Grunt and Sgt. Slaughter Get Their Ben Cooper Halloween Costumes in NECA Series 15

NECA revealed Series 15 of its Ben Cooper Costume Kids Collection on August 5, and for the first time the line has gone to Hasbro. Two of the five figures are ours: Grunt and Sgt. Slaughter, each sculpted not as the character but as a kid wearing the character’s 1980s Ben Cooper Halloween costume, mask and all.

If you were trick-or-treating in the mid eighties, this is the specific memory NECA is going after. Ben Cooper made the licensed vinyl-smock-and-plastic-mask costumes that every drugstore stocked, and the G.I. Joe ones were everywhere. The figures reproduce that look literally: a printed smock over a plain bodysuit, a hard mask worn on the face, and a trick-or-treat pillowcase in hand.

What is in the set

Five figures, sold as one wave: Grunt and Sgt. Slaughter from G.I. Joe, Optimus Prime and Megatron from Transformers, and Matt Trakker from M.A.S.K. NECA lists each at 6 inches, made of plastic and fabric, with multiple points of articulation and a treat bag apiece. Each one comes in a numbered retro-style window box built to echo the original Ben Cooper packaging.

NECA Ben Cooper Costume Kids Series 15 key art showing all five Hasbro costume figures

The Slaughter costume is the one to look at twice. It is the black and yellow tank with USA across the chest, the leopard-print trousers, the hat and the aviators, and the smock even carries a printed SGT. SLAUGHTER name tag. That is the wrestling-crossover Slaughter of the mid eighties, not the drill instructor Hasbro has been leaning on lately in the Sgt. Slaughter and Triple T Pulse exclusive. Two very different reads of the same character, landing within weeks of each other.

Grunt gets the greener treatment: a G.I. JOE branded helmet-style hood, and a smock printed with cartoon Grunt art, rifle and all.

Price, shipping and where it lands

NECA opened preorders on its own store the same evening at $99.95, and there the wave is sold only as a bundle. BigBadToyStore has the same set of five listed at $114.99, a price BBTS states includes its tariff surcharge and may change if the final rate moves. Both list an estimated arrival in Q4 2026, which lines the release up with Halloween in the way the subject matter demands, though a Q4 estimate on a preorder is not a promise of an October delivery.

One practical note from NECA’s own listing: because of licensing restrictions, the direct-from-NECA bundle only ships within the United States, US territories and Canada. Retailers are the route for everyone else.

This is a nostalgia object rather than a shelf-scale figure, and it will not stand next to your Classified Series shelf and look like it belongs. That is rather the point.

Sources

Product photography: NECA.