Our first glimpse of the Adventure Team came quite a while ago, and Storm Shadow was the first figure we saw. Now that I've got him in hand, how does he hold up?

He holds up pretty well, but isn't quite as exciting and different as I thought he'd be, at least from an action figure point of view. First of all, the entire figure, except for a retooled upper chest, is an exact reproduction of Storm Shadow version 1. Same head, same arms, same lower torso, and legs, so there isn't much new and exciting as far as that goes. I do love the retool he got for his upper chest, though, it does add a neat "adventurer" element to the figure and makes him stand out from the original. Where I absolutely LOVE Snake Eyes' new look, Storm Shadow pretty much retains his same basic appearence that he's had with pretty much every figure version of him that we've gotten.

As I mentioned, his head sculpt is the same as the version 1. This no doubt makes many people happy, since a lot of the folks have issues with the over-animated style of the second head we got with Storm Shadow Shouri Crossbow (and that we've gotten with all versions since). It does a nice job of separating this Storm Shadow from many other recent ones, but is still the same reused head sculpt. It doesn't make a huge difference, though, because there are only so many ways you can sculpt a ninja mask before it gets redundant. If this saves them some money for other projects, that's cool with me.

As I already mentioned, Storm Shadow has a totally retooled upper chest, which actually looks pretty cool. At first I thought it might be a vest of some type, but no, it's a whole new upper chest piece giving him some large brown cross-straps, a high red collar, and a nice chest-mounted port for his GPS system (or whatever else you might choose). It gives him a nice unique appearence apart from recent Storm Shadow rehashes.

The rest of the body, however, is all reused from the original Storm Shadow (meaning no double-joints), but still works to a certain extent. Hasbro does do a fantastic job spicing up the paint apps a bit, though, to make the figure standout somewhat. He still retains the mostly white color to the uniform, maintaining the Storm Shadow "feel". Luckily the brown straps really help separate this figure (the arm warpaint helps with that a lot, too). He also looks a lot better all souped up with his accessories.

His kung fu grip looks a bit out of place with the metallic spring loaded into his bare hand, but the hands are on the smaller side and the KFG works nicely. too.

As I mentioned with his accessories, that is where the figure really shines.

Put the red skirting on the figure and it immediately adds a lot of color and life to the figure and helps make him look unique, even though lots of the figure is still plain white. The dark brown trim on his gauntlets, shinpads, skirting, and chest-straps brings some darker color in as well.

Get the Adventure Team dogtags on there, not to mention his goggles, sword, and GPS system and suddenly the figure has a lot more energy than it might have originally. I'm not quite sold on how Storm Shadow can go on a hunting adventure in the jungle in his bandage-wrapped feet, but he's a ninja, they're funny that way.

Of course once you start talking about his accessories, you have to start talking about the incredible tiger and related gear that he comes with. I go into much further detail in the Tech Specs section, but suffice it to say, the Tiger almost single handedly makes this set, and I'm not even an animal fan when it comes to G.I. Joe. The tiger is large, well-articulated, very nicely detailed, and just looks imposing. He mixes with the "Adventure Team" format perfectly and the different tools and devices Storm Shadow has to interact with the animal are great as well.

So the Storm Shadow figure is a bit "Bleh" (though still not a bad figure on it's own) but with all of the gear and accessories brought into play, I still end up loving this set considerably. Storm Shadow ends up looking fairly unique and fairly interesting, even using mostly old parts, and when you start talking about the Tiger, real chain "leash", swords, nets, etc... you really start getting a very cool package that I can really recommend. Snake Eyes is great, Storm Shadow is pretty cool...so far the Adventure Team is two for two...I have a feeling once I get Recondo, we'll get a Trifecta of awesome toys.