From comments yesterday:
I just thought I’d bring forth this little piece of horror:
“G.I. Joe is now a Brussels-based outfit that stands for Global Integrated Joint Operating Entity, an international co-ed force of operatives who use hi-tech equipment to battle Cobra, an evil organization headed by a double-crossing Scottish arms dealer. The property is closer in tone to X-Men and James Bond than a war film.”
Yeah, I’ve already seen some right-wing blogs complain about this, although it’s probably a bit exaggerated – my guess would be that the movie will feature an international-ish task force but not be headquartered in Brussels. (I mean, come on – it’s Brussels.)
But. Two things.
Firstly, prior to the Real American Hero rebranding in the early 1980s, G.I. Joe was marketed all over the world (most notably as Action Man in England), so the concept doesn’t necessarily have a purely American origin. (Granted, the Real American Hero version is what inspired the movie, but even so.)
Secondly, what the hell did people expect? The American military isn’t as popular as it was during the 1980s (when G.I. Joe as we know it was wildly popular among kids of many nations) and the international film market has been bigger than the American film market for quite a while now. G.I. Joe in straight-up Real American Hero mode might as well be titled “three-quarters of potential worldwide profit gone before the first trailer even airs” and save the accountants some time.
Welcome to the global marketplace. If Americans want to have an economy where all they export is cultural product (and I think that’s kind of a bad idea, really, but hey: it’s your economy), then part of that strategy involves producing cultural product the rest of the world will want to buy. And if that means toning down the jingoism, guess what – Hollywood is a business, and they like making money, and if not putting a flag on everything in sight makes them money, then maybe – just maybe – they will do that.
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Good point — though if it becomes serialized, I would like to see an entire episode of the team returning from a mission and actually trying to find Belgium.
an evil organization headed by a double-crossing Scottish arms dealer
…Erp? I dislike the automatic lumping in of Destro into the Cobra hierarchy. But I guess “arms dealer = evil” and not “arms dealer = fluid and thus exploitable allegiance” plays better. And if the “now I know…and knowing is half the battle” line is included as has been mentioned (threatened?), I hope the context is sufficiently…what, ironic? Sarcastic? Punctuated with stabbing? What’s the best way to shoehorn that little nugget of Saturday-morning insight into a theatrical release?
Making the Joes an international anti-terrorist group shouldn’t be a problem. They’ve had a few non-Americans in their group before, even characters that were once enemies. Diana of the Oktober Guard (a Russian team that went against the Joes back in the day) joined them, and of course, you have Stormshadow. I’m sure there were others, but I don’t have time to look into it.
MY biggest problem with the movie is the fact that they casted Marlon Wayans in here (as Ripcord). The Wayans brothers should be nowhere near this movie.
the funny thing about america exporting cultural product is that we do a lot of filming in canada and a lot of the talent is canadian. so technically, we’re not really even exporting our own culture.
damn canadians have us doing the heavy lifting for you.
http://www.hasbro.com/gijoe/default.cfm?page=News/Item&newsid=F285F255-D56F-E112-46FAEBF95750D7E9
It’s headquartered in “The Pit” which according to Wikipedia is in Staten Island.
Which is hilarious.
Well, I guess if they wanted to pander more to Americans, they could make it reflect the coalition of the willing circa 200X. All of the soldiers would still be Americans, but we’d always be hearing about all of these other countries who were really jonesing to do their part.
Also, I urge everyone to visit Chris Sim’s ISB . . . where he has a deeply disturbing bit of evidence linking Jimmy Olsen to Cobra Commander.
“Well, I guess if they wanted to pander more to Americans, they could make it reflect the coalition of the willing circa 200X. All of the soldiers would still be Americans, but we’d always be hearing about all of these other countries who were really jonesing to do their part.”
Don’t you mean coalition of the dragged into it in the face of the largest political demonstration in our history by a grinning git who has since buggered off across the atlantic for his lucrative and prestigious rewards. Willing my chirruping arse-worms, coalition of the bribed more like.
If you do something for money, it sounds like willing to me.
I don’t know… I kinda like the idea of going over the top, ’80s style super-American, even if played for laughs. As it is, that description makes it sound like In Bruges. Which was nice, just not very Yo! Joe!.
Bad wolf: They already made that movie. It was called “Team America.”
Brussels sounds very funny and is an extremely boring town, but that’s where NATO headquarters are. (and the European Union institutions, but that’s not relevant to G.I. Joe). So that’s the most logical choice since they decided to go for an international military force not based in the USA.
Help computah.
Ah, I remember wondering what this GI Joe thing was and why they were stealing all the Action Force models.
Welcome to the global marketplace. If Americans want to have an economy where all they export is cultural product (and I think that’s kind of a bad idea, really, but hey: it’s your economy), then part of that strategy involves producing cultural product the rest of the world will want to buy.
Exactly.
Every time someone says conservatives are “pro-market” I wince and grind my teeth.