 Hello everybody hooded Cobra Commander 788 here. Welcome to Cobra Convergence 7 in the year 2023. And it is my privilege to have a guest here. This is codename New 2.0.2. He has been a participant in Cobra Convergence going back several years now. And it's my privilege to introduce codename New 2.0.2. And I'll start with asking you to just tell people a little bit about yourself and tell people what you do. Oh, first of all, I'm really ecstatic to be a part of Cobra Convergence once again. I think I started in Cobra Convergence number three, unofficially, but officially Cobra Convergence number four. So to see this grow to this level, it's absolutely been amazing. And I can't thank you enough for starting this and keeping up with it. But a little bit about myself, my channel codename New 2.0.2, I started back in 2015. I've been a lifelong GI Joe fan. I actually completed working for several government agencies. That's kind of how I started. And between my father being a Marine during the Vietnam era and my involvement working in several government agencies, you could see me leading to that and how GI Joe kind of triggered that. But what my channel does is basically, I felt that there was a gap in covering the IDW run of GI Joe comics. So we had you and we had our one good friend, 4MBX257, who did all the Marvel runs. But I saw that there was not really, first of all, I was shocked that GI Joe was still going on. And it was actually when Snake Eyes, the death of Snake Eyes, that kind of brought me back into the comics. I was sitting, I was a government auditor. So I was sitting at my desk and on Yahoo, I saw longtime GI Joe hero, Snake Eyes dies. And I'm like, what? But that's one of the reasons I kind of got started. And the fact that I felt that Larry Hema as a writer, as someone that has contributed to this pop culture altogether, wasn't getting the respect from this younger generation. So I decided that, hey, with the encouragement of you, our friend Carson from 3D Joes, GI Joe Berg. I mean, I was a fan first. And I think that's what makes Cobra Convergence as fun as taking our fandom to the next level. So that's kind of what my channel is about. We recap the modern GI Joe comics. But since we're on a little bit of a hiatus, I've been also looking at other Gen X or 80s properties kind of get us older guys back into this hobby that we love so much. So basically that's the whole spiel of what my channel is all about. You said that Larry hadn't gotten the respect that he deserved. But more recently, he won an Eisner award. Do you feel a little vindicated about that? Do you like people starting to recognize? Yeah, I think that that's what's, it's funny because my whole hat is in the GI Joe world. But then I've been putting, because of the covering the IDW run, I've had a little bit of a step in what these modern comic people are looking at or what they're. So it's kind of, you see that whole nostalgia trend that was coming around 2021. So I guess some people are starting to read more, especially the Wolverine run that he had. And I know he recently completed an Iron Fist run. So it's interesting to like see it kind of like, very happy for him to get the respect that he so richly deserves. It is true that the Marvel run is talked about a lot more. I think, well, it began with Marvel. So, and a lot of us grew up with Marvel, but what appeals to you about the IDW run of the GI Joe comic book series that Larry has been writing? Well, basically what I've noticed is his actually his writing style. So now with Hasbro not breathing down his necks about each nitty gritty thing that they want to incorporate, he has this total writing freedom. And being, I mean, auditing the right for an audit is different than writing for creatively, but there's some similarities in the whole process. Like, you want to hit certain benchmarks and you have some ideas you want to kind of convey. And I think he's able to do that, but at the same time, right in such a manner that it's not kid-friendly anymore. Like, I mean, even though the Marvel run issue 109, we had debts and that's some of the things that we were exposed to, I think you're more seeing that in the IDW run. It's just expanding that. So it's just a natural progression of what the whole real American hero line was going towards. And I think some of his best writing has been in the IDW run of a real American hero. We teamed up on a review of Snake Eyes that included the death of Snake Eyes series. And you did the summary of that. You've had a few years now to process that and to look back on it. How do you feel like it holds up now looking back on it from today's perspective? It's funny because it's one of the things that, like especially to get back into the Cobra convergence type of, you kind of revisit some stuff that we did as a, as I like to call the HCC78 family tree. So I kind of like to watch like what, not just me, but everybody did, but I think it holds up great. So some of the things that I discussed in that is that while the whole story are kind of wasn't, like, you know, it was missing something, especially how Snake Eyes died. I mean, we saw issue 300, you know, I'm not going to spoil a warning, but, you know, it was meant to be. It's like, you know, no one dies forever in comic books. You're right. I'm not saying that Snake Eyes is back, but remember there's a brainwave scanner out there that has most of Snake Eyes memories from a certain part of his life. So imagine if you transmitted that into somebody else that just so happened to look like Snake Eyes. That kind of did happen in that series with Dr. Venom, didn't it? Yeah, we have, there has been precedent, I guess, in the series for something like that happening. That's actually what kind of threw what was going to happen to Snake Eyes, because I think this was around issue 260 when Dr. Venom came back, but it was kind of like taking something from the Batman animated series where the Joker kind of imprinted himself on Tim Drake and he turned into the Joker. So I see that how Larry kind of took that and put a little bit of Dr. Venom into Dr. Mindbender, and then you get a new, I mean, of course, nowadays you have to, the science fiction element, I know we talked about that, we're like the military aspect of it, some of the science fiction, but it's just a tough sell to have a strictly military type of, you have to add some of the fantasy element. So you take it with the tongue-in-cheek as a story. Is there a favorite story arc that you have in that series? Actually, I thought that the whole story arc with the dawn of the Rashe Kagi was with the Dawn Marino taking, assume that mantle. I know with this whole movement, some people are being turned off by the push of just females, leads, unless it's well-written down our throats, like, you know, case in point, Ray from Star Wars, and a lot of people had issues with that. But when Larry did that with the Dawn Marino, you know, I thought it was well done. It kind of, you know, you do have a little bit of a snake-eyes aspect, but you also have a character that's kind of, you know, broken inside, but there's that essence to want to be a good person. So you could either go, it's kind of like the reverse Anakin Skywalker thing, you could go bad, or you could use your thing to go good, and she chose to go down a good path. The, I would say 1B is that silent options story with the creation of, with the whole backstory of Helix. And then you find out how terrible Hawke is in real life. Hawke is a jerk, like how he took a little innocent girl and made her into a killing machine. Like it just, like Geneva Code, all that stuff, all out the window. Hawke is a jerk. There is a moral ambiguity that Larry has been able to capture in this series, I think. But I mean, you still have some nobility in some of the characters. I think that Roblox is a character that was showed some nobility and some integrity stalker, some of these guys. It's not a cynical series, I would say, but contrary to maybe popular belief, I have read most of the IDW series, but my next question for you is, for those of us who grew up on the Marvel series and still refer to the Marvel series, since I'm review vintage stuff, I still refer to just the Marvel series. What would you say to a Marvel G.I. Joe comics fan that might bring them in to read the IDW series and hopefully a continued series in the future? And that's what, every month I would do a recap. So I usually waited a month because I didn't want to take away from sales, we both know Diana from IDW, all the G.I. Joe team from IDW have become really good friends and they are real fans. I mean, hardcore fans that work on that. We don't see that, I'm sorry to say that, from the Hasbro team, just watched a live stream, but the IDW team are real fans. So I usually wait a month. I'm also was a month behind because I didn't want to take away from sales. But during each recap, I always watch actually your videos a lot, I'll reread the issue, I'll watch your video or form BX257, and then I'll do cross references to what the modern story is to what it was in the past. So this way, as a Marvel reader, when you watch my recaps for a few times and you want to go off on your own, you're able to connect the dots to see like, okay, this all makes sense. So my story that I love so much as a child has evolved and grown up along with me. So I think that's what I try to do when I did my monthly recaps during the IDW run. Yeah, you mentioned Diana. We're referring to the IDW series now for those who probably everybody knows by now, that series is concluded with issue number 300, but there's the expectation that it will continue under another banner. But you mentioned Diana, the team at IDW actually did have people from the fan community working with them. That is fairly special and somewhat unusual, I think. It is awesome. Did you? Diana has reached out and on Facebook, she has asked questions to select fans that she knows or trusts. And it's a trust that you hold very dearly because you have the senior researcher for this team asking you about certain things. This happened a few times, but yeah, I think how she did everything is, and I told her this, you're one of the top five most important GI Joe people in our community. Not only she's a good person, but I think she's a top five. You would be another one, and I think Carson would be another one, just to give an example, but all of you have been carrying that flame that what we're seeing today. So yeah, definitely. Did you catch the, what was it, the Saturday morning memories? I think that's what it was called. The series that was based on the animated style, did you catch that one? Yes. The funny thing is that same artist wrote, I think on issue 281. And when you wrote, and it was a one with snow job on the cover, I mean, one of the covers. And I was reading that and I was like, this guy draws a lot like the old Sunbow version. Sure enough. And when I said that to Diana, she's like, hold that thought. And then a few months later, they announced that series. So I was like, this looks a lot like that, but that was well done. I think they're doing for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles now, and I think they're doing for Dungeons and Dragons. I continue that. I did see that. And it's a great idea, I think. A lot of fans came in through the animated series. That just reached so many people. Did you have any association or any memories of the animated series? Did that have an impression on you? Well, yeah. I remember, like I grew up outside of Philadelphia. I know during a certain Super Bowl, me and you were kind of at odds, you know? Well, we won't talk about who came out on top there. But anyway, I would remember cutting home from school. And of course, my Nana would finish watching General Hospital. Then after General Hospital, you have the He-Man, G.I. Joe, and Transformers. So I loved the fact that they were real people. They didn't have special abilities. They could be anybody I knew that could have a high moral sense to do the right thing. That's what I tried. Another thing that I focused on, the diversity of G.I. Joe, and the fact that you have a collected group of people of all different colors, races, fates, backgrounds coming together for a greater good to defeat this overall evil that's over here. And that's the heart, the meat and potatoes, in my opinion of what G.I. Joe, especially this real American hero line, is all about. And I think that's what I wish some, I would like more fans to kind of like gravitate to that because that's the essence of what makes this line so one of the best lines of all time. And I would say that Larry in the IDW run kind of leaned into that aspect of G.I. Joe, wouldn't you say? Oh yeah, definitely. Larry actually was kind enough to write to me, especially around issue number 283. He introduced a, and I'll be honest, he introduced a Muslim G.I. Joe character. And for the first time in 40 years, I had a G.I. Joe that was me. And he kind of like was really touched for me to like kind of incorporated that some of the things into this character called Mongoose. And I recently asked him if he's gonna continue with this character because it was a big hit with a lot of people in my community. Like so, it was something to be proud of, that, hey, we're portrayed as good people, not, you know, running around and doing bad stuff, you know, like things. And I think, you know, my father serving in Vietnam as a U.S. Marine and me and my contributions to protecting this country, that was very important for me to see. And I remember sitting lying next to my wife and I read that those few panels and I started to cry, you know, because it meant so much because it touched what he did, what I did and what we're about as far as like keeping innocent people protected. And, you know, evil doesn't have a religion, a look or a color or anything like that. Evil is evil. So I was so glad that, you know, Larry did that. And he's used women a lot more, not just, you know, smart women with, you know, MIT degrees, there are hackers. He's been setting himself up where if it was presented correctly that this modern day kids could actually identify with these, especially around that 281 to 283, all these new characters that he introduced towards the end, I could see them jumping forward with that as well as bring in the legendary characters as well. So there is a chance. There's always a lot of talk about like, what's next for G.I. Joe and how do you make G.I. Joe relevant to a new generation? But it sounds like from your perspective that Larry has already been kind of doing that. He's already been developing G.I. Joe in a direction that is more modern and accessible. I 110% think that he has already laid the blueprint of what G.I. Joe can transition into the future. He's incorporated new characters that would appeal to a younger demographic. We have a girl that's a hacker. We have someone that does make up or disguise and kind of like we have different ethnicities but they're all like scarlets still there. We have stalker still there. There's still points and they're serving as kind of like role models to these young kids like Dawn Marino, Helix, these other new people. We have a girl with a disability that's a new G.I. Joe. She's has a prosthetic hand or arm. So it's something for everybody that everybody could identify with. Now, what the Hasbro team and how they're going to incorporate that or if there's any connection or conversations between the two, I don't, you know, so far. It's all behind the scenes. Nobody's talking to us about it. But, you know, if they'd like my phone number, I'm sure I, if they'd like to talk to you about it, I'll pass your number on to you. I don't think Emily wants to talk to me. Now that, I mean, after talking about the importance of G.I. Joe and how it's evolved over the ages and how it's taught some important lessons, let's talk about Cobra. Let's dive into evil. Let's get in. Yes, let's turn to the dark side for a moment. Do you have, is there a Cobra character that resonates with you in any particular way, one that really stands out for you? You know, I've always loved Destro as far as a bad character because he's a bad character with honor and nobility. Like I remember when the Baroness wanted to kill snake eyes and he stood up and said, no, you are wrong to carry this hatred. He was, he's an innocent man to stand up for what's right. And there's several other instances where he had a, he would never cross his morals or his honor. For him, that was the big thing. So he's one of my favorite, I think Vader, I would say Dr. Doom and Destro are my three favorite baddies of all time. So, I mean, he's not pure evil, but he's a bad guy, but he's doing it for financial reasons. So it's not like more of hurting people maliciously or having an evil, or, you know, messed up in the head, like kind of crazy. Right, he's not crazy. I mean, let's not to give him too much credit. He is, you know, profiting off of way, you know. Let's not give him the Nobel prize. No, no, no, no. But he, no, but he does have a sense of honor and he has principles, he has morals and he sticks to them, which is something you can't really say about Cobra Commander. No. So yeah, there's a contrast there. And that's some of that moral ambiguity that we talked about before. It's, I mean, yes, he's a bad guy, but he's a different kind of bad guy. And what makes Cobra so interesting is that you see how, like especially, you know, we're talking about the IDW runs, the untold tales of the baroness and how activism and extreme, you know, can lead you to, you know, the wrong side. Because I think that's what was amazing with the IDW run. You know, going back to that real quick is that you saw how the baroness being, you know, beautiful, smart and all that stuff, you know, went to this extreme, because she's not as bad as, you know, Cobra Commander. Or she's not also like Destro either, because it's her cause that is more important, you know, that is anything else where Destro is profitability, Cobra Commander is a different evil altogether. So you have all these levels of evil and how they kind of arise and how they came to be. And that's what's excellently written and you have to take a step back and analyze. I mean, I do this for a living for 15 years as an auditor, but that's how I look at things. It's amazing how these characters are developed and just thinking about that is amazing, how evil comes to be. So I guess it's safe to say that Larry Hama is your preferred GI Joe writer. Yeah. Assuming again, knock on wood that the series continues under a different banner, will you be picking that up again as soon as it starts rolling and continuing with the reviews and the summaries? That's a good question. I actually sampled some of the Devils Do Run. You know, like of course I have to look, you know, this Kimakura that was just released is a Devils Do character. And it's something that Larry incorporated into the Marvel run with, you know, Sean Collins. You know, that's Sean Collins. He just, he had him before and he kind of like, you know, oh, I can't, I could incorporate what he involved to with these other people written about him. You have to be open and like I gave the Snake Eyes movie, I wanted that movie to be good. And you know this, like, I was like, all right, I was open to being this, that, this, and I was totally open to it. The end product was like, it's kind of like the experience with Star Wars too. Like we all went into these sequel series with the breadth of, you know, and then we got what we got. So we're like, we're rounding up our time here and you dive into the Snake Eyes movie, which is a topic that we could unpack for quite a long time. That's the kind of worms that, you know, the future, the future discussion we can dive into that. There is so much to say, so much. But yeah, but we do have a few more minutes. Would you like to talk about, I know that everybody will see this during Cobra Convergence. This video should go up on the same day that your contribution goes up on the calendar. Do you have, can you give anyone a preview, even if it's not of your Cobra Convergence stuff, but just the preview of what you have planned coming up for the future? Well, it's going to be, I'm not going to just do this one. I mean, of course I have my one official date, but as you know, I do different videos throughout the month of Cobra, just like, kind of like you. I don't make it official, I make it unofficial, but it all ties into Cobra Convergence. But the one important thing I wanted to leave with everybody as we wrap up is that it is very important for all of you fans out there to go and subscribe to every single one of these content creators channels because it's like a pat on the back. Remember, many of these fans were there during the quote unquote dark eras when there was no GI Joe. And it's important that if you're new, you've rediscovered GI Joe, please, you know, these are hard fans that work nine to five and they do this, you know, no one has a hundred zillion subscribers. They don't do this to get money, whatever, they're doing this because they're fellow fans and nothing is fandom than a pat on the back. And you could do that by commenting, liking, subscribing to all these people's channels. It's very important to do that because that's what Hasbro and all these other people are looking at, how are the fan base rallying? That's why other fan bases have become popular and we're still kind of, you know, yeah, we got classified, we're not there yet. We still want to see a good movie and we want to see a younger generation carry on that flame for us because we're not going to be here on earth forever. And just like the 12 inch guys did for us, we need to pass it on to another generation. And everything you just said, subscribing, commenting, that's all free. Free of charge, free of anything to do and an easy way to recognize the people who are fans but are also contributing something to the fandom and to the overall love of this property, this brand and these toys and these comic books that have been such a part of our lives. So I think that's our time. So I will say thank you to codename you too, Vera too. As you are seeing this right now, his video should be up on his YouTube channel. There will be a link and so go check it out, subscribe, give it a thumbs up, comment and do all the free stuff that you can do that shows your support. So thank you again. Any parting words for, you may have actually made some great parting words but any last words for our audience? Yeah, remember like G.I. Joe is a fan base and we're all passionate about it. So let's keep this going. I'm already looking forward to Cobra Convergence 8 and I'm looking forward to doing this for many more years. And again, we have to thank this man, was it this way? This man for all for his efforts and everything and thank you for making me part of the HCC 7-8 Family Tree. It's really been an honor and a friendship for all these years. Thank you, it's been an honor for me as well and thank you to you. I thank you to everyone else who has worked so hard. You've seen a lot of the behind the scenes stuff. You've seen what everybody puts into it. So thank you to everyone who has your name on the list this year, who has ever had your name on the list of contributors. You have done so much to keep this fandom alive. So thank you again, codename YouTube R2. Thank you. Go immediately right now and go check out his video and we will see you there. See you guys. Bye. Bye.