A to Z Challenge Day 13: Mainframe vs Major Bludd

In every wave of GI JOE figures there was usually a figure who was sort of useless.  Among the 1986 figures, Mainframe was probably the most useless.  He didn't come with a gun or missile launcher or anything.  Why?  Because he was GI JOE's IT guy!  I mean all those awesome vehicles and shit have computers so you need someone on call; you can't just call Geek Squad and wait for them to send a guy out there.

Anyway, check out the action-packed artwork on his original box:

Can you hear me now?

He makes computer repair look so exciting!  But in the second full season of the show he did get a surprising amount of screen time.  He was like the hacker guy whenever the Joes needed some hacking and shit.  He even had a thing with the evil Zarana, which got kind of awkward when COBRA turned Mainframe and a few other Joes into little kids in one episode.  He was in the animated movie to help get GI JOE's BET energy thingy to work.  But after he disappeared.  What happened with him and Zarana?  We'll never know.  Or maybe we will; we just won't care.

As you might expect, he wasn't reissued much.  A 2008 reissue was called "Dataframe" which sounds even lamer.  In later comics he was Sgt Mainframe and I suppose computer hacking and stuff was probably more useful for the 21st Century.

More useful was Major Bludd.  He was usually the COBRA field commander while Cobra Commander and Destro and Baroness were back at whatever lair they were using for the week.  He's Australian with an eye patch and mustache, so he's pretty awesome.

He appeared quite a bit in the early Sunbow cartoon episodes, though not as much by the end.  When his figure was reissued, he was reintroduced in the DIC show, again as the field commander for the most part.  I mean someone has to lead the various generic troopers and Vipers and whatnot, right?  I'm sure he was in the comics too, though probably not as much of a cowardly dumbass.

He wasn't in either of the live action movies.  Again, a perfectly good stereotype character wasted!  I mean an Australian guy with an eye patch and mustache; how could you waste an opportunity like that?  Michael Bay is shaking his head sadly.

BTW, check out this 1994 sort of disco pirate version:

Arr matey, I be stayin' alive!

This is probably why they shut down the toy line after 12 years.