Hasbro and Paramount Should Follow Marvel Studio's Lead

[Fred Broca]

I was reading on another message board, yet another thread about why people hate the JOE films. As I was reading the thread, I came upon post that asked the question of why the Joeverse can't be spun off into a larger cinematic universe and why Paramount and Hasbro are basically fucking up the opportunity to do so. Then I asked the question of myself, "Why haven't the Joes been spun off into a larger franchise, or rather, why hasn't the idea been executed better?

The success of Marvel Studios has proven wrong a lot of things that we considered couldn't be done in mainstream summer blockbuster. How to properly use a team, how to tie all the movies into together, having characters in a uniform that resembles their signature look, making a successful movie out of obscure characters, and most importantly, staying more true to the source material for the most part.

I understand that the dynamic is a little different with Hasbro and the brass at Hasbro want this generation of little boys to buy their army men. However, (using what little knowledge I have of business, marketing, and demographics,) I believe that maybe the Real American Hero brand should be retired or at least put on hiatus and the reality of the situation is twofold, 1) When people think of G. I. JOE, the image that comes to mind is a special ops unit. 2) Hasbro's target demo doesn't seem to be playing with action figures in the numbers that they used to.

With that being said, the JOE cinematic universe should be built around what people, (especially the JOE fandom expect it to be. A special forces unit that's compromised of best of America's armed forces and these special forces unit formed in response to COBRA, a ruthless terrorist organization determined to rule the world.

We've all seen what a Joe movie should look like and that movie was Captain America: Winter Solider. Was Winter Solider perfect, no namely because I didn't understand why Cap and Natasha just didn't call Tony, but I digress.

What G. I. JOE needs is a director and a screen writer who take the material seriously and "gets" JOE and getting JOE is to understand the relationships between the characters. Scarlett and S.E.'s relationship. Hell paying an ode to the Sunbow cartoon, (y'all are going to kill me for this,) I would be willing to have Scarlett and S. E. have problems in their relationship and have her mess with Duke for awhile and show the tension that creates.

Stalker being First Sergeant, but he does some shit that gets him before court marital, (e.g. using "coercive interrogration,") techniques that saves the lives of some of his comrades-in-arms. Stalker avoids Leavenworth, but at the cost of a promotion. Hawk is picked to head a new (perhaps at this point he's a Cap. Maj. Lt. Col.) goes to Stalker, (or somebody else as inquires to who his 1st SG) to which we cut to the scene where Conrad Hauser says,

"They tell me that an officer's job is to impel others to take the risks--so that the officer survives to take the blame in the event of total catastrophe. With all due respect, sir...if that's what an officer does, I don't want any part of it."

People often have problems with C.C. being a used car salesman. I guess the image the get is a guy selling 5 yr Civics, Accords, Tauruses, and Camrys. However, what if C. C. was selling Lambo, Ferraris, and Bugattis? In order words, he was selling used erotic luxury automobiles, that still constitutes C.C. being a "used car salesman," in addition to any other business ventures he may have had. How did he met the twins? How does he maintain loyalty in his ranks? Hell, with the proper writing and direction, wack ass JOE concepts like Serpentor, grape soda, and chocolate covered doughnuts could be cool.

 

[Videoviper]

I like the idea, & there are some working on rebranding GI joe, what that will look like is anyone's guess.

The paramount Hasbro relationship is a good one, Hasbro gets 5% of profits from the movie even if it crashes & burns. So they are OK with lower budget movie such as Gem as long as it turns a profit. Unfortunatly you do get into some legal grey area as to what Paramount (or Sunbow or DIC) own verse Hasbro. Which usually isn't to big of a deal. But if say Paramount passes on a movie idea, as they have first option (Say M.a.s.k. the movie) Hasbro has the option to shop the script to other producers. In this case a shared universe is just not possible.

If the reboot GI Joe I wouldn't mind a next generation type of restart, with Duke in Hawk's position. Cobra Commander has passed the torch to the next Commander. It would allow new content & still be able to bring back the favorites

 

[WVMojo]

Holy shit. Fred isn't yelling in bold this time...

 

[Giga Bread]

Not saying it can't, because it most definitely can. But there are a few hurdles.

1) what is being true to the source material? Marvel's only investment for decades was to sell stories and use those stories to increase profits with merch. Hasbro did it backwards. As a result, you end up with a fractured canon with less focus on story. Is it Springfield/Amway? Is it Cobra La? Hasbro could do it but it would require them to throw out the toy designers and marketers for a few weeks and bring in some writing talent to rewrite the history.

2) Marvel has employed thousands of creators that have created a very lush universe with hundreds of heroes, each with a large variety of villains.
GI Joe has a terrorist group that sometimes works with a biker gang. And that's about it for 30 years.

3) You could tell Marvel wanted to learn the business and get in there and handled it themselves. Hasbro has shown no interest in this. They've always sold the rights. They've never raised their own child and frankly, I don't know if they no where to start.

 

[blackrazor1]

Along the lines of what Giga Bread said, while some individual Joes have an origin story, the team as a whole doesn't. All we really know is that Hawk, Stalker and Snake Eyes had meet before the formation of Cobra. That's where Marvel has an advantage. They were able to weave an arc through the background stories of the individual movies before bringing the team together. Individual Joes can't carry solo movies that will lead to a team movie.

In terms of the character looks, Marvel characters are continuously upgraded so that the characters from the 80's look different than the same comic book characters today. Marvel hero costume have become more practical. There is nothing practical about the 80's ARAH uniforms for the modern battlefield. Uniforms based on Resolute, Renegades or IDW would be more appropriate, but most fans still think of the 80's uniforms.

In terms of an expanded universe, what properties are you going to link together? Here's the ones that come to mind: M.A.S.K., C.O.P.S., Centurions, Silverhawks, Sky Commanders, Inhumanoids, Transformers, or Visionaries. Linking with most of those properties would require a major shift in how the G.I. Joe universe operates.

A movie doesn't need to get too deep into backstory, if they can tell a compelling story. Trying to be faithful to Larry Hama's vision is hard, since he often retconned his own by not making bible to keep his story straight.

 

[Fred Broca]

Not saying it can't, because it most definitely can. But there are a few hurdles.

1) what is being true to the source material? Marvel's only investment for decades was to sell stories and use those stories to increase profits with merch. Hasbro did it backwards. As a result, you end up with a fractured canon with less focus on story. Is it Springfield/Amway? Is it Cobra La?

Along the lines of what Giga Bread said, while some individual Joes have an origin story, the team as a whole doesn't.

Of course, you would go to "daddy," (Larry Hama,) and write a Joe bible. The focus should be on telling the story and who's going to be in the story. I would daresay that there would be a smaller than team than the original 13 JOEs. Certain JOE's are give me's. For example, S.E. Stalker, Hawk, S.S. and Hawk. Depending on the what the movie is about you fill out the rest of the roster on an ad hoc basis.

The way I would do the JOE Cinematic Universe is like this. One movie would be a pre JOE story and another movie would basically be what RoC name implied it to be, which is COBRA rising.

In the JOE prequel it would be typical origin shit, how they meet, relationship dynamics, motivations, with this one important exception. Since this an origin movie, it's REALLY going to be an origin movie. What do you mean Fred? I would show S.E. pre helicopter accident and yes he would talk. . I know what I just said was a JOE sacrilege, but I feel that this element would make for compelling story telling and it would tie into how Scarlett ends up fucking around on S.E. with Duke. In this movie S.E. would never be comfortable with his disfigurement and as a result it causes a strain in his and Shana's relationship. However, I would never give S.E. a name. A running gag would be every time his name is said, there would a loud ass noise or he would enter into a room and a person would be like, "I was just going to call you."

On the COBRA end, C.C. would be a rather successful business man who's primary businesses selling erotic sports cars and other businesses. He also does a podcast, railing against the government, (e.g. Alex Ross,) which puts him on the F.B.I.'s radar. Trying to avoid paying the least amount of taxes possible, this leads to C.C. getting into tax trouble and his assets being seized, he also becomes the victim of a faulty hedge fund dude. This becomes too much for C.C. bare and he now has a vendetta against the government and feels that world would be better off if he controls it. This leads to him hooking up with the twins and the Baroness.

I've always been opposed to this antagonists being bad or evil for the sake of being bad or evil. In this reality, (being that C.C. is a rather charismatic dude,) the twins and the Baroness actually in the heart of hearts believe in C.C. and his message and his goals.

C.C. goal is use terror as means to bring about the collapse of world economy's and government's. Via the Twins they come up with the idea of a Crimson Guard who will be placed in various important positions throughout the world and as it says on C.C.'s first file card he kidnaps businessmen, scientists, and military leaders and forces them to reveal their most top level secrets. It needs to be conveyed that COBRA Commander and COBRA are truly dangerous and are a threat to world disability and peace. COBRA would also align with unnamed rogue government, (Cough North Korea,) to help facilitate it's goals.

COBRA would be do a lot of small things, but it would come to prominence either through series of assassinations, threatening stock prices of major corporations, or damn near collapsing the currencies of certain industrialized countries. The JOEs would be formed as response to COBRA.

Hasbro could do it but it would require them to throw out the toy designers and marketers for a few weeks and bring in some writing talent to rewrite the history.

It's obvious that before movies dropped that Marvel had a long term plan. That's what Hasbro needs to do develop a long term plan and figure out how get each of these parts of media to accentuate each other.

2) Marvel has employed thousands of creators that have created a very lush universe with hundreds of heroes, each with a large variety of villains.

GI Joe has a terrorist group that sometimes works with a biker gang. And that's about it for 30 years.

That's what make the changes in RoC and Retaliation so odd and frustrating, you have a universe full of characters to fuck around with, but needless changes were made to core characters of the JOEverse. Retaliation was alright, but I really didn't see the need to made Lady Jaye a Marine or put a fish bowl on C.C. in RoC.

3) You could tell Marvel wanted to learn the business and get in there and handled it themselves. Hasbro has shown no interest in this. They've always sold the rights. They've never raised their own child and frankly, I don't know if they no where to start.

Well that's why you hire people who do.

Individual Joes can't carry solo movies that will lead to a team movie.

Ten years ago people would have said the same thing about

Wouldn't a better title for this movie had been Captain America: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., but anyway.

Dude there's a fucking Aquaman movie in the works. Fucking Aquaman! If somebody would have told me five years or ten years ago that they're would be an fucking Aquaman and Ant-Man movie, I would have thought they were :trollface:. It isn't about what we perceive said character to be on January 1, 2015, it's about how the character is written and how said character is handled on film. Marvel changed the game and what we previously thought about movie adaptions of comic book characters is now null and void. With the exception of The Punisher, outside of D-to-D, I don't think a Punisher film will ever work, though I am curious to see how he will be handled in DD.

In terms of the character looks, Marvel characters are continuously upgraded so that the characters from the 80's look different than the same comic book characters today. Marvel hero costume have become more practical. There is nothing practical about the 80's ARAH uniforms for the modern battlefield. Uniforms based on Resolute, Renegades or IDW would be more appropriate, but most fans still think of the 80's uniforms.

Depends, again people always said that The Batman in his traditional black/navy blue and gray uniform would never work in a film, however, (at least in the picture,) when the color photograph was released, we have the best version of the Batsuit to date. I hear what you're saying, and I maintain that there's no reason why when the JOEs are in the PITT, they should be in their signature unis.

In terms of an expanded universe, what properties are you going to link together? Here's the ones that come to mind: M.A.S.K., C.O.P.S., Centurions, Silverhawks, Sky Commanders, Inhumanoids, Transformers, or Visionaries. Linking with most of those properties would require a major shift in how the G.I. Joe universe operates.

I haven't thought that far ahead to tell the truth. I will say that the Transformers and JOE universe should remain separate. Then again I'm bias, I was never a fun of G.I. JOE vs Transformers. I'd rather see Serpentor before G.I. JOE vs Transformers

A movie doesn't need to get too deep into backstory, if they can tell a compelling story. Trying to be faithful to Larry Hama's vision is hard, since he often retconned his own by not making bible to keep his story straight.

Again, the conundrum is to have a take on a JOE film that doesn't make it your run of the mill action military flick.

 

[Giga Bread]

I guess I just feel like it's putting the cart before the horse. MU was a ready made product by the time they decided to make movies. GI Joe needs to start over and reinvent itself and have a lasting vision before they even think about copying the Marvel formula.