SPOILER HEAVY! SPOILER HEAVY! SPOILER HEAVY! YOU'VE BEEN WARNED!
Okay, here is the main thing you need to know about "G.I. JOE." If you are, or ever have been, a fan of the cartoon, the comics, or the toys, which all basically tie together, then this live-action version will ruin any fond memory that you have of that history. I repeat, it WILL RUIN ANY FOND MEMORY!!!! And I mean FOREVER! You will see and hear things that you can't un-see or un-hear. You will be scarred!!
This movie is so dumb, far-fetched, asinine, horribly acted, with unbelievably bad CGI. I couldn't believe how much money that they spent on that piece of sh-t! And with all of that money, it STILL looks like crap!!
It starts out in 1641 in France, where a guy that is supposed to be Scottish, although he sounds like nothing even close, is forced to wear a mask while it's still hot. Then it jumps to modern day after subtitling "In the not too distant future." Yeah, only 500 plus years...I don't know what they consider far if that is "not too distant." We meet James McCullen (Destro) and he sells weapons. He sells some glorified rockets with green stuff inside to NATO and it's guarded by Duke and Ripcord and a bunch of other nobodies that are about to get blown up.
While traveling, they're ambushed and everyone dies except, you guessed it, Duke and Ripcord. Well, The Baroness is the the one ambushing and apparently had a life with Duke previously. So despite being an enemy that just killed ALL of your men and is kicking you in the face while stealing the most dangerous weapon on the planet, Duke can't somehow shoot her. Instead he just keeps saying "Anna? Anna? Anna!" while running after her. Genius.
To the rescue is Heavy Duty and along is Scarlett and Snake Eyes. Heavy Duty actually STOPS firing at The Baroness and says "Don't make me shoot a lady." This makes so much sense. It's only a highly classified and dangerous weapon, but since it's being stolen by a woman, he can't find it in his dedication to shoot. Brilliant.
She, of course, escapes but, without the goods. (The weapons, not her breasts. Btw, those are her only saving grace and while they are really quite nice, her cleavage is not nearly enough to save this film. Great tits though Sienna!) Dennis Quaid appears via a hologram and talks about Duke and Ripcord coming to Joe HQ. They and the rest go to Egypt, under the sand, and see all of the cheesy looking Green Screen, I mean, training facilities and base from which the Joes operate. They are hundreds of people walking around and doing stuff in the background (Remember this for later).
Apparently, the New World Order is in place because instead of "America's highly trained Special Missions Force," we're told that 10 nations gathered together and sent their best and they all share the Intel.
McCullen appears via hologram now, (I guess phones are obsolete) and makes a crack about Duke not doing his job. Duke flinches like he's going to hit him but, is held back by Ripcord. From what??? HITTING A HOLOGRAM?!?!? Dumb!!!
Duke wants into the Joe program but, is refused. So he spills the beans that he knows everything about Anna, er, The Baroness to become a "provisional recruit." All of this appears as a flashback, which btw, this movie is peppered with so many stupid flashbacks, it gets incredibly old after the first, and there's a LOT more than one. Her name was Anna Lewis and Duke asked her to marry him and she asked him to promise to protect her "egg-head brother." This being Rex Lewis, the kid from 3rd Rock, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, now all growns up.
Ripcord comes up during this flashback, and makes a racist comment. "Oh, you 2 look like the little white couple on the cake!" Why does race have to be entered into it? It's obvious that they're white.
Now, can you imagine if the roles were reversed? "Wow, Ripcord! I'm so happy for you! You 2 look like the little black couple on the cake!" Puh-lease. The NAACP would boycott this film so F'n fast. But, I digress...
Well, Rex gets his ass blown to smithereens (during another flashback) and Duke gets a scar and some regret. Duke goes to Rex's funeral, sort of, as he rides in on his motorcycle, in the pouring rain, WHILE WEARING SUNGLASSES!! He takes them off for a couple seconds, never leaving his bike, and then puts them back on, IN THE POURING F'N RAIN MIND YOU, and then rides off. Unbelievable.
At the Pit, Duke and Ripcord are tested with everything the Joes have at their disposal. Ripcord starts to hit on Scarlett because they apparently don't have her in a relationship with Snake Eyes, like she is in other incarnations. Brendan Fraser makes a 5 second cameo here, I think as Gung-Ho. He's in and out so fast, I don't even think they referred to him by name. Maybe he quit during filming because he saw it for what it is. Duke is lauded as really good because he tackled Snake Eyes after getting his ass beat repeatedly by Snake Eyes the last few rounds. He beats him silly and just tackles Snake Eyes and all of a sudden he's great? Apparently so, because they've "never seen Snake Eyes take a hit." He tackled him from behind after the match was over!!!
Some weirdo, with a bad voice that sounds like a kid trying to sound like an adult over the phone, named The Doctor appears and if you haven't figured it out yet, with all of the rumors, the toy packaging, etc., it's Cobra Commander. And yes, it's Rex, back from the grave and out for revenge. Yawn. He created the nanomite technology and has injected into his soldiers that he will control with a keyboard.
Zartan makes his appearance around this time and isn't master of disguise, just a guy that will trade clothes with you after he kills you. Oh, and he doesn't have more than like 3 lines. He just whistles a lot. Horrible.
The Baroness and Storm Shadow (with his perfectly coiffed hair and white suits, he looks like a gay fashion model) break into the Pit with Zartan's help and steal the rocket weapons with the green slime. Somehow, there's only like 2 guards on duty and they're dead before you can blink. I thought these were the best of the best??? During the battle, Duke, again, has the opportunity to shoot The Baroness, for what seems like an eternity and decides to disobey his orders/training/honor by not following through. Um, Duke, do ya think you might want to shoot her considering that she's going to kill a ton of people?!? Nah. Of course not.
Oh and while all of this is going on, there only seems to be like 6 or 7 G.I. Joes fighting them. What happened to the HUNDREDS that were around earlier?!? This was no short fight mind you, it goes for a good long while. So where is everyone?!? Afterward, they somehow decipher that McCullen is in on it by guessing and then everyone agreeing. No proof, mind you, just a hunch and a simple agreement between the group. Okay.
Later, The Doctor injects Zartan with needles so he can change his appearance. So again, not a master of disguise, he needs chemicals to change his look. It's so obvious what they're planning when they do this...it's interspliced with shots of the U.S. Prez, so figure it out.
Somewhere in here (I think, it's all over the place with these damn flashbacks) Snake Eyes has his flashback, showing him as starving boy in Tokyo and sneaks into a house to eat. 10 year old Storm Shadow catches him and they fight like crazy. Storm Shadows master comes in, speaking perfect English and says to him "Storm Shadow (yeah, he calls him this at 10), we have guest, where are your manners? English please." "But he's a thief!" responds the young Storm Shadow. "No, he's just hungry. Let's invite him in and teach him. Now, what shall we call you?" Painfully dumb to watch!!!!
Duke and Ripcord go on the mission with the Joes and are given the infamous "accelerator suits" because, ya know, they're so experienced with them and have been trained for so long. (Roll eyes here) They arrive in Paris to go after The Baroness and Storm Shadow, so Duke and Ripcord put on the Matrix, I'm sorry, accelerator suits. The Eiffel Tower gets destroyed, which, in all seriousness, was the only truly cool part of this crappy movie. The lame, cartoonish looking slime (nanomites) is just that, lame and cartoonish looking but, the Tower falling looks pretty real. The ONLY CGI that looked believable. And I'm thinking that they might've used a model. Duke gets captured by the bad guys and the other Joes get captured by.....wait for it....the French police. Seriously. The most bad ass special forces agents on the friggin' planet can't escape from the stinky French cops?!?!? This is just sad now. While they have Duke, Storm Shadow has a flashback where he kills his master while still a kid because he is envious of kid Snake Eyes and runs away.
They get released by promising to never return to France again and figure out where McCullen is hiding and it's in the North Pole. The Baroness arrives there with Storm Shadow and Duke. The Baroness somehow is still showing off her cleavage in sub-zero temperature. (They still look great honey but, it's supposed to be cold out.) McCullen's base is under the icy water where you've no doubt seen the footage of those fake looking subs, etc. They look really fake on the big screen. Snake Eyes, Scarlett and Ripcord go to the North Pole to rescue Duke and get the other weapons back. The other no name Joes are sent underwater to fight the fake looking subs with their own fake looking subs.
The Doctor is going to turn Duke into a nanomite slave and reveals himself to be Rex and that he has his own sister, Anna, now The Baroness, under his control. Btw, when takes off his mask, he doesn't look scary, just sickly.
Meanwhile, Anna is having her flashback images of her and Duke's life together and breaks free of the control from The Doctor (which she was unaware of) and frees Duke but, is knocked out by Rex. McCullen comes in and asks Duke to choose what he wants more, to stop them or to save Anna. Duke tries both and something explodes and McCullen gets his face burned to a crisp. The other Joes try to stop the missiles with the warheads from being launched but, to no avail. Missiles take off, Snake Eyes shoots one down. Ripcord decides to jump in a plane that he's never flown before and gets a kiss from Scarlett, who has now come around to his flirtation. He can't fire the controls because they're voice activated and won't respond in English. Scarlett says to try Celtic, which Ripcord has never heard of, (You've never heard of the Celtic language?!? Are you retarded?? Oh yeah, it's Marlon Wayans) and tells him the translation for "Fire." He saves Moscow, the last one is going for Washington D.C.
The U.S. Prez has been evacuated to a secret bunker and is locked inside. A secret service guy blows away his counterparts because he's under The Doctor's control. A door opens and out comes Zartan but, you don't see him and have to assume that he looks just like the Prez. They couldn't have Jonathan Pryce do a split screen or something?!? C'mon! The Prez says "So, that's your plan!" Yeah, pretty lame.
Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow fight it out and the latter gets cut up and then stabbed and falls into the water. He and Scarlett escape as the whole place blows. The Doctor has taken McCullen to his own special sub and takes off with Duke and Anna (who is not under the spell thanks to Duke) in tow behind them. The Doctor injects something into McCullen and proclaims that he will now be called Destro, as the nanomites make his face hard metal. He then puts on his own mask, another one, and tells Destro that he can call him Commander. Ugh.
Duke catches up and now is face to face, underwater, with Cobra Commander. Duke says he'll take him in. "You and what army??" asks Cobra Commander. Really, he says that. The rest of the Joes pop up behind Duke and he says "This one." Ripcord destroys the last missile and parachutes onto the LAWN OF THE WHITE HOUSE where he is somehow treated with kid gloves because he says "Same team! Same team!"
Last shot is Destro and C.C. in a special prison. Anna is also in a cell but, can get conjugal visits from Duke, while they work on removing the nanomites from her body. Then we see the Prez being welcomed back and he puts his feet on the desk and starts whistling, because it's really Zartan. THE END.
This movie was so damn awful, it was hard to even write this, as I had to relive it. I would flog Stephen Sommers and the writers if given the opportunity. This movie was so bad, I thought it was almost over and I looked at my watch and it had only been an hour!!! I literally said out loud, "God, please, let this movie end!" It was that painful!
It has very little connection to anything that you will remember from your childhood. What it is, is a slap in the face and a complete aberration to what I would consider G.I. Joe. I actually regret seeing this movie and only wrote this to stave off the disappointment you will also feel as a result.
These bastards are planning a trilogy for this story. Please DO NOT SEE THIS FILM! If it does well, it will only embolden them to make that happen. If it fails miserably, maybe a reboot can happen in 5 plus years. What a total failure of a movie.
Say NO to G.I. JOE.
Blood Red