Thursday, August 13, 2009

GI Joe:Rise of Cobra

As I watched GI Joe: Rise of Cobra, a certain thought kept popping into my head over and over: Hal Needham oughta sue. I was flabbergasted as I watched this movie and realized that it was an unabashed complete and utter clone of Needham's 1982 sci-fi/action flick MEGAFORCE. It sounds absurd to say that anyone would even be aware of MEGAFORCE, a film that hasn't even been released on DVD and is rarely, if ever, acknowledged by those who are aware of it since they're all embarrassed to have seen it; a film so cheap, so poorly made, so hopelessly inept that it has gone down as a little more than a punchline for bad movie geeks' jokes. But allow me to make my case:

MEGAFORCE involves a super-secret, hi-tech army of futuristic fighting men made up of elite soldiers from around the world, which officially does not exist.

GI Joe involves a super-secret, hi-tech army of futuristic fighting men made up of elite soldiers from around the world, which officially does not exist.

MEGAFORCE battles tyranny and evil in every corner of the globe

GI Joe battles tyranny and evil in every corner of the globe

MEGAFORCE makes it's HQ in a secret bunker hidden under the sands of a desert

GI Joe makes it's HQ in a secret bunker hidden under the sands of a desert

MEGAFORCE HQ is an obvious, poorly drawn matte painting

GI Joe is an obvious, poorly rendered CGI backdrop

MEGAFORCE has an invisible car

GI Joe has an invisible suit

MEGAFORCE have motorcycles and trucks mounted with machine guns and lazer cannons

GI Joe have motorcycles and trucks mounted with machine guns and lazer cannons

MEGAFORCE leader Ace Hunter is old friends with their enemy, Duke Guerrera

GI Joe leader Duke was once engaged to marry their enemy, Ana

MEGAFORCE uses holograms to fool their enemies about their whereabouts

GI Joe uses holograms to fool the audience about the characters' whereabouts

MEGAFORCE have access to weapons thought by the rest of the world to only be theoretical concepts

GI Joe have access to weapons thought by the rest of the world to only be theoretical concepts

MEGAFORCE has to save innocent, peace-loving people from an evil gay cowboy

GI Joe has to save innocent, peace-loving people from an evil gay Scotsman

MEGAFORCE's action scenes are filmed in such a way as to render them incomprehensible

GI Joe's action scenes are filmed in such a way as to render them incomprehensible


IT'S THE SAME MOVIE. Literally every scene of GI Joe contains elements of MEGAFORCE. Blatantly. Directly lifted, not the least bit altered. It's almost a direct remake. So fuck it, if you want a review of GI Joe, just go read my MEGAFORCE review and substitute the names. There's literally no difference. It's astounding to me that this could happen. At least when Trey Parker and Matt Stone remade MEGAFORCE (as Team America: World Police) they were honest about how goofy it was and made a spoof out of it. The idiots making GI Joe don't even admit that it's a remake and they expect us to take this material seriously. Yeah right! I was laughing my ass off the entire time I was in that theater watching GI Joe unspool, laughing at how bad it is and laughing at the sheer, unbelievable audacity of it all. Screw Obama's Audacity of Hope, Steven Somers has the Audacity of Crap!

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