Okay, I have a confession to make. I love these Resolute toys. I really, really, REALLY love these Resolute toys. I know everyone labels me a Hasbro fanboy anyway, so that probably comes as no surprise to anyone, but my love for these Resolute toys goes beyond my normal love for the normal cool toys.
While I am fired up for the Pursuit of Cobra items and I love what I’m seeing there, too, for some reason the look and feel of G.I. Joe: Resolute just has me on cloud nine. It’s a little bitter sweet, because I’m not sure we’ll ever see anything else from this awesome Resolute universe, but if this is it, it’s a great last stand.
Granted, there were aspects of the Resolute story that certainly were not perfect, but the big drawing point were the designs, and seeing those designs translated into 3 3/4″ plastic form is absolutely awesome. So, of course, since I’m so ramped up, I couldn’t just stop at two reviews posted today… here are FOUR more. These are all linked at the G.I. Joe: Resolute Reviews Page, or you can check them out individually below:
So that’s a total of eight of the fourteen figures… I might even get the last six posted tomorrow. But I don’t want to shortchange my “Review-A-Rama” too much!
Anyway, check ’em out above.
Sure, it’s not G.I. Joe: Resolute, but part of me still enjoys the rampant cheesiness and the total “made low budget just for kids” mentality of these Operation: HISS webisodes. Hasbro’s Monkeybar TV has uploaded two more featurettes to continue the Rise of Cobra storyline.
First and foremost, Episode 6 has been posted, and you can check it out right here. You can check out some screen shots mirrored below.
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But there’s also a Zartan related profile episode that’s been posted here, with a nice little cameo of everyone’s favorite G.I. Joe Marine near the end.
Warning – There are Spoilers abound in this review! If you don’t want to be spoiled, stop reading.
As I sit down and read through this issue, it suddenly occurs to me. We are well over a year into G.I. Joe’s run through the IDW universe, and we haven’t even seen Storm Shadow yet. How is that possible? Or did I just miss it somewhere along the way?
I don’t have a clue why I suddenly thought of that as I was reading the issue…perhaps it was seeing Snake Eyes meditating in the darkness as Scarlett welcomed him back to The Pit in a sort of awkward non-conversation. I don’t know whether I should commend Chuck Dixon for holding off that long, or if I should ask “what the #@$ are you waiting for?” Granted, there really hasn’t been a place for Storm Shadow to fit in yet, but part of me does hope they don’t just reserve the “Origins” book to show all of the…you know… origins. I mean, something like that has to happen in the main title, right?
G.I. Joe’s flagship book continues to move at a decent pace, though I’ve grown a bit weary already of the “Destro in the gulag” storyline. It at least takes a step in the right direction this time around, and it was cool to see him have some direct (sort of) interaction with Cobra Commander. I find myself really digging Cobra Commander’s “look” in this universe, and part of me hopes maybe this is a new evolution of the character. As comfortable as we all are in his typical battle helmet or hood, this fanged faceplate is growing on me. It would be neat to see this look in Renegades as well.
We get a small taste of Destro’s ancestry in this issue, too, which follows pretty typical norms as his Scottish ancestor uses grenades to scatter a French invasion force just prior to the events of Waterloo. Gallant’s art continues to have a great flow and feel in this issue, and he draws landscape scenes and action with similar energy. I find myself consistently reminded of Mark Bagley, and I enjoy that style of art, so I have no issues with that whatsoever.
The issue wraps up with a possible cameo of Cobra Island, as the Joes look to pay a little visit to this mysterious piece of green forest in the middle of the ocean.
As I said, the pace continues pretty steadily this month, and things actually continue to happen. Action was mostly concentrated in the gulag, but it looks like that could potentially change next month as the Joes crawl into enemy territory. It does continue to surprise me that we have a glaring lack of certain core characters, but there’s always something to look forward to. One just hopes they don’t wait a little bit too long.
Looks like Hasbro is making up for some lost time. After a few months in limbo, a couple of days ago, we got a short Scarlett spotlight, which was the first Operation: HISS update we’d gotten in quite a while. Now this morning, it would appear that even though Hasbro hasn’t posted them on their site yet, MonkeybarTV.com has Episodes 4 and 5 posted for the animated series that has gotten quite mixed reviews.
Well, not so mixed. Pretty much just bad. But hey! Look! It’s Agent Helix!
Seriously, this is obviously made for kids…not much money invested in it…and not a whole lot of emotion either. But it’s always cool to see Joe characters come to life on screen, and I can’t help but smile seeing Helix running around alongside Snake Eyes in animated form. Check out the episodes at the links below. These actually have a nice little helping of action…and yes, it’s quite obvious they’re simply using the video game models to make these, but hey, I guess it’s something, right? Episode 4
For a short while we were getting monthly updates to a new animated G.I. Joe short-format “web series” that takes place in the Rise of Cobra universe, called “Operation: HISS”. Initially designed to bridge the story between Rise of Cobra and Pursuit of Cobra, but is obviously something that was not necessarily created with the highest standard in mind.
Regardless, it’s been a couple of months since we saw anything new from the Operation: HISS series, and some folks (probably not many) were wondering what the heck happened. No idea. But I do know at least, that Hasbro posted a short Scarlett Spotlight on their video page, and the MS G.I. Joe Collectors’ Club posted a very nice high def encode up on their Facebook page.
I’ve encoded it below.
I know this is pretty hokey, but I was at least hoping to see someone like Helix show up somewhere along the way…
