I am a child of the 80′s. I grew up playing video games (Atari 2600/NES), playing with Transformers and more importantly – G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero. I owned every figure and vehicle I wanted (I mowed yards and bought my own stuff…) and I collected every issue of the comic book. Both the regular series and Special Missions. Larry Hama should have gotten an “ironman”award fro writing all 155 issues. The art was never outstanding, but the way he wove the storylines throughout the series, even with the interference of Hasbro forcing him to add characters and change costumes (as silly as some of them got in the later years…), was outstanding. Even now, my children and I are collecting the new figures. The comic that Devil’s Due published as a continuation of the original series was good and probably would have been better if I were still a kid.
When it was announced that they were beginning production on a G.I. Joe movie, I geeked to a whole new level I had never been to. I mean, Ray “I AM DARTH MAUL”Park as Snake-Eyes – Holy $H^T, Batman! Larry Hama as a story advisor! How can this go wrong? Little did I know.
I was lucky enough to go to San Diego Comic-Con last year and made it a point to attend the G.I. Joe Movie board. They had assorted behind-the-camera movie people there and even Larry Hama made an appearance. He looked like he was trying not to throw-up the whole time. Not just from possibility of partying the night before. He visibly winced more than once as the movie was being described and the slides were being shown.
A lot of the original comic stories revolved around the Vietnam War as a starting point for the older characters, so they had to do some updating. Given the state of the political world since, the writers had lots of wars and conflicts to choose from. You’ve probably heard all of the following already, but here’s my take. Duke was engaged to the Baroness when they were younger and he leaves her at the altar and enlists; making her bitter and embarking on life of international terrorism. Eh, okay. I never liked the whole Duke and Scarlett thing from the cartoon. Scarlett’s heart belongs to Snake-Eyes. Snake-Eyes now meets Storm Shadow at age ten and they grow up together and train as ninjas rather than serving together in a war zone. Originally, Snake-Eyes approaches Storm Shadow to bring himself back to center through training and his family is killed on the way to pick him up at the airport. Okay. I can live with that as long as they are ninjas, sword brothers and have the same tattoo on their forearm.
The slides they showed were all abysmal except for the Snake-Eyes and Storm Shadow pics. Ripcord is now a black man. This is not even a little issue for me. One of the things I liked so much about G.I. Joe was the fact that it was a multi-cultural and multi-national unit. Ripcord was a secondary character, so no biggie. The fact that they cast MARLON WAYANS in this movie at all – that, that I have a problem with. Plus, they are going to create some weird sexual tension between him and Scarlett. No, no, no. Again, Scarlett’s heart belongs to Snake-Eyes. Dennis Quaid asked to be in the movie and they cast him as General Hawk. The director and producers liked him so much that they REWROTE THE MOVIE TO FIT MORE SCENES WITH HIM!He’s a decent actor, but much like Mel Gibson and Chris Tucker, he’s the same d@mn character in every movie. The sad thing is, other than Snakes and Stormy, his costume is one of the best I’ve seen. I understand that in this modern world, the need for practical body armor is a must by our soldiers. But every frickin’ Joe is wearing the same d@mn thing! They all look like Snake-Eyes without the mask or sword. All in black body armor. The cool thing about the Joes, was that each had a personality and wore what they wanted as long as it was close to general issue. Why can’t Duke be in tan camo armor? Or Ripcord in OD Green or green camo? Scarlett with some grey or tan instead of the yellow. But, not all black. Cobra soldiers are all supposed to look the same, not the Joes. Baroness looks the best from the Cobras I’ve seen, although the casting of Christopher Eccleston as Destro is as good as the casting of Ray Park. But we still haven’t seen him in the mask yet. Yeah, he’s probably only going to wear it in battle, but if you’re not going to show us Cobra Commander in the mask or even a single cobra trooper, show us the mask.
Here’s a biggie: Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Cobra Commander. Huh?!? The kid from 3rd Rock from the Sun?!? Yes, I know he’s done some movies since, but does anyone who watched the cartoon or read the comics look at him and see Cobra Commander? There is nothing behind his eyes that says megalomaniac. And that’s all I better see. His face either in shadows or his eyes behind the hood.
They recently interviewed Chuck Dixon, the writer of the new G.I. Joe Movie Prequelcomic from IDW in issue #210 of Wizard to hype the movie. He was quoted as saying this after reading the script, “It’s a good, solid action flick.” Not that it’s a great movie and a movie that both regular movie-goers and fanboys alike will want to see, but “a good, solid action flick.” There are lots of good, solid actions flicks out or coming out this year or the next. It scares me that that is the best he could come up with. I don’t think the producers realize the fan base or the amount of nostalgia that G.I. Joe has. Just like Iron Man, Batman or Spider-Man, there are expectations. Expectations that have only increased with movies like Iron Man and Dark Knight.
Will I take my kids to see it? Yeah, I’m a sucker. I will go into the movie and try to forget all of the years of continuity and hope beyond all hope that I’m pleasantly surprised and proven wrong.
By-the-way, the only thing that was said at the board in at Comic-Con that I liked: Larry said he stopped the producers from making Snake-Eyes talk and then everyone clapped. And a room full of people clapped like we were waiting for SOMETHING worth clapping for…
