“GI Joe #24” Review – All Risk, Nothing But Reward!

Creative Team

Writer: Joshua Williamson; Artists: Andrea Milana & Lee Loughridge; Cover A: Tom Reilly; Cover B: Joshua Cassara & Romulo Fajardo Jr; Cover C: Ben Oliver; Cover D: Tonci Zonjic; Cover E: Andrea Milana.

The Story

In GI Joe #24, the unlikely alliance between the Joes and Cobra continues as they fight to overcome the mysterious common foe that is somehow attacking them using the physical manifestation of their darkest fears! Questions are raised, trust is breached and there just might be the spark of a forbidden romance that long time fans have been wondering about since issue #1 Also: What’s up with General Hawk?

Writing

This Energon Universe has been exceeding expectations since day one and the thing that impresses me the most is how tightly connected the story is between Void Rivals, Transformers, MASK and GI Joe without compromising each individually. The special sauce? Energon! The life blood of our favorite Cybertronians is also the catalyst of nightmares, the fuel for weapons of mass destruction and the source of hope for our heroes. So many of the wild, weird weapons and tech from old school Joe stories were just accepted. Like, “Okay, cool… but how?” Here, the answer is Energon. Joshua Williamson is arguably one of the greats and he continues to prove it with this series. His love for GI Joe is obvious with his inclusion of some deep cut characters and I really appreciate that he is not beholden to any previous continuity. One major benefit of this is that he can bring in characters that seemed odd or out of place as a member of GI Joe or Cobra and write them as independent players that may or may not align with either team. Pacing is solid, dialogue is spot on and this issue, like the others before it, has plenty of surprises that build up to a cliffhanger, leaving the reader salivating for the next issue.

Art

Andrea Milana and Lee Loughridge are killing it! Milana is someone who can really become legendary. He excels in all phases: movement, relaxed conversations, conveying emotion, consistency, legibility, layout and visual storytelling with sequential art. A solid technician. This is not an easy thing to find nowadays with so many self trained artists out there. This issue really lets Andrea shine as a director, with one, silent, two-panel scene that literally made me smile, nod and say aloud “Okay, I see what you guys are doing!”

Loughridge’s colors keep the eyes moving in the right direction. He is someone who has mastered the art of color filtering. As Risk and Mercer battle this arc’s villain, there is a warm orange filter. For Destro and Baroness, a cooler magenta. Flashbacks are a monotone warm gray and once the conflict is resolved he switches to blues and yellows to separate. I didn’t really notice it at first, but I did notice how smooth the story flowed with so many moving parts. I thought it was weird that there were so many transitions with no courtesy captions or transition panels and yet I never felt confused about what was going on or where I was in the story. That is a testament to Loughridge and now I want to go back and read some of the other books he’s worked on to see if this is his signature or something unique to GI Joe because it really is cool as hell!

Final Thoughts

GI Joe has been a blast and this issue continues that trend. So if you’ve been a fan of this run, you won’t be disappointed. If you haven’t given this Joe a go yet, I highly recommend it. You can read GI Joe from issue #1 without any prior knowledge. If you’re a long time fan, this is the GI Joe you’ve been waiting for. The one you deserve. What are you waiting for?

Overall Grade: 10/10

P.S.
While not mandatory, I do recommend starting with these titles:

• Void Rivals
• Transformers
• Cobra Commander
• Duke
• Destro
• Scarlet

This is completely optional, but these titles will 100% enhance the experience.