GI Joe: Special Missions #4 – Review

By: Chuck Dixon (writer), Paul Gulacy (art), Aburtov & Grafikslava and Romulo Fajardo, Jr. (colors) and Neil Uyetake (letters)

The Story: Crush Depth concludes….will anyone get to take the sunken Cobra money?

Review: This is not good.  As I was reading this comic, I tried to think of reasons could be so poor.  But, rather than dive into excuse-making for creators, let’s talk about why this issue (and series so far) have been a total waste.

The story is highly-problematic.  Whereas the main GI Joe title and Cobra Files are doing some very subtle, intricate storytelling that appears to be heading somewhere, this “Crush Depth” story has gone nowhere–literally.  In issue one, we learned about how Baroness had a plan to reclaim some money that was on a sunken Cobra ship.  Scarlet and her special team of Joes set off to interdict her and “tag” the money so they could monitor Cobra’s activites.  We’ve had some danger and fighting along the way, but the end result is that the money was sunk back to the bottom of the ocean.

GI Joe: Special Missions #3 – Review

By: Chuck Dixon (writer), Paul Gulacy (art), Aburtov & Grafikslava (colors) and Neil Uyetake (letters)

The Story: Scarlet tries to thwart a Cobra salvage operation.

Review: This is a pretty mediocre comic.  If you’re a big-time GI Joe fan and just want to keep connected to the storyline, I guess this will do, but it’s hard to imagine this issue winning anyone over to the cause of GI Joe comics.

The story is pretty mundane and routine: Cobra is trying to salvage a bunch of money from the wreck of one of their ships; Scarlet and a team of Joes is trying to stop them.  Most of the actual fighting happened last issue and this issue treats us to little more than Scarlet watching Cobra escape.  The storytelling choices in this issue leave a lot to be desired.  For example, at one point in the issue Scarlet and Mainframe have a mini-cliffhanger of “We’re not alone in this water filled room…”  Turn the page and they get attacked by a shark–and that’s kinda cool.  Who doesn’t enjoy a shark-attack?

GI Joe: Special Missions #1 – Review

By: Chuck Dixon (writer), Paul Gulacy (pencils), Aburtov & Grafikslava (colors), Shawn Lee (letters)

The Story: Now that most of the Joes are out in the open, someone still has to do the dirty, secret missions.

Review: This issue was a bit of a disappointment.  The sorrow starts with the art.  This just isn’t good enough.  I was really excited when I saw that Paul Gulacy would be drawing this series.  Gulacy isn’t my favorite artist, but there’s no question that he is highly competent; the man has had an almost 40 year history in comic art and has drawn just about everything.  This issue is NOT one of his higher points.  I’m really not sure what happened with the art in this issue.  There are panels here and there that look like classic Gulacy, but there are also a LOT of rough images.  I wonder if IDW just didn’t pay him much and he drew it in a hurry?  I’ve heard rumors about what IDW pays their artists (~$40/page) and it’s really cheap….certainly not something a person could pay the rent with.  I also noted that Gulacy is only credited as a “penciller” and that no inker is credited.  If these are rough pencils (perhaps done in a hurry) where all the “inking” was added via Photoshop contrast adjustments and the spot blacks and shading by the colorists, that would explain a lot of the rough looking faces and inconsistency of the comic.  Ultimately, all these potential excuses don’t matter: Gulacy’s name is listed and the comic costs $3.99.