The costume guides really lend themselves to the look of the Modern Joes for this same reason so we have some uniformity but the hardest part was making the helmet
I really wanted to embrace the look of the figure and also get my hands a little dirty along the way so I went ahead and made my own from hand laid fiberglass. It’s a task not for the faint of heart but building is my favorite part of costumes.
Overall I’m pretty happy with the results. I started it nearly one year ago when I first found out about the Finest at the Michigan Comic Con 2018. It took me about 2 months on and off to complete the costume and helmet and I was first able to wear it to take my son out for Halloween in our city, which is also the same day I submitted my costume with my fingers x’ed
Loved the Sideshow line on most of the Cobra figures. Some of the Joe’s I think were a little too modern looking in that they just looked like modern soldier dudes and without someone telling me, I wouldn’t know that the figure was Dusty for example. But those Cobra figs… hot damn.
I decided I needed a little Joe in my life. Still a work in progress but working towards another Sideshow figure of Beachhead. I have some more details to work out and I’ll be ditching the pads. Outside of heat stroke from wearing a ski mask in 80 degrees, this is a fairly comfortable costume to wear.
The knives aren’t too bad. Great for cosplay because they are lightweight. I did dress mine up a bit by repainting the handle closer to the figure and the sheath, adding paracord details and some screws to make it look a little more authentic. It’s a little undersized for what it’s trying to reflect on the figure but it’s good enough for me.
Fairly easy build with a good number of off the shelf core pieces, however, unless you really like dyeing fabrics I’d recommend just going the road of their black ninja version!
The forearm and leg armor was made from EVA foam courtesy of Habor Freight floor mats and a couple of thinner pieces of foam from the craft store. This was my first experiment with textures on foam using the stone bits on a dremel tool.
Source images:
For the Gi I bought a cheap ninja costume and added the hakama pants and a sleeveless gi jacket over it. I closed off the look with a black obi belt and a standard karate black belt.
All together my target was to get some photos of this costume in the fall colors and that mission was accomplished this last weekend
I’m very pleased with the results
