I haven't considered this. And it's possible. But it's pretty clear that GI Joe, if it's going to have legs, is going to have to appeal to old fogeys like us who are looking to scratch a nostalgic itch. They aren't going to succeed going after new fans at this point. There's just too much other stuff out there to appeal to kids. So, are they just trying to avoid negative PR? I don't recall much of that when the 25th anniversary stuff hit.
I think, similar to SSC, they are trying to find some compromise between classic looks and "modern" special ops-type gear and aesthetics because they feel that is what the market is looking for. It didn't work for me with SSC, and it isn't working here. I won't buy any of these, even though I do like some of Duke's clear references to the original figure/design. I actually think the best way to move forward is letting someone like ThreeZero do classic card art/toy designs with mixed media in 1/12th scale. No mass produced, Hasbro-based product is going to be sufficiently high in quality for me anyway. But I would at least pick up some of my favorites if they did this line with pure, classic looks.
I actually caught up on some Joecon news and you're definitely right that they need to appeal to old fogeys. Unfortunately, I just learned that the last "official" Joecon was held in 2018 and the official G.I. Joe Collectors Club shut down last year. I attended the 2004 Joecon in Orlando and the 2005 one in Minneapolis..they were a lot of fun. Kind of ironic on the heels of another Hasbro attempt to revitalize the franchise, the official Joecons are already gone...
I think if they want to win over new fans, they have to do what they did before and create an accompanying cartoon to go with the toys. I think the reason the 25th Anniversary stuff was looked over by the media was because it was blatantly an adult/classic collector-aimed line. Those lines tend to get away with more because the media and parents KNOW it's aimed at older collectors...similar to what we've seen with the He-Man line. Problem was, and this is mostly my opinion and optic, Hasbro was over-saturating the market with LOTS of 25th Anniversary stuff towards the end of the line, they had expanded into the comic two-packs, and then had one-pack figures with exclusive colors at discount retailers (Dollar Stores, etc.)...it was definitely a good time to be a Joe fan. But I think a lot of the good will they built up basically got trashed and they lost lots of fans once the G.I. Joe movie came out and they released figures for it. That's around the time that I stopped collecting RAH and sold my collection. They then slammed the market with the "Pursuit of Cobra" stuff which basically replicated the movie designs. Classic characters were released with "movie designs", there was stuff from the ill-fated "Renegades" show...and basically the 25th Anniversary/30th Anniversary stuff was repackaged and slowly ventured away from the classic designs re-made in the new 25th Anniversary style. By the time Retaliation came out, Hasbro was full-blown on G.I. Joe movie stuff and any classic designs were repaints in the new-style boxes.
It was actually up to the G.I. Joe Collector's Club (run by Brian Savage and his company Fun Publications...I think it was) who had to revitalize the 25th Anniversary style line continuing with a "Subscription style" figure releases. The GIJCC partnered with Hasbro to do these figures, but because it was mostly funded by the GIJCC, their costs were extremely high and these 3.75 figures ranged between $35 - $50 per figure. It's an interesting story, but it was basically the fans that were keeping things going and working with Hasbro to release limited figures at basically double/triple the original costs for the old fogey fans. It eventually all caught up with them and by 2018/2019, you can see the Joecons and GIJCC have shut down.
I like your idea of ThreeZero, but I don't see RAH Joe fans paying those prices regularly, they were scoffing at the Sideshow figure prices on some old forums I frequented when those figures were released. Especially when Sideshow got lazy and basically would release Army Builder figures hoping they could capture on the army builder mentality. The line only had about 3 good years, in 2013 and 2014 they just released one figure each of those years (Bludd and Cobra Commander) before they canned it. There's also a big distinction between the old school G.I. Joe/Action Man 12" collectors and the RAH fans. At the Joecon, they had activities, exclusives, and panels that catered to both fanbases, but you can clearly see a divide in the legacy fandom.
I love G.I. Joe, I hope it ALWAYS does well and I will always love discussing and seeing the figures. But I'm done with it. Gave lots of good years to it and have great memories, but I really struggle to see it survive in the way lots of us remember it. It's one of the biggest 80's franchises, but also one of the ones that always seems to struggle to maintain support from its fans (I think lots of us are aging out or collecting other things) and more importantly, maintain support from the company that created it.
