Is the G.I. JOE movie going to be massively changed from the cartoon/comic?

[toddly6666]

Well, it seems like the G.I. JOE movie is going to be massively screwed up because of producers wanted the film to be marketed everywhere, so they have to make it international, non-American, and have ACTION MAN in it.

Just because the world may hate America politcally now, it doesn't mean the world will not watch a patriotic group of Americans fighting a terrorist organization. Producers are forgetting that the majority films watched and the majority of films in foreign video stores are, in fact, American Hollywood films, not local films.

Just because the G.I. Joe cartoon didn't play in other countries, it doesn't mean they gotta screw it up. Most superhero movies aren't changed around to adapt to foreign countries - in foreign countries, they only know of Batman, Spiderman and Superman. And there have been tons of other comic book movies besides those three.

Well at least, the cartoons of Transformers, M.A.S.K., Thundercats have been played in other countries, so that could be good news for potential M.A.S.K. and Thundercat films.

The only other place that I know of that grew up with G.I. JOE is Japan, Mexico, South America, England and India. I don't know if they had the cartoon, but they had the toys:

There are enough countries that are aware of the G.I. JOE toys so that they don't need to screw up the original JOE characters/storylines for the movie.

 

[mr. peasant]

Well, it seems like the G.I. JOE movie is going to be massively screwed up because of producers wanted the film to be marketed everywhere, so they have to make it international, non-American, and have ACTION MAN in it.

Just because the world may hate America politcally now, it doesn't mean the world will not watch a patriotic group of Americans fighting a terrorist organization. Producers are forgetting that the majority films watched and the majority of films in foreign video stores are, in fact, American Hollywood films, not local films.

I absolutely agree. Speaking as an Asian from a Commonwealth country, I can speak with great certainty that there is validity in your argument. Most of the popular movies watched here are in fact, English language films, particularly from the U.S. and the U.K.. Even though the people here are largely unhappy with the political situations in both countries, that has yet to stop us from watching these movies. Here, and I believe everywhere else in the world, people are smart enough to separate politics and entertainment. Just because we don't agree with what the U.S. does doesn't mean we will stop doing what we like, such as watching movies.

Just because the G.I. Joe cartoon didn't play in other countries, it doesn't mean they gotta screw it up. Most superhero movies aren't changed around to adapt to foreign countries - in foreign countries, they only know of Batman, Spiderman and Superman. And there have been tons of other comic book movies besides those three.

I'm not sure how widespread it is globally, but I remember G.I. Joe cartoon being aired here as well as the comics sold in bookshops, both baring the name 'G.I. Joe' too, mind you. While I can't say for certain how popular they were, I can say that for a time, the Joe toys themselves were pretty well received (again, with the G.I. Joe brand name even though I'm in the Commonwealth).

There are enough countries that are aware of the G.I. JOE toys so that they don't need to screw up the original JOE characters/storylines for the movie.

The problem is not so much a question as whether the G.I. Joe brand name is popular and in how many countries. Rather, the issue is that the producers believe (whether rightly or wrongly) that the name Action Man is more popular and recognizable in Europe, thus making the film easier to market and profitable over there. The whole 'appeasing international markets' is referring to this group, rather than South America, Africa and Asia. They seem to equate the European market as the international market or believe that whatever is popular in Europe will be in other parts of the world.

 

[toddly6666]

Normally, a movie gets a name change in all the different countries it plays in. They can just rename the G.I. JOE movie ACTION MAN in any damn foreign country they want.


I don't mind the G.I. JOE producers just adding Action Man aka Alex Mann as one character, but if they try and merge the two stories and characters from the Action Man cartoon, we have an officially screwed up G.I. JOE movie. Here's the synopsis of the Action Man cartoon from wikipedia:

[edit] 1995 Series

Action Man is a member of an elite multinational task force. While fighting for this task force, Action Man tries also to unlock the mystery of his past.
Produced by DiC Entertainment, Action Man producers dubbed the show as being in the vein of James Bond and Indiana Jones, and claimed the show would "thrill both children and parents."
The series was created using live-action footage to enhance the computer animation. DiC's sales promotions touted its "morphing techniques". The circular AM logo is first used in this series.
Twenty-six episodes, half an hour each.
Action Man was played by Mark Griffin, who is best known as "Trojan", from Gladiators, the british version of the hit sports show, American Gladiators.
Tagline: Let's Get Extreme!

[edit] 2000 Series

Produced by Mainframe Entertainment and aired on YTV in Canada and on Fox Kids Saturday in the United States, Action Man now has a civilian identity as Alex Mann, an extreme sports athlete of Team Xtreme who discovers that danger and adrenaline trigger hidden mental powers called AMP (Advanced Mathematical Probability) Factor, a result of secret experiment by his former coach Simon Grey that allows Alex to calculate all the future possibilities and choose the best course of action. With the help of Desmond 'Grinder' Sinclair, Fidget Wilson, and Rikki Syngh-Baines as support crew, Action Mann must stop Dr. X, a brilliant genecticist and bio-engineer, who will stop at nothing to hunt down Action Man and duplicate his AMP Factor for the quest of rebuilding Earth with the genetically enhanced neo-humanity. At the same time, Alex must also get back to the stadium in time to win extreme sports tournaments.
In the first season, Dr. X captured and tested Alex Mann repeatedly, and captured and brainwashed Alex's main rival and best friend Brandon Caine. Dr. X always worked alone, save for his trilobite robots. Dr. X added nanotech enhancements to Brandon, first to make him superior to Alex in battle but then to make the athlete "perfect". The culmination of the experiments was to mind transfer or upload Dr. X into Brandon's body. Dr. X in Brandon's body then became a nanotech cyborg, able to change his appearance and infect others with his nanotech devices. Dr. X hired Asazi (an assassin), and Templeton Storm/Tempest (a temperamental young genius), and tried to recruit AM to form a Council of DOOM.
In second season (titled 'DOOM Strikes Back'), COD was formed when Dr. X hired Gangrene, Sidney/Quake as additional members. Team Xtreme gained a dolphin named Triton. Dr. X's nanotech trilobites appeared to gain collective intelligence and rebel against Dr. X in the season finale, but this was actually Brandon Caine's uploaded mind trying to punish Dr. X for taking his body.
The 2000 series is also the first series that launches the slogan 'Action Man, The Greatest Hero of Them All'.

[edit] Action Man: Robot ATAK

In this CGI movie, Action Force consists of Action Man, Flynt, Red Wolf as members. The world's leading scientist is kidnapped by a mysterious villain called No Face and Action Man is framed for it. Meanwhile, an army of robots are taking over the world and the evil Dr. X has been brought back to life and has a deadly plan to control all humans with a mind controlling gas. Only Action Man and his Action Force Team of RedWolf and Flynt have a hope of stopping them. But it means taking the fight to the dreaded Island X and time is running out.
Unlike previous releases, this movie is only available in Europe. When Atari released the game in Australia and New Zealand, the movie is bundled with the GBA Action Man Robot Atak video game.
In the GBA video game, the Action Force has to discover who is this mysterious NO FACE who kidnapped Professor Moran because of his new discovery, a medicine which makes people doing what you want them to do. NO FACE wants to enslave the world by using this medicine.
Movie script is written by Alan Grant[1].

[edit] Action Man X Missions: The Movie

Produced by Reel FX Creative Studios and released by Paramount Home Entertainment in Europe on 2005-09-28, this time AM battles against the Dr. X and his Toxic troopers, created by mixing the DNA of humans with angry animals. Dr. X used animal DNA to create a deadly Terror Toxin to spray innocent people, turning them into an army of Toxic Troopers. The upgraded Toxic Robot now equipped with razor sharp swords on the arms.
Action Force consists of Action Man, Flynt (snowboarder), Redwolf (kayaker), with Tiger Strike (tiger) as ally. Dr. X has a Komodo dragon pet named Dragon X.
Action Force gadgets included Turbo Bike (motorcycle), Spy Patrol (stealth suit), Aqua Camo (underwater stealth suit), Orca Sea-Jet (jetski), Mountain Racer (skateboard), Arctic Storm (snowmobile), Air Assault (attack helicopter). Dr. X's army included Deep-Sea ATAK/X-Shark (shark), X Robot (robot).
The movie's plot is very similar to the G.I. Joe movie Valor vs. Venom (also based on a Hasbro franchise): The bad guys create mutant troops (Cobra V-Troops/Dr. X's Toxic Troopers) and kidnap the good guys' leader (General Hawk in VvsV, in this movie an "office leader", Sir Arthur Strong, was created only to be kidnapped), who is transformed into the most powerful mutant. Also, some Toxic Troopers were very similar to Cobra's Snow Wolfs.

 

[OptimusCannabis]

Just because the world may hate America politcally now, it doesn't mean the world will not watch a patriotic group of Americans fighting a terrorist organization. Producers are forgetting that the majority films watched and the majority of films in foreign video stores are, in fact, American Hollywood films, not local films.

I lived in Puerto Rico for a couple years and although it is basically a commonwealth of the U.S. there isn't much love for Americans. In fact, there IS flat out hate in some parts. Still, you go to any of their multiplexes and all ten movies are American films in English.

Besides, what good is having one British character going to do for marketing to the rest of the world? How many more viewers will Action Man bring in? 100? 1000? Hardley enough to make altering the story drastically a wise decision.

The only other place that I know of that grew up with G.I. JOE is Japan, Mexico, South America, England and India. I don't know if they had the cartoon, but they had the toys:

I could do without Negro Viper.

There are enough countries that are aware of the G.I. JOE toys so that they don't need to screw up the original JOE characters/storylines for the movie.

If they put Mark Wahlberg, Brad Pitt, Jet Li, and Willem Dafoe in this THAT will make up for the anti American sentiments in foreign lands.

 

[TheVileOne]

Someone explain to me how a movie like Transformers, crappy as it was, to have all sorts of overt patriotism and military themes and still make $354 million overseas.

I don't get the flawed thinking of Hollywood.

 

[Oerwinde]

http://www.chud.com/index.php?type=news&id=11568

Don't know if he's joking or not. Sometimes hard to tell on that site. But Destro is now the leader of Cobra? Bull****.

 

[toddly6666]

Well, the Chud script summary sounds 10 times better than the Action Man vs. Rex summory...And as much as I love sticking to the cartoon, Cobra Commander is basically Starscream - Destro really should be the one in charge.

 

[tamron]

CC was akin to Starscream because it was a cartoon.

CC has been handled seriously in the comics, and could easily be a credible threat in a GI Joe film.

 

[OptimusCannabis]

Cobra Commander is basically Starscream - Destro really should be the one in charge.

Thank you.t:

 

[CobraCommander]

The cartoon is not the canon that I follow. The comics are where it's at. And Cobra Commander is one evil, dangerous, scheming bastard in the comics. Far more of a threat than Destro, and even has defeated Serpentor in hand to hand combat.

Destro, as great a character as he is, is not the leader of Cobra. He is a businessman first and foremost. He runs a large arms corporation. He is not a terrorist leader. Cobra Commander, however, is.

 

[TheVileOne]

The comics canon also came before the cartoon.

And the toys were originally for the comics as well. Larry Hama was essentially the creator of all modern GI JOE continuity.

I got to wonder what his take on all of this business is. I'm not saying he should write the movie, but you know, he's basically the pioneer of material Hollywood says they want to adapt.

And it also just goes to show that Hasbro doesn't give a **** about protecting the integrity of the source material. All they care about is making more Transformers money.

 

[Rockbottom]

Isn't G.I.Joe the same as Action Man in the UK? Im not 100% sure.

 

[OptimusCannabis]

Isn't G.I.Joe the same as Action Man in the UK? Im not 100% sure.

No, not at all.

 

[TheVileOne]

No Action Man is a separate property and character.

He's been repackaged in the US in years past as an American character and an extreme sports star in that terrible CGI cartoon.

 

[mr. peasant]

And the toys were originally for the comics as well. Larry Hama was essentially the creator of all modern GI JOE continuity.

Correct me if I'm wrong, I always thought it was the other way around; that the comic was used to promote the toys. It was when the comics were popular that Hasbro decided to incorporate elements from the comic into toys, thus becoming a strong influence on it for a time. However, I will not argue against the opinion that Larry Hama is the creator of the modern G.I. Joe mythos on the grounds that it's fairly true.

 

[CobraCommander]

Everything was an advertisement for the toys. Hasbro was a toy company, and the comic, cartoon, and any commercials you saw were all made to sell toys.

BUT, with a story, the toys became more desirable and more interesting. Larry Hama is responsible for that story, and for the mythology that Joe fans everywhere know and love.

This movie is ignoring all of that. And that is more than a shame- it is unacceptable.

 

[Timstuff]

Here's an article that got posted a few days ago. It has at least managed to temporarily comfort me, reminding me that even though the project is currently going downhill, Hasbro is not completely oblivious to the fact that GI Joe is American, and that the production could change in the blink of an eye.

http://adage.com/article?article_id=119955

LOS ANGELES (AdAge.com) -- GI Joe is a real American hero -- and that might be a bit of problem for both Paramount Pictures and Hasbro.
GI Joe: Americas movable fighting man.
GI Joe: Americas movable fighting man.


Their relationship would appear to be on extremely solid footing: Paramount and Hasbro are both riding high this summer, enjoying the $633 million global box-office haul of the toy maker's smash hit, "Transformers." But now, efforts to turn Hasbro's GI Joe into a motion picture are proving particularly fraught.

Deciding whether to make "GI Joe" at all, let alone how to market it, is nettlesome thanks in large measure to an unpopular American president defending an unpopular war: In a July USA Today/Gallup poll, a record high of 62% respondents had called the invasion of Iraq "a mistake."A month later, that view is 57%, more or less where it's been for over a year.

Overseas, the view is even more dire. "Not only is there worldwide support for a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, but there also is considerable opposition to U.S. and NATO operations in Afghanistan," the Pew Global Attitudes Project found in June. So the prospect of sending more soldiers -- albeit celluloid ones -- is a complicated task at best. "There are always challenges," said Brian Goldner, Hasbro's chief operating officer. "GI Joe is not just a brand that represents the military; it also represents great characters."

Two competing scripts
In the early 1970s, with America in a Vietnamese quagmire, Hasbro sought to play down the war theme that initially defined GI Joe. The line was rebranded "The Adventures of GI Joe," and Joe was cast as the leader of the "Adventure Team." Sales flagged, and Hasbro shut down domestic production of the line in 1978, only to relaunch it in 1982 as counterterrorist forces fighting a spectral terror organization called Cobra.

Now that Paramount has again teamed with producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura, who produced "Transformers" for the studio, the question is: Which GI Joe will Paramount and Hasbro go with?

There are two competing scripts in development at Paramount. The latest comes from screenwriter Skip Woods, best known for writing the thriller "Swordfish," the other, from the team of David Elliot and Paul Lovett, who last penned Paramount's sleeper action hit "Four Brothers," which Mr. di Bonaventura also produced.

Mr. Elliot and Mr. Lovett's script is said to be evocative of the less-overtly militaristic version of GI Joe. A person familiar with both scripts describing theirs as "sort of an 'X-men' meets 'Mission: Impossible' -- like GI Joe force."

No decisions made
Mr. Woods' script is more akin to GI Joe circa 1997, when Hasbro's Classic Collection featured more realistic military hardware and weaponry and a more patriotic theme -- and presumably, therefore, a more problematic marketing plan. It's said to include a character called "Action Man," a nod to the title GI Joe used in overseas markets. Mr. Goldner said the film might be marketed as GI Joe in the States and Action Man overseas but no decisions has been made.

A spokeswoman for Mr. di Bonaventura would not comment on the picture's development. Rob Moore, Paramount's president-worldwide marketing and distribution, said, "Until there's a [locked] script, I don't think you can really comment on what the international reaction will be. In 'Bourne Ultimatum,' you have the story of what is essentially an American spy. But the characterization of the military and the CIA is: They're the bad guys. In any event, there are parts of the world where it's an issue, like Western Europe, and parts where it isn't, like the U.K., Australia and Asia."

But Mr. Goldner said Hasbro is sensitive to the current world climate. "We'll weigh our options. Clearly we do a lot of work on consumer insight."

Screw this "globally integrated" crap. GI Joe is an arm of the American military, and there should not be any shame in that. If they're worried about the global market, then they should just dub it over as "action force" internationally, and focus their efforts on marketing in the US.

 

[toddly6666]

Exactly, screw this globally integrated crap.

As long as the villains are clarified, the people will enjoy watching a USA-military group kick ass, and also have their ass kicked. If they give any respect to Cobra, Cobra will kick major ass as well so everyone's happy - both sides should be equally biotch-slapped. Even at the end of the movie, no one really wins, Cobra should get away, just like in the cartoon. The cartoon is a better representation of reality, because if the good guys won all the time (a Hollywood concept), then there wouldn't be any more Cobra characters in following episodes.

Furthermore, The Cobra villains are exactly like the nazis (besides the minorities-extermination factor) - they make their ideas clear, they tell everyone who they are, and that's that. The Joes vs. Cobra is not G. Bush's USA vs. some vague terrorist group. In reality, everything is vague and corrupt. In movie reality, the nazis were the last black & white villains, and the easiest to deal with in cinema. Cobra should not symbolize any middle eastern/korean conflict - they should symbolize the nazis. Even in the Transformers movie, the only Middle Eastern scenes are the ones that the whole USA base is slaughtered like biotches, especially funny with all that military technology they have - they have to go to little Arab boy's family to get a phone, and then the little middle eastern town helps them fight against Scorpnok.

 

[Desslar]

I could do without Negro Viper.

Hmm, sounds a bit racist, don't you think?

 

[Hypestyle]

i hope that Cobra Commander and Destro are not combined.. their interaction is a key component to the comics/toons..

 

[OptimusCannabis]

Hmm, sounds a bit racist, don't you think?

Negro is the Spanish word for black.

 

[OptimusCannabis]

i hope that Cobra Commander and Destro are not combined.. their interaction is a key component to the comics/toons..

Combined? Why? What do you mean?

 

[Timstuff]

From the description so far, the villain is supposed to be a "Double-crossing Scottish arms dealer." There is no mention of an American terrorist leader, which sounds like they could be attempting to merge Cobra Commander and Destro into one character.

 

[OptimusCannabis]

From the description so far, the villain is supposed to be a "Double-crossing Scottish arms dealer." There is no mention of an American terrorist leader, which sounds like they could be attempting to merge Cobra Commander and Destro into one character.

Do the so called 'brains' behind this supposed G.I. Joe production have any knowledge of G.I. Joe? Have they ever even seen a comic book or cartoon or played G.I. Joe's??? I'm willing to bet 'NO.'

Sorry G.I. Joe fans, it looks like we'll be getting the equivalent of Daredevil or Cat Woman.

 

[mr. peasant]

From the description so far, the villain is supposed to be a "Double-crossing Scottish arms dealer." There is no mention of an American terrorist leader, which sounds like they could be attempting to merge Cobra Commander and Destro into one character.

That's just the official summary of the sales pitch Sommers made. Granted, this is pure speculation on my part, but I don't think they are going to release any important plot points at this time. So, for instance, if they want to make it such that Cobra Commander is the one really running the show from behind the scenes, I doubt they would have announced that in that little sound bite.