COBRA COMMANDER

Ryan Cairns submitted this excellent drawing of Cobra Commander to share with the faithful followers of Champion City Comics. Enjoy.

G.I. JOE #172 REVIEW

Writer: Larry Hama

Artist: S.L. Gallant


Some kids grew up reading titles like Superman, Spider-Man, or The Uncanny X-Men. I wasn't one of those kids. It was not that I didn't like those comics, but I was more interested in the war stories like Fightin' Army and Fightin' Marines. Those comic books really appealed to me and my love for those comics grew when I discovered G.I. Joe. 

It was November 1982 when my parents purchased G.I. Joe #4 for me as a gift. That's right folks, this was the Marvel era. I think it might have been a first communion gift, but that issue was my first G.I. Joe comic book. After reading that issue I was a regular reader of the series due to the fantastic stories by Larry Hama, who has been the man for this title for over four decades. His work was (and still is) great and he did a fantastic job developing many great tales of the Joes and COBRA. By the late 1980s my priorities had changed and I stopped reading comics. I recall selling my issue of G.I. Joe #4 at a garage sale for $.25 circa 1989. Ah, stupidity.

My comic book interest returned during the mid and late 1990s when I was in college, and I wanted to see what happened to G.I. Joe. The title had moved from Marvel to Dark Horse and for some reason I can not recall, I was not interested. Fast-forward to 2001 where I decided to get back into the G.I. Joe title when it was published by Image Comics. The stories were good, but for some other unknown reason, I stopped reading. I blame my Generation X slacker genes for dropping the ball.

A couple of weeks ago, I was looking around my local comic book store and noticed IDW was publishing G.I. Joe. I had not read the title in years, but decided to give it a try because Larry Hama was back at the helm as the lead writer. I immediately picked up issue #172 and was excited to see what was going on in the world of G.I. Joe.

As a fan that has been away from the title for a long time, I knew I was jumping right into the middle of a story where I was going to be lost. When I read issue #178, I was introduced to a group known as The Blue Ninjas and had a blast from the past with Darklon. What I liked about this issue is that we had The Blue Ninjas in Brooklyn taking on Storm Shadow, Snake Eyes, their sensei, and Billy. I'm doing my best to remember Billy, but their battle in Brooklyn is really exciting. Also, we have the Joes with a captured but wounded Darklon aboard a helicopter headed for the USS Flagg. Lady Jaye is also wounded and the helicopter may have been damaged while capturing Darklon and they are forced to make a crash landing.

Hama's writing is great because he's the mastermind of the G.I. Joe universe. We have an action-packed but well-paced comic book where we go back and forth from the helicopter about to crash to the battle in Brooklyn. Hama has been great at writing military themed comics due to his Army background and his knowledge of the martial arts is the perfect touch for this comic. S.L. Gallant's artwork is excellent and there is nothing more that I can say about this great series. 

OK, I'm back to reading G.I. Joe. I need to get back to the comic book store and do my best to get caught up with this series. Additionally, I need to jump in to the COBRA: Civil War series as well. Excellent work, Mr. Hama.




TonyDoug Wright is the owner and editor of Champion City Comics. His webcomics include Dr Death vs The Zombie, The End of Paradise, and Day 165.

COBRA #6 REVIEW

Writer: Mike Costa

Art: Werther Dell’Edera


Warning: This review contains spoilers

The Snakes have hit the fan. Well, they’re preparing to, at least.

Issue #6 of what’s currently the favorite of my monthly pulls, COBRA Civil War, keeps getting better as time progresses and the story unfolds. This month, and I’ll try to keep spoilers to a minimum in case you want to backtrack and snag the five previous outings of the cream of IDW’s crop, a renegade Joe is deep inside enemy territory and itching to tell his boss Bludd about the Joe’s soon-to-be built base.

He’s having a tough time covering his tracks, what with blatantly murdering a fellow Joe to throw off the investigation and all. To brownnose the Snakes he serves, the backstabber plans to transmit any and all details, provided he can make it past some suspicious security protocols set up to prevent just that. Meanwhile, as the ex-Joe digs deeper and Firewall’s investigations close in, COBRA sniper-elite Blacklight has been hitting the road Route 66 style to make it his target, the U.S. Capitol building, a target that competing COBRA Tomax stands to “benefit” from.

Like the other issues in the series, it’s too damn short. Not the creative team’s fault, economies and all that (paper’s EXPENSIVE) but with a book this good, this well edited, inked and colored, it DESERVES more pages. Fans would eat it up. Fans like me – No! Newly devout diehard fans like me—can’t wait, it’s that good. This is the G.I. Joe of my backyard youth, the one comic I look most forward to and the one you should be seriously consider pulling next time you’re at your local shop.

Verdict: 4 stars and not 5 because of lack of pages. More, IDW, more—don’t downsize the good stuff.


Brian Cee is a contributing writer at Champion City Comics

COBRA CIVIL WAR REVIEW

Writer: Mike Costa

Artist: Werther Dell'Edera

If G.I. Joe defined your 80s kid experience and you think the filmed diarrhea called GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra borders on child abuse, then IDW has THE grown-up title for you.

Writer Mike Costa and artist Werther Dell’Edera keep up with the Cobras in this month’s COBRA: Civil War #5 which, if you haven’t been keeping tabs on it, follows a handful of COBRA elite as they vie for the vacated throne of Commander in a jolly free-for-all power struggle that’s like a lethal backyard game of Duck, Duck, Goose meets Russian Roulette. Regular series artist Antonio Fuso sits this one out and that’s fine; Werther’s pencils fit neatly into Antonio’s very sparse detailing, a look that suits the tone of the series perfectly. As always, Costa’s damn good at nailing character nuances, like the Baroness’ icy disposition and Tomax’s cavalier ruthlessness.

In this issue—and we’re keeping it spoiler-free, so keep reading—we’re seeing the fallout from a rogue Joe’s covert actions to cover his tracks as the truth starts to surface. Seems he stands a lot to gain from aligning himself with one Major Bludd, but since the good major’s a—well, a bad guy—not all looks hunky dory for the turncoat Joe. This is all hitting the fan as COBRA sniper and all around guy-you-don’t-wanna-meet Blacklight heads cross country in a return trip, leaving bodies and excess property damage in his wake. We don’t know what it is exactly that he’s coming back for; all we readers know is that whomever he comes across had better have their final affairs in order.

I don’t buy IDW’s other ongoing GI Joe series that crosses over with this title, simply because this series is villain-centric and as a kid I dug the Snakes more than the Joes (the COBRA Rattler remains the coolest toy I ever drooled over.) Thanks to Costa’s smart dialogue—and when I mean smart, I mean Jeopardy contestant smart—we’re flies on the wall to the underhandedness of a COBRA corps who don’t terrorize the world for monetary or political gain— they terrorize because they feel they’re entitled to do so.

And the splash ad on the last page shows Blacklight, the U.S. Capitol building and some crosshairs, so if you’re down with realistic and the militaristic, drop the $4 on this issue and add this title to your monthly pulls.

A resounding 4.5 stars from the possible 5.

Brian Cee is a contributing writer at Champion City Comics