Skybound Comics' Energon Universe: The G.I. Joe Continuity

Now that the first four mini-series have wrapped, I have some thoughts.

It’s October 16th and the final issue of DESTRO just dropped. That’s twenty floppies over the last year, all to establish the forthcoming G.I Joe series from Skybound Comics.

I’ve been very vocal about how much I enjoyed DUKE, I thought COBRA COMMANDER was fine, DESTRO has been just-ok, and SCARLETT is largely bad. I thought I would lay it all out here in detail to explain my frustration with the latter series, and what it means going forward.

Here is a brief issue-by-issue summary of all four titles (five issues each). Before DUKE #1, you need to know that the Transformers are on Earth and one of them killed a fighter pilot, call sign “Frosting.” Duke was riding passenger in the fighter jet behind Frost and he survived, but his superiors didn’t believe his story about a transforming robot jet. He’s trying to get answers as to what it is.

G.I. Joe as an organization is not quite fleshed out yet, so we’re learning about them as we follow Duke’s journey here.

DUKE

1: Duke ignores orders from his superiors and starts carrying out his own investigation into what killed his friend. His CO orders two other operators to arrest Duke and bring him in.

2: Duke’s hunters capture and arrest him. They take him to The Pit (a G.I. Joe base) where he’s locked up in a cell next to The Baroness (a Cobra operative.)

3: Various Joes clash as Duke attempts to break out, forced to team up with Baroness to succeed. She immediately double-crosses him for the bounty on his head.

4: Duke convinces Baroness to switch loyalties and help him escape. They steal a fighter jet and fly to a M.A.R.S. industries facility where there are rumors of robot soldiers being built. He thinks M.A.R.S. might have made the Transformers.

5: Duke faces off against Destro, leader of M.A.R.S. Industries, and learns that his Battle Android Troopers are not the Transformers. Duke beats a BAT and escapes, though in the conflict he is presumed dead. Later his CO, Colonel Hawk, tells him he’s reinstating Duke and putting him in charge of a Joe team at The Pit so that they can go after the Transformers, which are becoming a bigger problem. They believe him now and they think he’s the man for the job.

COBRA COMMANDER

1: Cobra Commander inexplicably has Megatron locked up in a facility at Cobra-La (a weird snake-cult headquarters from G.I. Joe canon). We don’t know how Megs got there yet, but Commander has been extracting information from him about Cybertron and the cosmos. He uses what he’s learned to find Energon signatures on Earth.

2: Commander’s pursuit of Energon takes him to the Cajun swamps, where he runs afoul of local unsavory characters and falls into a gator pit.

3: The Dreadnoks (Cajun swamp baddies) torture and beat Commander while they keep him tied up. He uses his superior psychology to trick them into fighting each other.

4: Commander discovers the Dreadnoks’ secret lab where they have a doctor doing research on Energon. Now that he’s located it, his boss at Cobra-La double-crosses him, but Commander survives and takes control of the Energon lab. The Dreadnoks were planning to sell the Energon to Destro at M.A.R.S. industries.

5: Commander meets with Destro. The former will provide Energon and the latter will provide BATS to be powered by the potent source. Now that he has an army and weapons, Commander becomes the founder of Cobra, bent on world domination.

DESTRO

1: Destro, CEO of weapons manufacturer M.A.R.S. Industries, finds himself in both a corporate and military conflict with Tomax and Xamot, identical twin brothers who run a competing manufacturer, Extensive Enterprises.

2: After an expensive and bloody engagement wherein the twins lost many soldiers and Destro lost many androids, the two heads meet in neutral territory and agree to wage their conflict by other means, with low collateral. The winner will absorb the losing company.

3: During a retreat to his ancestral fortress, Destro is attacked by an assassin called Chameleon. He survives, brutally injured, knowing his secrets are compromised. He meets with General Flagg of the U.S. Military and proposes a working relationship to protect himself and his company.

4: Destro is able to locate Chameleon and persuade her to his side. She tells him of a global satellite intelligence network that can potentially hold the world hostage, depending on who controls it.

5: With all the pieces on the table, Destro coordinates a meeting with Tomax and Xamot, as well as Cobra Commander. He’s able to prove his cunning and his tactical intelligence, not only fighting everyone to a standstill, but proposing that they work together as part of the larger Cobra operation. In the end, Destro sends a nuke into orbit to get rid of the satellite that runs the intel network.

SCARLETT

1: Scarlett is sent on a spy mission to thwart the Arashikage ninja clan. She’s supposed to infiltrate the organization and become one of them, just like her roommate Jinx, who joined two years ago.

2: Successful on her infiltration, Scarlett is sent to compromise a weapon belonging to the Arashikage that was then stolen by a rival.

3: Scarlett fights her way through the enemy facility and beats up a bunch of people. Jinx joins her at the end.

4: Scarlett and Jinx, now joined by Storm Shadow, continue to fight their way through the enemy facility. Storm Shadow finds a powerful sword that looks like it could be made of Energon, but we’re not sure.

5: Scarlett, Jinx, and Storm Shadow escape with the maybe-Energon sword. After a brief meetup with another Joe, Scarlett is told to stay undercover with Jinx and the Arashikage.

Arcs and Conclusions

The DUKE and COBRA COMMANDER books were written at the same time by the same writer (Joshua Williamson) and it shows. The pacing, story arcs, and characters all move with similar purpose. There are significant changes in circumstances from issue to issue. Someone is on a mission, someone is captured, someone changes the dynamic, someone learns something new, someone has a new purpose at the end. Very linear and sensible.

The DESTRO book was middling at first, to the point that I was juuuuuust on the edge of disappointed whenever it was a Destro week at the comics shop. “Ah. Well. I mean. Fine.” I wanted to see it go somewhere, largely because DUKE and CC were really good.

By the time I got to the end of DESTRO #5 I was really satisfied. It was a well-done origin for how the Cobra organization came to be, with multiple figureheads of competing ambition levels. Destro and Cobra Commander are moving in the same direction but they both think they’re in charge and they both expect the other to double-cross them. Classic villainy. Plus the story ends with Destro neutralizing the Twins in both a diplomatic and military sense—without killing them. On the contrary, they’re in the fold now. The dull buildup was worth the strong ending.

Then there’s SCARLETT. Just…ugh. WTF. This is five issues of Scarlett having a crush on her roommate, and at the end, Storm Shadow gets a sword. I think the word “Energon” was mentioned maybe once in this series. It’s like Joshua Williamson and Dan Watters got together with Daniel Warren Johnson and they all shared notes on their Energon books, while Kelly Thompson had the Zoom call on mute so she could write a self-insert book about two girls who are totally just really good friends, you guys.

There is hardly any reason at all for the Scarlett series to be an Energon book. If this story is to be justified as part of the larger Energon narrative, it will now have to come in the G.I. Joe series, or some other series. Such a disappointing experience from the other titles in this universe.

Testing my hesitancy…

As frustrating as the Scarlett book is, I’m going to be objective here and give Kelly Thompson’s writing another try, because this is the only series I’ve read from her. She’s writing ABSOLUTE WONDER WOMAN with DC, so that’s a different publisher with a different editor and a different ethos. I really enjoyed ABSOLUTE BATMAN #1 and I hope it’s the start of something really good over at DC. There’s an ABSOLUTE SUPERMAN coming in January. If the Absolute Trinity works then DC has reason to look forward to something.

But if ABSOLUTE WONDER WOMAN, which features a new look for the Amazonian (including a right shoulder tattoo that is weirdly similar to the one for KT’s Jinx) ends up being another SCARLETT treatment, I’m gonna struggle to make it to the end. We’ll see what happens.

For now, the Energon Universe has finished one of its major starting arcs, as all four of these G.I. Joe books will now converge into a single title, starting next month. I expect this will accelerate things in the run-up to a G.I. Joe/Transformers crossover, and I really hope that Void Rivals picks up again too. Should be November 26.