A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

It's not always pleasant to revisit your childhood. Some of the things you loved back then stand the test of time. Star Wars is still great, Dr. Who of the 1970s and 60s remains, below-bargain-basement special effects aside, a fun and well done little program and The Incredible Hulk is better than any attempt to meld a gamma radiation-spawned monster with The Fugitive has any right to be. A lot of the stuff you loved as a kid, however, doesn't survive adult scrutiny. That's because you and I and everybody else don't really know enough when we're young to tell when something sucks. I recall seeing an episode of the original Thundercats cartoon and being struck by how the animation was still very pretty and reasonably fluid, but the storytelling was…so…unbelievably…slow.Well, when I was a child I loved G.I. Joe. I loved the toys, which were the smaller, hard-plastic action figures and not the bigger one with the real hair and clothes you could take off. I loved the cartoon. And I really loved the comic book. As a grown man I can say with complete confidence that the toys and the comic book are still pretty cool, at least until Hasbro's continual deluge of newer and stupider additions to the line destroyed the creative integrity of each. And yes, action figures and comic books about those action figures can have creative integrity. As for the cartoon…?Well, I haven't seen an episode in a good long while and this film-length version makes it hard to judge because this is rather a long way from what the regular show was like. G.I. Joe: The Movie was apparently made by people who said to themselves "You know what would improve our cartoon about a crack U.S. military team vs. a fearsome terrorist group? Let's make it more like Sectaurs! And let's create a new bad guy with the biggest ass in animated history!"The story is about the hidden society of Cobra-La, led by the evil Golobulus (Bergess Meredith), which sent Cobra Commander (Chris Latta) out into the world to destroy human civilization. After years of Cobra Commander proving the only thing he's good at is running away, Golobulus has decided to take charge and orders the seizing of an energy transmitter which he will use to shower the Earth with spores that will mutate Mankind. G.I. Joe gets in his way and various battles where no one gets killed ensue, leading up to a final confrontation where Lt. Falcon (Don Johnson), a reckless and irresponsible soldier, finally proves himself worth of saying "Yo, Joe!" Oh, and Duke (Michael Bell) dies, only to have the movie producers chicken out and have new dialog dubbed in that he was just put into a coma and recovered.Putting aside Cobra-La's Nemesis Enforcer and how he clearly inspired a lot of the character design at Image Comics in the 1990s, the attempt to inject some sci-fi and almost Lovecraftian horror into G.I. Joe is a massive stinkburger. It doesn't even come close to fitting in with the established concept and has to rank as one of the greatest creative missteps of all time. Golobulus and company are the "Greedo shoots first" of G.I. Joe and the only reason it's not as infamous is because this movie came out when we were kids and far less prone to obsessing over one of our favorite things turning to crap.On the other hand, the animation isn't terrible and the voice work, outside of Don Johnson, is as good as I remember. This flick is certainly action-packed, though amazingly repetitive, and Chris Latta's Cobra Commander remains a great juvenile adventure villain. While this film isn't any good, it makes me suspect the original TV show might not look that bad to my now-adult eyes.So, skip G.I. Joe: The Movie and give the original cartoon a try. You might be pleasantly surprised.

Like Transformers G1 I never grew up with the classic GI JOE series, luckily my uncle who grew up with the series introduced me to the classic GI JOE episodes. After watching all the GI JOE episodes online(season 1 was better) I decided to check out the movie they had. While not as great as the Transformers movie this was pretty good. I can't say much but this mainly could've been one of the five-pat mini series that the show would usually do. I mean other than the opening theme, they use music from the show and the animation is pretty much the same as the show. Nothing wrong with that, but look at the Transformers movie it had better animation, a great soundtrack and to be honest better characters.I feel sorry for Cobra Commander in this film. I just do. He's been the great leader of COBRA, now reduced to a slithering snake. I really didn't like the idea of Cobra-La and Cobra Commander and Serpentor's origin. The leader of Cobra-La implanted the idea to Dr. Mindbender? In the show they made pretty clear that they wanted a new leader to lead COBRA all because Cobra Commander was doing a bad job. It just doesn't make any sense. While a lot of people may think that Lt. Falcon was like Hot Rod from the Transformers movie, but I see no resemblance other than the fact they're young. Hot Rod was young, but also kind, energetic, and grew into the role of leader.Lt. Falcon was suppose to be like that after Duke, supposedly died, but the idea was scrapped because of the death of Optimus Prime in the Transformers movie. So instead have Falcon as a bit of a jerk. I just realized I have more complaints than positive things to say. I do like the action, but it's pretty much the same action we see in the show, It's good to see characters from the show, like Roadblock, Beachhead and Sgt. Slaughter. And I do love Serpentor's famous "COBRA LALALALALALALA"!! Overall this movie could've been a regular episode of GI JOE

Gijoe was a combat organization based somewhere in the US that fought local and global terrorism throughout the eighties into present day. They operate under some compartmentalized structure that allows them to act independent of any otherwise typical military format. Their foe, the super slick Cobra, which is the biggest terrorist organization worldwide. With the joe's in the Arctic is the new B.E.T (broadcast.energy.transmitter) that can power things from a distance using a giant satellite dish attached to a tank. Leave it to GIJOE anytime they needed something, they just threw it on a tank. This movie goes everywhere and involves all your favorite characters in one of the wildest cross-country trips ever witnessed. The joe's have something that Cobra wants and a seemingly serendipitous battle emerges between them forcing the empire to come in contact with some old lineage of Cobra that, with the B.E.T seeks to explode poisonous spores over America, or the world really, in a final resolve to their endless desire to rule the world. The intro is breathtaking, the vehicles: awesome, the story a-bit more complex then usual but I'm glad to see that writing for a kids show could explore some weird territory, leave it to the eighties, you just don't see this kind of stuff anymore. I have a copy somewhere taped with original commercials. It's the only time I'm not fast-forwarding through them. Visionaries!

I speak badly of G.I.J.:T.M. mostly because I think it lacked something that G.I. Joe had. Yes It had something that G.I. Joe didn't have like celebrity cameos by Don Johnson, and Burgess Meredith but I think G.I. Joe: The Movie lacked the passion for the characters that the G.I. Joe TV series had. Most of the voice over artists really sounded like they were dead pan and they were going to die at anytime now. It's a good movie but I wouldn't say that it was the greatest movie in the world I.M.H.O. :)Although violence is what G.I. Joe was built on I'd say that Serpentor striking Duke in his chest wasn't the very best way for Charlie Adler's character to go out. Neither was seeing Golobulus remind Cobra Commander why he was chosen to lead the Cobra forces and then being horribly mutated after he failed to deliver what Cobra-La felt was rightfully theirs.It wasn't the best way for the G.I. Joe series to go out but it's better than nothing. :)