Tag Archives: Ron Rudat

Torch by Rudat

It is in 1984 and 1985 that the G.I. Joe toy lines gets really fun.

’82 is great, but straightforward — all that green. A year later the color palette expands, but there’s still a lot of business. ’84 feels like my G.I. Joe, because those are the first figures I bought. And honestly, there’s a lot of mixing up of who and when, because I obtained several 1983 figures in their second year of availability, and key 1985 characters debuted on television in 1984.

But with the arrival of more flamboyant characters like Tomax and Xamot, and costume designs that were less formal like Bazooka and Quick Kick (or lack of a costume, as the case may be!), G.I. Joe found that right mix of serious and silly.

The Dreadnoks are a big part of that. For all of Zartan’s calculating performance, he’s still got these greedy bozos working for him. (Well, most of them are bozos.) I think much of the Dreadnoks’s popularity comes from their behavior in the Weather Dominator TV miniseries — they don’t fear Cobra Commander — but also how real-world and approachable their costumes are. They’re wearing blue jeans. And in an era when cool icons like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Tom Cruise were wearing cool sunglasses, there’s a small link to these biker thugs doing the same. Toy-wise, the Dreadnoks were also a trio. That was a team that was obtainable. A kid maybe couldn’t afford the full line of 20 open stock figures in 1985, but that could could probably get Torch, Buzzer, and Ripper and complete their sub-team!

So let’s look at Ron Rudat’s lovely character presentation artwork for Torch, my favorite of the original three Dreadnoks. Click to enlarge.

Rudat’s lines are lovely, with subtle feathering in his brushwork. The leather sure looks like leather, and while we’re a step away from this because it’s a color photocopy with those NTSC-like vertical lines, this piece still communicates care and skill.

And here’s Rudat’s sculpt input drawing via a photocopy, gorgeous in a different way. Click to enlarge.

I’ll never get over looking at this kind of drawing, that it is certainly a small consumer product, a toy, whereas the color piece is a person, a real guy.

Rudat draws a cocked brow here, and maybe the slightest smirk on Torch’s face. That does not carry over in the final sculpt, to the production figure that arrived at retail — Final Toy Torch has a neutral, more symmetrical expression. That’s fine, as in my mind he was always smirking, guffawing, pushing back at Zartan, at Cobra Commander, at the Joes.

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Psyche-Out design by Rudat

I’ve always had a soft spot for Psyche-Out, subtly 1987’s weirdest G.I. Joe action figure. Here’s mine, missing his two shoulder clips. (Sorry, there’s 25% of his weirdness gone right off the bat.) (EDIT: Stephen Jubber posted this correction: “I fear your childhood Psyche-Out may also be missing his original pistol, Tim. He’s got a loaner from a Night Force Shockwave!” Thank for the fact check, Stephen!)

And here’s Ron Rudat’s pencil final for the character. This would get turned into painted presentation art, then a sculpt input drawing (aka a “turnaround”), and then a wax sculpture.

My favorite thing about this drawing is Rudat’s nebulous notation for “Electronics of some sort” on Psyche-Out’s chest piece. My favorite aspect of this character in general comes from his action figure’s dossier, written by Larry Hama. It reads, in part, that “Psyche-Out got his degree in psychology from Berkeley and worked on various research projects involving the inducement of paranoia by means of low frequency radio waves.” And then explaining what “Deceptive Warfare” is, Psyche-Out’s specialty, the dossier continues: “…you see a commercial on TV ten times a day for a particular brand of cookies. One day at the supermarket, you’ve overcome by a sudden craving for cookies. Confronted by an array of unknown brands, you choose the one that you saw advertised. They’ve won… And you’ve lost.”

The day I bought this toy my brother and I then went to our local video store, which was called Video Cassette Rentals. We must have just been to Lowen’s, an extraordinary mom and pop toy shop and just a few blocks over. I was so struck by that cookie reference that I read it aloud to my brother, us sitting there in the back seat. Kevin probably thought that Psyche-Out’s neon green jacket and wacky satellite dishes made for an unrealistic and unappealing Joe, but A) I thought they were cool and always gravitated more towards the sci-fi in Joe, and B) I think I also identified with clean shaven blondes on the G.I. Joe team since I looked like them. But this was the first time I had an inkling that the back-of-package dossiers were unusually written.

But returning to Rudat’s wonderful design and drawing (that’s two different skills! Design being one and drawing being another), I’m impressed by those six solar cells on his arms. It makes sense that his gear wouldn’t just be battery powered. (Insert joke here about Night Force Psyche-Out’s ineffectiveness.) I like that Rudat is thinking through what such a soldier would need in the field, and yet if I didn’t know what these do-dads did, they offered just enough of an impression to be an addition to this costume without being confusing or distracting. Also great in this art is Rudat’s handling of Psyche-Out’s quilted jacket.

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Barbeque colors by Rudat

G.I. Joe fans are probably familiar with this guy:

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Ron Rudat faces 1981

Ron Rudat 1981_17_TEASE

In May and June of 1981, Ron Rudat was sketching up a storm.

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B.A.T. Concepts (#3) by Ron Rudat

From 1981 to about 1987, Ron Rudat was Hasbro’s G.I. Joe figure designer. This drawing likely dates to 1984 or 1985. As with the last two we’ve examined here at A Real American Book!, it’s Rudat figuring out the look of Cobra’s Battle Android Trooper. Here’s a production B.A.T. that I purchased in 1986:

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B.A.T. Concepts (#2) by Ron Rudat

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B.A.T. Concepts (#1) by Ron Rudat

RonRudat_86BAT_concept01_TEASE

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Rudat Serpentor Air Chariot sketches

Serpentor Air Chariot sketch detail by Ron Rudat

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Wild Weasel color study circa 1983

84 Wild Weasel color study close up

We all likely respond to Wild Weasel’s signature red flight suit. Depending on the light, it’s a little maroon, a little magenta. But overall, it’s red. Red, the color of blood, the color of rage, the color of evil, the color of the Red Baron’s plane. Much of what made Cobra stand out so much from G.I. Joe those first few years, 1982 – 1986 or so, was color: Joes were generally greens, browns, and tans. Cobra was generally blue, black, and red.

After figure designer Ron Rudat finalized each Joe or Cobra, he would color several — sometimes several dozen — photocopies of his final drawing, and with markers or ink, brainstorm a myriad of color schemes. You lose much of the effect if you see any one by itself, as the real revelation comes in seeing ten or fifteen laid out together, all the strange and wonderful possibilities that might have been.

But here’s a might-have-been for Wild Weasel.

84 Wild Weasel color studyI think he might have gotten lost against a dark blue plane had he arrived in this grey. But it’s neat nonetheless. (Perhaps these duds against a red plane!) In what colors have you wanted to see Wild Weasel?

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Dreadnok Thrasher color comp

1986 Thrasher sketch color comp Ron Rudat

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