So I Just Watched… G.I.Joe: Retaliation (Paramount/MGM, 2013)
Sometimes I just can’t quite figure it out how to make a positive review about some movies, especially when I just had a long time waiting for it to come out and they just turn out to be such a huge disappointment. G.I.Joe. Retaliation was coming along at the same time as “The Avengers” last year (a couple of weeks later give or take), after the release of the Marvel film, Paramount decided to push back the movie to covert it to 3D. Big mistake. The 3D will make the experience far from enjoyable, as a matter of fact I haven’t seen 3D this bad since I watched Tron: Legacy. Moving forward to what sells the movie for me: the script. The story is very predictable it doesn’t help at all that the over-hyped marketing for the movie told you the story in every trailer released. That is one of my main gripes with this movie: if you’ve seen the trailers you’ve already seen every mayor scene on it, from London Blowing up, to the Ninja fight in the mountains.
I was a little excited by the casting, we at least had Duke, Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow back which is good right? We also have Bruce Willis playing the first Joe which must be awesome, doesn’it?. Well don’t get too attached to Duke, he’s dead by 15 minutes IN the movie and your leading man for the rest of it is Dwayne Jhonson a.k.a The Rock. The credits say he plays “Roadblock” but he’s actually playing the exact same character he plays in “Fast & Furious 5” down to the excessive sweating this man is always showcasing in almost every movie he does. It’s never explained why Storm Shadow is still alive after you saw him take a sword to the chest in the first film and Bruce Willis is just there very bored waiting for the paycheck, you can see it in his face!
Not everything is bad in Joe-Land: Cobra Commander was great! the best translation I’ve seen from a character based on a toy line to a movie so far. He’s vicious and he means business (sadly he’s surrounded by a lot of incompetents and traitors, but he still has his time to shine) All in all, you may say this film let me down in a huge way, I was expecting more of the Joes this time around I don’t know how much money this film has made so far, but i’m willing to bet that we’ll get to see one more before Hasbro decides either to kill the franchise or reboot it. My only advice for the next one? please bring the sweet, sweet Siena Miller back as the Baroness. Expect for this one to rent it on Nextfilx for a dollar or to buy the Blu-Ray for 5 bucks on a Black Friday.
