G.I. Joe:
The Movie
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For a detailed overview of this movie, click here.
To eradicate all human life on Earth, the forces of Cobra seek the broadcast energy transmitter. Can G.I. Joe save the planet?
Original USA release date: April 20th, 1987
Contents
1) Synopsis
2) Notes
3) Action Force: The Movie
4) Errors
Synopsis
At the Terror Drome, Cobra Commander and Serpentor argue about who is to blame for Cobra's failures. A single assassin infiltrates the Terror Drome, and as most of Cobra tries to intercept her, she manages to get to where Serpentor is. Serpentor recognizes her, as he's seen her in his dreams. Her name is Pythona, and she instructs him to capture the broadcast energy transmitter. In the Himalayas, the B.E.T. is being tested by G.I. Joe. The B.E.T. is capable of pumping pure energy through the air.
Cobra arrives, and a battle breaks out between them and G.I. Joe. However, Serpentor gets captured, and Cobra Commander orders a retreat. Roadblock leads a unit which goes after Cobra, but as they enter a mountain, they come under attack by a new enemy, and are defeated. Meanwhile, Beach Head meets G.I. Joe's newest recruits: Chuckles, Tunnel Rat, Big Lob, Jinx and Law. He starts training them to become Joes.
Meanwhile, Falcon, another new member of G.I. Joe, takes his new girlfriend Heather on a tour of their base, including revealing where they are keeping Serpentor. Duke angrily berates him for doing this, and has Heather pass her roll of film over. Heather leaves, but she is actually Zarana in disguise. Cobra assaults the base, and thanks to Falcon abandoning his guard duties, Serpentor is freed by Pythona, Nemesis Enforcer and the Dreadnoks. They escape with Serpentor, leaving Alpine, Bazooka and Gung-Ho injured. Hawk tells Falcon he's confined to quarters until court marshall, and orders for him to be taken away.
Serpentor is taken back to Cobra-La, where he meets his true creator: Golobulus. Golobulus reveals to Dr. Mindbender that he was the one who implanted the idea of Serpentor into his mind. Back at the Joe base, Duke has looked through Falcon's record, and has found nothing redeemable about him. Duke asks the court for Falcon to be spared, believing there is a Joe worth saving in him, and that he is also his half brother. At Cobra-La, a trial takes place for Cobra Commander. Golobulus reveals that 40,000 years ago, Cobra-La dominated the planet, but an age of ice destroyed almost everything. As their kind exiled themselves, human beings took over the planet. As time passed, Cobra Commander was sent back to the surface to raise a mighty army, and destroy the human civilization. But he has failed in this task.
Nemesis Enforcer releases some degeneration spores over Cobra Commander, which start to effect him. Meanwhile, Falcon has been sent to the Slaughterhouse, where he meets Sgt. Slaughter and his Joes in training, the Renegades: Mercer, Red Dog and Taurus. Back at Cobra-La, Cobra Commander is to be thrown in with the captured Joes, but they escape from their cell. They run into a plant which captures nearly all of them, but Roadblock avoids it thanks to Cobra Commander telling him to wait.
Roadblock attempts to leave with Cobra Commander, but Nemesis Enforcer releases some more spores which blind Road Block. He and Cobra Commander still manage to get away, but fall down into a river. Cobra Commander's mask falls off, revealing that he is starting to degenerate into a snake. Meanwhile, Falcon's grueling training begins. Duke contacts Slaughter and asks him to lead an assault on the Cobra Terror Drome, and find out what happened to Roadblock's unit.
The Joe's have the B.E.T. moved to a civilian security lab, but Baroness finds out about it. Meanwhile, Slaughter's group manage to get into the Terror Drome, and overhear talk about an attack on the lab and something called Cobra-La. Mercer, an ex-Cobra Viper, says he's never heard of Cobra-La. The group split up, and as Slaughter's group setup a bomb, Falcon gets captured trying to contact G.I. Joe to warn them about the upcoming attack. Slaughter's group go back and rescue Falcon, and then get out of the Terror Drome.
The Terror Drome explodes, but Serpentor and the others survive. They launch a massive assault on the lab, aided by several Cobra-La creatures. The Renegades arrive to help, but Serpentor tries to kill Falcon. Duke gets in the way and takes this hit meant for Falcon, whilst Serpentor and the rest of Cobra take the B.E.T. and head back to Cobra-La. Duke goes into a coma.
The B.E.T. is activated, to begin a plan Golobulus has made to wipe out all of human civilization. Many pods are launched into space, and the pods contain spores which will cover the Earth, degenerating any human life they come into contact with into mindless beasts. The pods need energy to ripen, which is what the B.E.T. will provide. The Joes pick up the energy readings from the B.E.T., and Duke leads a strike force to the Himalayas. Beach Head believes Falcon and the other new recruits aren't ready yet, and they are told to stay and guard the base. As Duke's force begins their assault, Flint's unit, which had been sent out to find Roadblock's unit, contacts Falcon. They've found Roadblock, and he warns them about the plants in Cobra-La.
Duke's team invades Cobra-La, but get captured by the plants. Falcon and the others head to the Himalayas, where they meet Flint's unit. They all head into Cobra-La thanks to some directions from Cobra Commander, but he appears to lose his mind, and slithers off. Falcon's group find and defeat the Dreadnoks, and then use their Swampfires to begin a surprise attack. The captured Joes are all freed, and then a big battle begins between them and the combined forces of Cobra and Cobra-La.
Falcon, Jinx and Slaughter head off to try and stop the broadcast energy transmitter. Falcon gets into a fight with Serpentor, but gets some unexpected help from Cobra Commander, who appears and battles one of Serpentor's snakes. Jinx fights Pythona, and when Pythona leaps forwards, Jinx ducks, leading to Pythona falling to her death.
Slaughter fights and defeats Nemesis Enforcer. Falcon gets onto Serpentor's chariot, and they fly over to where the B.E.T. is. After managing to send Serpentor flying away, Falcon gets into a fight with Golobulus, but eventually he manages to deactivate the broadcast energy transmitter. However Golobulus tells him he's too late, and says that G.I. Joe has lost. He retreats, but Falcon decides to try something. He overloads the B.E.T., causing it to send out far more energy than ever before.
The energy overload causes the pods in space to be destroyed, taking the spores with them. Slaughter and Jinx work together to get Falcon back to where they are, and then they and the rest of G.I. Joe retreat. The B.E.T. explodes, resulting in Cobra-La's destruction.
The Joes all make it out, and are overjoyed to hear from Doc that Duke has come out of his coma. Falcon and Jinx share a kiss. As the Joes head back home, Falcon and Jinx look at the remains of Cobra-La. They then look at the sky, and Jinx says that these sparkles must be the last of the mutation spores, which are burning up in orbit. Falcon thanks his big brother, then tells Jinx it's time for them to go.
-It had originally been intended for this movie to be given a theatrical release, but this never happened, and it was instead released straight to video. The reason for this is believed to be the poor box office returns for the My Little Pony and Transformers movies made Hasbro change their minds about G.I. Joe. However Buzz Dixon (story consultant for the film) mentioned in an interview that the reason the G.I. Joe movie never saw a cinematic release was due to an argument Sunbow had with a distributor about the Transformers movie.
-The opening Statue of Liberty Battle was not in the original script. It was added at Hasbro's request, as they wanted the film to have a "big, action opening".
-Ron Friedman wrote the original script for this film, and had a deal that he would get the sole "written by" credit -even though his script would be heavily edited, to the point where, according to Buzz Dixon "we basically went back to square one". Buzz says that they did use one of the characters that Ron came up with -Nemesis Enforcer -but just how different Ron's original script was compared to the final script remains to be seen.
-Big Lob is the only new character to not have a toy. Presumably Hasbro intended to release one, but then cancelled it, leaving Big Lob to only appear in this movie, and then never being heard from again.
-Chuckles has no dialogue in the film at all.
-The battle cry of Cobra-La was meant to have the villains shout "Cobra-La!", but the "La" part would be a high-pitched, piercing shriek. But the voice actors, such as Richard Gautier, had too deep voices, and couldn't do it. So the cry was changed to the silly "Cobra-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la!".
-In the original script, Duke dies, and the Joes later hold a funeral for him. But when the Transformers movie was released, there was an extreme fan and parent backlash over the death of the good guy's leader, Optimus Prime. So for the G.I. Joe movie, some extra dialogue was added to change it so Duke goes into a coma. More extra dialogue was added to the end of the film, as Doc radios in to the Joes that Duke has woken up from his coma and is going to be alright -despite clearly having a snake thrown into his heart.
-A shot of the time worm being stabbed into the right eye of Golobulus was animated, but it was cut due to it being deemed too violent.
When released on video in the UK, some changes were made to it, as had happened with episodes of the animated series. Retitled Action Force: The Movie, the opening Statue of Liberty battle scene was altered to remove some animation, and a new song was recorded for it. Unfortunately the opening scene had all the sound effects removed for this version. The "Yo Joe!" battle cry was redubbed, so now everyone instead says "Full Force!". The other major change is that Sgt. Slaughter is always called Sgt. Slammer in this version, and the name of his home was changed from the Slaughterhouse to the Slammerhouse. The redubbed dialogue did not use the original voice actors, with some poor replacements being used who don't do a very good job.
-When Heather passes Duke the disc, the disc passes through Duke's thumb.
-When the Joes are seen moving out after the alarm goes off, the sign on the buildings states "BARRAKS" instead of "BARRACKS".
-When Golobulus says "that wrong" his eye color changes from yellow to white as his head moves.
-Lifeline is part of Flint's unit, but he's at one point seen with the group of Joes who move the B.E.T. to the security lab.
-When the Renegades attack Serpentor, his fist is flesh colored instead of yellow when he says "what?!"
