Tunnel Rat

Wanted this one for a while now. Nicky "Tunnel Rat" Lee's Brooklyn family is Trinidadian Chinese with branches of Irish, Spanish, and Native American thrown in. "Tunnel Rat figures he can shoot straighter, bite harder, and run faster than anything he's ever encountered in an enemy tunnel, so what's to worry." This figure was released when we had the plastic-free packaging; those were the days! The photo on the front of his box just shows him standing in a well-lit train or subway tunnel, which is a little plain (even if it does feature the bell he had to reach as part of his Rawhides training run in the movie). The promotional photos on Hasbro's site show him infiltrating the mines where the Mole Rats were digging up Dark Energon, which is a much cooler scenario and helps build the world in the absence of any kind of dedicated fiction. Still, only the packaging gives us his stats: Ordnance 3, Light Weapons 2, Explosives 4, and Siegecraft 4. The original 1987 Tunnel Rat was famously based on Real American Hero creator Larry Hama, both his appearance (vaguely) and his military background (Larry, too, was a combat engineer). Although there had always been servicemen tasked with going into cramped spaces to look for enemies, "tunnel rats" became an unofficial specialty during the Vietnam War. So if you ever hear it applied to a war before that, it's an anachronism. This figure was also released when Classified was only doing the 1980s designs, upsized by half, so Tunnel Rat wears a short-sleeved shirt, fingerless gloves, and regular pants pulled down over his boots. There are pads on his knees, since he's going to be spending a lot of time crawling places, and if it's good enough for people installing flooring, then it's good enough for a guy disarming bombs. Strapped around his thighs are large, tall pouches, and he wears a shoulder holster with a grenade and one of those Classified tech devices that showed up on all the early figures and never received any specific explanation. The scarf around his neck is a separate piece, but the scarf over his hair is sculpted. Since the bandolier of bullets around his chest was a part of the sculpt in the '80s, we'll mention it here instead of waiting for the paragraph about the accessories. The green of his shirt is a drab shade, and his jeans, scarves, and gloes are grey. There are black lines painted on his forearms and face; presumably that's meant to be a bit of camo to help him when sneaking around, given how precise and clean the edges are; if it were a bit more irregular, we'd think maybe it was just grime he'd managed to absentmindedly wipe on himself while underground. There's a tunnel rat logo on his left shoulder - not the actual patch worn by real-world tunnel rats, but it's got a silhouette of a rat holding a flashlight, so at least it's close. No surprises with the articulation: Tunnel Rat has swivel/hinge ankles, swivel shins, double-hinged knees, swivel thighs, hips that are a balljoint mounted on a hinge, balljointed waist, hinged chest, swivel/hinge wrists, double-hinged elbows, swivel biceps, swivel/hinge shoulders, pectoral hinges, balljointed neck, and a barbell head. We can tell Fred Aczon had to do a lot of sculpting for this one, because it doesn't share any existing pieces with anyone else: Tunnel Rat was always a short guy, and this figure comes up to exactly the 6" mark - which should help you understand why size creep is a problem. On mine, a molding error on the right arm means that hand wants to pull out very easily, but at least it doesn't fall off on its own. The original Tunnel Rat came with a bag to sling over his shoulder, a big backpack with two removable flashlights, and a rifle that's comically large for a guy whose entire life is spent inching on his belly down narrow tunnels. Classified Tunnel Rat gets all that, plus a knife for the holster on his leg, a revolver for the holster on his chest, and a set of night-vision goggles for the holster on his head. Er, "that fit onto his head," that should be. The machine gun has poseable bipod legs for stability, and a little removable ammo box that can plug in underneath it. The mini flashlights can be held in his hands, if you want, but sadly the goggles are one big piece and so you can't swivel them up off his eyes and still have him wearing them. This is my second attempt to get a Classified Tunnel Rat: the first one had had most of its accessories stolen, and it's taken a while to find another at an appropriate price. There's also a Night Force variation available as a Walmart exclusive, but I like his original colors more than the repaint's. Tunnel Rat has always been one of the more popular Joes, despite never really having much to do in any of the stories, and it's exciting to get a great modern toy of him. -- 06/20/25 How much do you miss the plasticless packaging? Tell us on our message board, the Loafing Lounge.