G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero #144
“Snake-Eyes: the Tale Untold!”
Writer: Larry Hama
Penciler: William Rosado
Summary:
After Milleville, Snake-Eyes Stalker, Scarlett and Rock n’ Roll are all lifted out via Tomahawk. Snake-Eyes makes sure that the door doesn’t jam again, and this causes everyone to flashback to Snake-Eyes’ accident on an early mission.
:::cue flashback music :::
Snake-Eyes gets his face fried off (now with some additional dialogue from his teammates) and the other chopper blew up, ….yet we’re shown that the mission actually continued. Snake-Eyes scrawled “CM” or “Charley Mike” in the sand, which meant “Continue the Mission”. Snake-Eyes bandaged up his head, stole Scarlett’s throwing stars and continued on. The mission was to save a hostage in a Middle Eastern country (possibly Trucial Abysmia)– one George Strawhacker, the fiance’ of Snake-Eyes’ sister. Snake-Eyes leads the rescue mission and is able to identify Strawhacker when two Cobra Vipers also claim to be him.
Once back home, Strawhacker was debriefed by a young Hawk. Back in the present, Hawk concludes that Strawhacker never knew that Snake-Eyes rescued him twice (once in this flashback, and also in the “future”, circa issue 105 in Borovia).
Notes:
- Important to note that Hawk narrated the last part of the flashback. So it’s told from his vantage point. Strawhacker didn’t recognize Snake-Eyes in this story…but he clearly recognized and knew him in issues 105-107. Fans could complain that Strawhacker not recognizing Snakes was a slip-up, but there is a No-Prize Explanation: Strawhacker didn’t recognize Snakes the first time… but later did some research and found out all about him. When they met in Borovia, he DID recognize him. So the slip-up is simply Hawk not knowing what Strawhacker knew (confusing, eh?) Hawk is simply incorrect that Strawhacker “never knew it was the same guy who got him out of the gulag in Borovia”.
- Okay, but there’s still a bad ending to this: Strawhacker was eventually killed in Borovia…so Snake-Eyes didn’t “save his life”.
- Also some big continuity errors present. First, Wild Bill and Doc fly in as a support team after Snake-Eyes’ chopper crash. This was before issue 1 of the series, yet Wild Bill and Doc didn’t join the team until issue 11. In this flashback, both Hawk and Rock n’ Roll recognize Wild Bill and Doc. Also, since Doc was on hand, you’d think he’d remember Snake-Eyes (see issue 11, where he’s surprised at Snake-Eyes’ mask).
- No-Prize/Ret-con Explanation: Wild Bill and Doc worked with the team before they became official members in issue 11. Doc didn’t get a clear chance to evaluate Snake-Eyes, because he ran off and continued the mission. When Doc officially joined the team in Alaska, he thought Snake-Eyes was just some dude in a black mask…not the mask-less grunt he saw, head afire, for few minutes in the desert. Doc probably put it all together, off-panel, in issue 11.
- Another tougher continuity error: Cobra Vipers, Toxo-Vipers and HISS tanks appear. The HISS tanks didn’t appear until issue 11 and the Vipers didn’t appear until roughly issue 50. Furthermore, the Toxo-Viper armor depicted didn’t apper until roughly issue 125! It’s possible that both were in-use WAY back when…but an easier explanation is to chalk it up to a flashback error. I.E; the person flashing back in this story has seen so many Vipers and Cobra HISS tanks that, in their mind, that’s what was on-hand, back then.
- Grunt, Rock n’ Roll and Snake-Eyes all meet up with Stalker as they continue. It’s possible that this mission is the first part of the “Hot Potato” story from issue 1! More likely,the Joes had a lengthy, multi-part mission in Trucial Abysmia. Possible that Colonel Sharif was their first nemesis until Cobra came along in issue 1. Uber-fans can fill in their own continuity.
- -But another, more important question: WHO was in the other Joe chopper that blew up?
- In the present, the Joes mention that they’ve “liberated” Milleville. So that plot thread is finally solved.
- Once again, Hawk is blonde in both the flashback and current day stories. He’ll suddenly have dark hair once again, next issue.
- Roadblock asks Stalker to “do the honors” since he’s on his way to Arlington. A cool little scene that’ll appear next issue.
Appearances:
Characters (figures): Hawk, Snake-Eyes, Scarlett, Rock n’ Roll, Stalker, Grunt (flashback only), Doc (flashback only),Wild Bill, Storm Shadow, Roadblock, Spirit, Airtight, Tunnel Rat, Dojo, Tjbang, Jinx
Characters (“comic-only”): George Strawhacker
Vehicles and stuff (toys): Tomahawk, Rhino GPV, Cobra HISS
Vehicles and stuff (not toys): GI Joe Huey, standard army jeep
Firsties:
Characters: none (although, retroactively, it’s the first for Strawhacker)
Vehicles and stuff: none
Rating: 2 Flag Points
I’ve been rereading my Joe comics lately and am glad to have found your site as I’ve been reading my way through it was well. I had never even picked up on the oddity of Wild Bill and Doc being on the helicopter until you mentioned it.
I know you’ve talked about the other chopper of being likely being explained by Scarlett’s reference to the Joes originally being farmed out to other spec ops teams for missions, but I was thinking that maybe the same is true for Doc and Wild Bill. Maybe they were just a random spec ops medic and pilot assigned to the Joes as part of the broader mission — in some ways this could even explain their eventually joining, because maybe in the early days the Joes would give offers to people that they’d done joint missions with (which is how Duke and Roadblock came to their attention).
As for Doc being surprised by Snake’s scarring just after Doc joined the team — two possible explanations come to mind. Firstly is maybe he didn’t see Snake Eyes’face again after the incident, so he never realized how had the permanent scarring was. Secondly is, maybe he simply forgot that it was the same guy – the stories were likely 2-3 years apart (Snake Eyes had 10 surgeries and has recovered enough to be active by issue 1, which means at least 1-2 years between the crash and issue 1), so it’s possible that it just slipped his mind.
As an aside, did you ever get the impression that this story was inspired by Operation Eagle Claw, Delta Force’s failed mission to save the Iranian hostages? I read about Eagle Claw a few months ago and when rereading this I can’t help but notice a lot of similarities.
Yeah. We both align on the Wild Bill and Doc thing. They had crossed paths with the GI Joe team, before they officially signed on. Same way Hawk first crossed paths with Chuckles in “Declassified”. That was all set before issue 1, yet Chuckles didn’t officially become a Joe until issue 60.
Now that I’ve typed that, this does bring up an interesting question: why didn’t Hawk recognize Chuckles in issue 60 (and vice versa)? Ya’d think he’d remember the dude in the Hawaiian shirt. No-Prize explanation: Chuckles is always working and understands the importance of secrecy and classified info. He didn’t want to spill that info to the other “new” Joes, Fast Draw, Falcon and Law.
Never knew the details of “Operation: Eagle Claw” until you mentioned it (and looked up the broad details). Entirely possible that it was of some inspiration.
I haven’t actually read Declassified in awhile and don’t know where my copy is, so unfortunately I can’t recall the meeting.
The apparent error that really bugs me is the two ninjas in the recent Duke flashback. Clearly one is Snake Eyes, and your theory about it maybe being the Arashikage guy from Trieste is a good theory, but it bugs me since that seems clearly meant to be Storm Shadow. My original No Prize guess for that was Scarlett, with her breasts bound to help hide her gender for some reason that I can’t guess lol
I actually found my issue Declassified issues and had a chance to reread them.
With respect to Wild Bill, it seems to me that the Joes had their eyes on him for awhile. Early on they might have figured that they could get by without having dedicated pilots and using the resources of other services, but when they expanded they went with one of the tried and true guys who they were familiar with.
As for the Chuckles theory, I think that works. On the one hand, Chuckles probably doesn’t want to divulge anything that isn’t well known (like Hawk’s court martial). On the other hand, Hawk might have been playing dumb and waiting for them to play their hand. That said, it’s also entirely possible that he didn’t make the connection until later on – after all, early Joe books were closeish to real time, so a few years had passed. In declassified they didn’t spend more than a few minutes together, and while this can probably be chalked up to the artists having different styles, it looks like Chuckles put on a ton of muscle between those two meetings.
The annual expansion of the team–and the actual reasoning for it— could make for some interesting back-stories. Or at least a debate among obsessive fans.
Easy theory is that it was all due to budget. 13 guys seemed liked a good idea, at first (or 14, if you count Shooter), and all the DoD was willing to spend. As time went on, Cobra grew, so the Joes’ budget expanded and they were able to bring in more people (and nifty vehicles, of course). So when Hawk got the okay to expand, he reached out to some guys he trusted and respected– like Wild Bill and Doc.
Hawk: “Sirs, we need more resources, personnel and equipment”
Jugglers: “Whatever. Most of your time is spent chasing wackos in blue uniforms”
Hawk: “They have an entire city”
Jugglers: “So?”
Hawk: “Intelligence says they are working on a bio-weapon and mind control techniques”
Jugglers (to themselves): “Dammit. They beat us to it.”
Jugglers (to Hawk): ” Errr…okay, we’ll increase your budget. Go get 9 more soldiers”