sergeant Slaughter memorabilia here that I think because he is you see this in a lot of shows, like when they know that somebody's gonna be making an appearance, like they bring more sort of Sergeant Slaughter specific or or whomever it may be. Uh, I've seen that a lot uh at other shows and stuff like that. So I saw a a couple of these, not as not as many as I would have thought, too, because I I don't know how how well they move. I guess.

SPEAKER_01 17:43

But what were those going for? What were they asking for those?

SPEAKER_00 17:45

$400.

SPEAKER_01 17:47

So which was not saying it's not worth it, but it was it was more it was more than I wanted to start.

SPEAKER_00 17:54

Sure.

SPEAKER_01 17:54

I get it. So just like you spotted that spirit for me, we were at a table, you were filming, I believe.

SPEAKER_00 18:02

Yeah, I think so.

SPEAKER_01 18:02

And I started tapping his leg. Because how much did you end up paying for this figure?

SPEAKER_00 18:08

I was it 150?

SPEAKER_01 18:09

I believe it was 150.

SPEAKER_00 18:10

Yeah, so from $400 down to $150 for the number one thing that I wanted.

SPEAKER_01 18:15

Did you did you try to haggle on it? No, no, no, no.

SPEAKER_00 18:18

I, you know, I I was sort of having seen what they were going for, you know, around the it was a fair price, you know, more than a fair price. It was cheaper than what I see them go for online, you know, and that to me, it's like okay. Like I I'd never seen one in a while, like at that point.

SPEAKER_01 18:35

And there are certain pieces that are like that. It's it's already a great deal to begin with. You don't want to taint that deal with trying to eke out a little bit more value for yourself, just buy it. If the deal is right, if it's priced right, you know, I would just say to those who are in it, grab it. Pull the trigger. Yeah, it's not gonna be there tomorrow.

SPEAKER_00 18:55

Yeah, if you feel good about it, pull the trigger. There's certain things you can wait on, you can haggle on. Uh, a buddy of mine, Mark, has cut his uh sort of motto is uh I refuse to pay full price. So and he he's he's very good at it. Uh I I don't have uh the same level of skill that he has in that regard. I've I've I've gotten to do some some some good moves.

SPEAKER_01 19:14

He's in he's in it for the game.

SPEAKER_00 19:16

Yeah, and I mean this in the most complimentary fashion. I was talking to a couple other friends about this. That culturally, Joe Fest and shows like this, it is everyone becomes Jawas. Oh, yeah. He's very much so like the sand crawler when it hit place. It's like, yeah, what about that blue one? You know, what about that hooded cobra commander? Yeah, what about that hooded cobra commander? Yeah, uh, that kind of deal. And again, complimentary, but so uh that's not my strong suit. Uh and so, but I would I was stoked to to find this Sergeant Slaughter at 150. And yeah, just to have it, like, because it completes a big sort of need, like not need, but a big want that uh I that I had. So yeah, I was thrilled to find that.

SPEAKER_01 19:58

That being said, though, you had one major grail piece that you've been talking about for probably a year long now. Um, we may have found it one other place, but the the hunt, it was about the hunt.

SPEAKER_00 20:12

Yes. And again, wanting to find it here. This is something that I also very specifically saved for Joe Fest. I did mention it in the mail call. I inserted the commercial talking about it.

SPEAKER_01 20:22

And what is it? And did you find it?

SPEAKER_00 20:24

It is the G.I. Joe commando attack game. Hold on a second here. It's gonna take some doing.

SPEAKER_01 20:31

We've got to be gentle with this one.

SPEAKER_00 20:32

White glove it. Yeah. Well, so this is this is one we saw this pretty early walking in as well. We saw this because this was before we even hit the main convention floor. This is James and I wandering the halls. Yeah, this was like the the lobby of Joe Fest. And you know, I I was very heartened, you know, very encouraged that uh that we saw it as early as we did, and it was going for 50 bucks.

SPEAKER_01 20:59

Uh so why would why didn't you pull the trigger on it right away?

SPEAKER_00 21:02

Well, because we had just gotten here, and I was like, oh, this place is this place is gonna be flush with commando attack games, you know, and how many we might see a sealed inbox, you know.

SPEAKER_01 21:12

And how many variants did you find while you're there? How many additional ones?

SPEAKER_00 21:16

Just this one. Um and so yeah, I was um to be honest, I'm still sort of stunned that there weren't more of these floating around because they're not exactly super rare online or anything like that. You can find them. I mean, I know yeah again, one of the things Jesse would send me links from eBay, like, hey, you can get this, you can get it's like sealed, da da da da. And I was like, Yeah, but I want to get it with you. Yeah, you know, because we have such fond memories of playing this game with dad and everything like that. We played this game a lot, and it not only the childhood memories, it's a great game. It is a fun game. We're we're gonna we're gonna knock out at least one round of it before we before we fly back to California. But yeah, it's uh and it does have the flint patch.

SPEAKER_01 21:57

Yeah, so this is the rarest part of this.

SPEAKER_00 22:00

Uh boards game is this little teeny tiny shoulder patch, press with dry it's ironic.

SPEAKER_01 22:11

It's like a sticker.

SPEAKER_00 22:12

Yeah, to press for 20 seconds, let cool for three minutes. So yeah, I'll I'll press it on your polo after we get done recording. But yeah, I was actually stunned that it had the flint patch. I was not, I was not as good.

SPEAKER_01 22:24

I was too, and that was my biggest fear for him is we were gonna find one, but it was gonna be missing the patch or some key piece. This had the patch, not missing any key pieces at all. A win-win.

SPEAKER_00 22:37

Yeah, the only thing it was missing is dice. And I didn't real I didn't realize that until we got it back, but uh we can add it all all good. I and honestly, even if it didn't have the flint patch, you would have gotten it. I would have gotten it because this is what I can't do. And I would have found you the flint patch. It would have been for your backoff thing. Yeah. Um, but yeah, that's so that's the the holiest of holies for me for my trip. You got you made one last big purchase, and I know we're running a little long here, so let's let's finish it. We did get a bunch of other figures too. Yeah, you got a ton of stuff, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:07

But let's at least finish it off with this one last piece. So I didn't when I was a kid, I I was aged out roughly at this point. This I think these started coming out in 1990, and I was aging out of G.I. Joe a little bit. And also, I just didn't quite understand it at the time, but Sky Patrol. And so I started collecting Sky Patrol. I got the Sky Raven, all the some of the major pieces, and it's the VAC metalized chrome that makes these vehicles incredible. James actually spotted this for me in box, which is the Sky Havoc. They were asking 300. The guys weren't budging on it. Hasn't even hit the store yet. Hasn't even hit the store yet. I'll take it home, put it in the case. We got 20 bucks off of it. Um, but honestly, it's in the box, blueprints, stickers unapplied. Uh, all the parts are there. It was a worthy buy, and it almost completes my Sky Patr uh Patrol collection. Um, yeah, so great buy. Show the back of the great artwork on the box, both front and back. Um, and if I ever end up taking this out to display it loose, it's just gonna shine, baby.

SPEAKER_00 24:19

Yeah, you know, I always liked the uh the like chromey Skyhawks too. I thought they I thought they looked cool. So Sky Havoc, uh, I don't remember seeing as many of those. So good uh We didn't. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:30

You know, we were Sunbow cartoon was over at that point.

SPEAKER_00 24:33

Yeah, good find, though. Uh good find, and it was a good way to cap off sort of our questing uh for deals at at Joe Fest. And yeah, as as we close out here, just Jesse, any sort of advice uh for for further advice.

SPEAKER_01 24:50

Yeah, well, in fact, you've you probably should do a whole episode about that.

SPEAKER_00 24:52

Well, just quick a quick couple quick hitters here as we're on our way out the door.

SPEAKER_01 24:56

If you see your grail piece, first go as early as you can. Go the first day they're open, pay the extra money to get in early. Uh, and again, scour if you see your grail piece and the prize is right, snap it up. Just snap it up because there may not be many, it may be the only one, like in the case of your game.

SPEAKER_00 25:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:19

Uh that was literally the only one at the show.

SPEAKER_00 25:21

I I think definitely the the first night too. Also, your like energy is high, you know, and I and I think it was really cool that we found that dragonfly. And did I did I even I didn't buy the board game until day two, right?

SPEAKER_01 25:37

I don't remember. I don't remember. I I think you waited till day two.

SPEAKER_00 25:41

But the the dragonfly was it was a great tone setter. Oh, and I don't even think I mentioned that. That Sergeant Slaughter that I got. Sorry, I'm I'm bouncing all over the place, but that Sergeant Slaughter, again, how you know I got a good deal is some guy came up right next to you like, oh, I was gonna get that.

SPEAKER_01 25:54

So this is this brings me to a good point. Know your pricing before you go. Watch eBay for the first couple months before you go to the show. Look at what sold as or sold and look at what the prices are, the fluctuation. That's gonna give you a good gauge of whether or not you're getting a deal or you're getting the screw job. Um but that, and then the other thing, anyone who tells you, we have the other parts and we'll mail them to you, or we'll bring them down here the next day, forget it, walk away from the deal unless you're okay with getting only what they have available because 90% of the time they don't mail it and they don't show back up with the parts.

SPEAKER_00 26:34

Yeah. Uh I I I will end with this from my perspective. And this I haven't even talked to you about this yet. Uh, this is not a tip or anything like that, but I was I was chatting up at the Super Seven booth, by the way. One of the things I got was this cool flag hat. Yeah, I I am a big fan uh of the Super Seven Ultimates line because they look like the cartoon, and that's that's what I love so much. So I'm chatting with one of the guys that runs Super 7, and I I don't think uh I'm okay, can't take this as gospel, but uh I mean it's coming straight from their mouth. I asked him about the Super Seven Ultimates line, and he said, verbatim, it's it's not canceled, it's just it's just paused. Uh and we were talking more about it, and you know, he was like, you know, when you know, when the sort of the license holder is pushing you in a direction, you listen to them and they wanted us to do more O-ring, but I the yeah, I was like, Do you think it seriously will come back? And he said, Yes, I do.

SPEAKER_01 27:31

We need a Firefly.

SPEAKER_00 27:32

Well, and so I said, I said, okay, well, when it comes back, I said, Shipwreck, Firefly, and Spirit. And he says, Yeah, Shipwreck's the main one that uh really that that that they need to make because he's so iconic. He was so well and he in in the cartoon, that's really the only place that Shipwreck has a strong foothold in G.I. Joe. So that I think that when it does come back, I think there's a in there's much I'm much more encouraged that the ultimates will be coming back than I was coming into this. I thought they just sort of sort of soft canceled it. Yeah, that was our worry.

SPEAKER_01 28:05

Sort of like the Thundercats reboot from uh Cartoon Network in the closed they had closed their shop in downtown San Francisco. So we who knows what was gonna happen.

SPEAKER_00 28:14

But yeah, he used to run the guy I was talking to, he used to run some of those stores, and uh, he's been with Super Seven for a while. So I am very encouraged by that. So a little bit of uh soft, soft breaking potential news in terms of that.

SPEAKER_01 28:27

So keep your hopes up, keep the faith.

SPEAKER_00 28:29

Yeah, keep your hopes up. And uh, I mean, overall, just Joe Fest was a phenomenal experience, such good brother-brother bonding. Uh, great to be with the community. Oh, and and shout out to um Tim from Third Wave Sabotage. Tim, thank you for coming up to me and letting me know that you're enjoying the show and enjoying the channel and everything like that. Really appreciate it. And yeah, again, the community is so strong and so positive. And I love being a part of it and getting to connect with y'all. So hopefully I'll get to connect with more of you at future Joe Fests and other conventions and stuff like that too. So I definitely want to come back out next year and in the years to come and do even more sort of more coverage-related things. So we'll we'll see how that uh how that shakes out. But yeah, other great guests besides Sergeant Slaughter 2, the voice of Storm Shadow, tons of other people were here. So there is a lot to make it worth your while. So come to Joe Fest, and if you were curious, you know, about you know what goes on here and you didn't know, now you know. Take it away, Flint. And knowing is half the battle.