Most of the movie is an OK kung-fu movie but then it ham-fistedly tries to work in Cobra, GI Joe, Storm Shadow, and Snakes Eyes getting his suit and that's where it all falls apart. The problem is the same since 2009: no one who makes these ever seems to really take them seriously. By that I mean no one ever seems to treat the canon with any respect. There's way too much artistic license taken.
And I'm not talking about minorities playing characters like Snake Eyes or any of the other roles. I'm talking about that by the end Snake Eyes is still talking. I mean the one thing we all know about Snake Eyes is he does NOT talk. So by the end he'd have to suffer a vocal cord injury or take a vow of silence, right? Nooope. He gets the more or less traditional Snake Eyes costume but there was no setup. The old ninja lady just hands him this thing that wasn't shown previously and seems to come from nowhere.
And even though Cobra's machinations caused Storm Shadow to get booted from his warrior clan, he's going to join Cobra? How does that make any sense?
And can we get a Baroness who actually talks with an Eastern European accent? You know, like the character is supposed to? Why is even that tiny thing so fucking difficult?
Scarlett was OK--for all fifteen minutes she's on the screen. In the comics especially, she and Snake Eyes had a sorta brother-sister relationship. It spilled over into one of the early 90s toy lines when they made her a ninja along with Snake Eyes. Absolutely none of that is evident here. Or really any backstory on Scarlett except she works for GI Joe.
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The first two movies are on Amazon, Paramount+, and Pluto TV. Rewatching some of the first one it reminded me of all the problems with it: Destro and Cobra Commander being unmasked; Cobra "Commander" being a peon; Baroness being American and not a bad guy but Duke's brainwashed girlfriend; Snake Eyes with a mouth on his costume; and of course those awful robot suits they were running around in. Retaliation did a little better job, but Zartan killed Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow's ninja master? WTF?!
All these things are what really turn off an old fan like me. The problem at the core is Hasbro never seems to get anyone to actually take this stuff seriously. I tend to think whoever they hire has this attitude of, "Heh, this is kids stuff!" Then they take all this creative license to make it more "real." But the comic book runs of Larry Hama and Mike Costa had some really good stories that were not really all that suited for kids. Why don't they use more of that instead of doing this lame, half-assed shit? Come on, Robot Chicken parodies do a better job than these expensive movies.
I get this is based on a toy line, but also one of the most successful and enduring toy lines of all time. People have played with Joes for almost 60 years! So, maybe you should actually take that seriously instead of basically using the character names and a few very basic facts? Maybe get someone who can check his fucking ego at the door and actually try to give fans what they want? Find someone who wants to make a real GI Joe movie as much as I want to watch it instead of someone just cashing a paycheck.
Besides just thinking, "this is a toy, it's kids stuff," I think there's also this attitude that fans are just nerds living in Mom and Dad's basement. Maybe some are, but fans of GI Joe and Transformers from the 80s are mostly middle-aged with kids of their own now. It's not just a few nerds--otherwise they wouldn't be spending all this money on movies, would they?
It's kind of odd with that Snake Eyes movie because you'd think Hasbro learned a little something from the failure of their last regular Transformers movie versus the success of Bumblebee. That is that people are tired of movies that really only give the barest lip service to the toys that inspired them.
It was a costly lesson Disney already learned with Star Wars after the complaints on The Last Jedi and failure on Solo that pretty much derailed the last movie. As I noted in one article no one probably read, Marvel has gravitated towards more and more comics accurate costumes since the MCU started in 2008. They don't always stick too close to the comics, but they usually get enough right that people don't complain too much. Snyder nuts aside, people didn't really take to the DCEU's gritty take on Superman.
It's a pretty basic idea to me: there's a reason that stories and characters stick in the public consciousness. Filmmakers should set aside their own egos and gravitate towards those characters and stories. Or in short, give the people what they want. If you want to make "art" then make an indie movie. You're making an action movie based on a toy line, then actually give fans what they want. Because those fans are the core of your audience.
Or Hasbro could use the ideas I've put on this blog already. I'm just saying.
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