GI Joe No. 261 is full of killing machines

The Joes grind through Shazidar on a rescue mission, as Destro and Baroness are cornered in Kansas by The Revanche in GI Joe No. 261.

GI Joe: A Real American Hero 261 art by Netho Diaz and Vinicius Townsend (Courtesy Hasbro, published by IDW)

Cobra is “A ruthless terrorist organization determined to rule the world.” Over the years hundreds of blue-shirted scrubs have died for that mission statement, and thousands of robot BATS (Battle Android Troopers) have been mowed down. In Cobra human life is disposable, but the robots are now striking back. The sentient mechanical collective The Revanche, who supply parts for those droids, have begun an initiative.

The Revanche have been muscling in on the sales of Destro’s family business, MARS weapons sales. In response, Lord Destro and Baroness have stormed a Revanche facility hoping to kill their leaders and steal their best technology. Instead, they’ve been lured into a trap and the duo spend issue 261 of GI Joe: A Real American Hero battling for their lives. This enemy is a machine of perpetual death, feeling emotion only when they need it—as shown in this year’s GI Joe Yearbook. What is the motivation of these machines though? We don’t know, but The Revanche’s Core Entity, Alpha 001 Prime, is still chasing Destro at the end of this chapter, leaving answers for later.

GI Joe: A Real American Hero 261 art by Netho Diaz and Jagdish Kumar (Courtesy Hasbro, published by IDW)

Meanwhile, in the faux middle eastern country Shazidar, two teams of Joes are on the run from a different unstoppable enemy, flesh and blood loyalists to Dictator Aboud. Cover Girl’s trio catches up with Airborne’s group of orphans and U.N peacekeepers, while all of them are being chased by an essentially faceless cadre of bad guys. Thanks to buckets of bullets, and tricky flying by Wild Bill, the team gets away. The Joes take some nicks, the peacekeepers suffer too, but the native fighters get the worst of it when they’re blown away with a parting shot from the sky.

What’s interesting about these the two plots in this issue, is how the adversaries are paralleled. By cutting between each scenario, Hama inadvertently asks readers to draw a comparison between the enemies: Like the killer robots hunting Destro, are not the loyalists chasing the Joes also in a sense, inhuman? I don’t think it’s intentional, but in a military comic where lives are regularly lost, the adversaries will inevitably get dehumanized, least the constant bloodshed becomes disturbing to readers.

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One of the best ideas Hasbro ever had was to create the BAT robots for GI Joe to smash week after week on the cartoon. Needing only a handful of human bad guys to return each episode/issue created its own problem though, GI Joe fans have become so attached to Cobra Commander, Zartan, Destro, etc., that their role of adversaries has gotten compromised over time. Both the readers–and Hama himself to a degree it seems–have come to adore these characters. We get endearing moments like Dr. Mindbender sending the gift of a prosthetic foot to Sightline, who saved his life in issue 259.

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The longevity of GI Joe: A Real American Hero helped allow the evolution of their sympathetic villains, and opened the door to more involved and varied storytelling. The inadvertent juxtaposition in this issue though, makes me think about how the media and politicians have dehumanized other groups in the real world, as a way to justify hate and supremacy. I’m probably overthinking it, but I’m glad the Joes have left Shazidar, and we’ll be spending more time with Destro and Baroness mowing down the robots of The Revanche next issue.

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