Some Thoughts And Guesses About Skybound’s ‘GI Joe’ #1

This week, Skybound Entertainment announced what every Energon Universe fan has been anticipating — GI Joe is coming in November from the Duke creative team of Josh Williamson, Tom Reilly, and Jordie Bellaire.

The quartet of miniseries leading up to it has gotten us excited. While we wait for the debut, we poured over the first cover to look at hints and teases for the series. So from what’s already debuted and what we see on this cover, here’s what we think.

The Line-Ups

While we know that the Joes and Cobra both have large character rosters that couldn’t possibly fit on a single comic cover, those who were included (and excluded) were definitely significant. On the Joe side, we have (from the top down) Rock’n’Roll, Clutch, an unknown sharply-dressed character with a shotgun, Duke, Cover Girl, the Baroness and Stalker (or Sgt. Stalker as he’s been redubbed in the toyline). On the Cobra side, we get BATs, Tomax & Xamot, Mercer, Cobra Commander, Scrap-Iron, Destro and a new woman sniper. Some great choices to start the story. Not to say these are the only characters that will kick the story off, definitively, but if if they are, it’s a good starting point.

Also of note: all but the new characters have already been introduced in three of the four lead-in limited series.

Heel Turn Face? (Or Chekov’s Laser Gun)

Looking at that cover, two characters stick out. The Baroness has usually been Cobra, and sometimes she’s a little more neutral, even an ally to the Joes. This is the first time she’s outright been a member of the GI Joe team. Meanwhile, as part of Cobra, we see Mercer — a character who debuted as one of Slaughter’s Marauders (now known as the Mad Marauders) as a former Cobra Viper turned Joe.

Now, in both cases, a heel or face turn seems inevitable. In fact, with the Baroness, her inevitable heel turn just seems to be a ticking time bomb. Frankly, it’s so obvious that we think that it’s too obvious, and we’ll get Baroness on the side of angels much longer than anyone will anticipate. Hell, at least long enough for Hasbro to put out a GI Joe Classified figure of her rad GI Joe design. Mercer, on the other hand, is a D-list Joe at best, which makes his prominence point towards a Chekov’s gun. Is he a deep cover agent working for Hawk? Or is he truly a bad guy who will have a change of heart?

Ninja!

A GI Joe debut without Snake-Eyes or Storm Shadow — arguably the franchise’s most popular two characters — is so surprising that it got our wheels turning. Doubly so considering that Scarlett and Jinx are missing as well. Are the Arashikage going to be a third player in the series? Or is there possibly going to be a companion series to GI Joe featuring this quartet?

If I had to guess, the Scarlett series may lead directly into this series, meaning Snake-Eyes, Scarlett, Storm Shadow and Jinx will chose sides over the course of the first arc.

I guess they could actually be on the cover and they’re just that good at being ninja. 

Rookies

There are two characters that everyone buzzed about on this cover: The sharp-dressed Joe and the Cobra sniper. We think one might be a totally new character, while the other is a re-imagining of a popular-but-frankly-dated character.

The true rookie, we think, is the Cobra sniper. We can’t find anyone who matches her description in the Joe archives. She could be a radically rethought Black Out, but she would be the same character in name only at that point, considering the original Black Out is a male redhead. But then again, Lady Jaye is a deep cover agent, and she’s not on the Joe side despite her appearance in the Energon Universe FCBD special. Maybe she’s Lady Jaye in disguise? (This guess is entirely based on her mole, which really isn’t evidence, just a common trope for undercover spies.)

Meanwhile, our sharp dressed Joe looks new, but we’re pretty sure we know who he is. Considering his clothing and weapon remind us of a Texas Ranger, we looked at non-white Joes from the American Southwest, and one character immediately jumped out at us. We think this is Spirit Iron-Knife. His original design and characterization leaned into Native American stereotypes heavily, so re-imagining him as a “small-town sheriff” pulled into the Joes keeps the core of the character while moving away from the stereotypes.

Where is Zartan?

Cobra Commander made a few references to the leader of the Dreadnoks and master of disguise, Zartan. His exclusion here is the biggest outside of Snake-Eyes, Storm Shadow, and Scarlett. Or is he excluded? Could he be hiding in plain sight?

Yes, I’m saying he might be in deep cover as one of the Joes (which does make for a lot of possible double crosses and triple agents). And it may not be one of the ones we see here. Considering Hawk’s suspicious actions in the Duke series and the Energon Universe FCBD special, could Hawk actually be Zartan in disguise? He could absolutely be an unaffiliated agent of chaos as well, considering how violently Cobra Commander and Nemesis Prime tore through the Dreadnoks, aka his family, in Cobra Commander.

THAT ARM

Who does that Cybertronian arm belong to? Who?!

Is it Soundwave? I mean, that is his chestplate that Destro is standing next to. But the color is all wrong … Maybe one of the Autobots, considering we see wreckage of an unidentifiable Autobot on the Joe side of the cover?

I guess we’ll see when GI Joe #1 debuts in November from Skybound Entertainment/ Image Comics.