G.I. Joe #1 (June 1982) – “Operation: Lady Doomsday” – Larry Hama/Herb Trimpe/Bob McLeod
This is my first G.I. Joe review, but I’ve actually read quite a few of these issues before so this isn’t completely new territory to me. It has been a long time since I’ve read them, but I remember liking the series overall, at least until it turned into Snake Eyes and His Amazing Friends. Don’t get me wrong, I like ninjas as much as anyone (and Larry Hama came up with some great stories about Snake Eyes, Storm Shadow, Zartan, Firefly, and the rest), but I prefer when they’re just part of the story, not the sole focus. I thought about starting with the Origins miniseries (which were published much later) to give some background, but some of those weren’t written by Larry Hama and they contain massive spoilers for the regular series, so
maybe I’ll save them for after the first run. Anyway, this issue starts on a train between New York and Washington. The train is full of soldiers protecting Dr. Adele Burkhart, a nuclear physicist who’s invented a viable doomsday device. (If you’re too young to remember the Cold War, a doomsday device was a theoretical device that would wipe out all life on Earth. Supposedly, possession of such a device by one or both of the world’s super-powers would keep the other from starting a nuclear war, for fear of leading to their own destruction.) Anyway, Burkhart has figured out how to make a working doomsday device, but she claims she was tricked into it and her research was co-opted by the military 
without her knowledge. She’s apparently an ultra-liberal (and ultra-pacifist), who hates the military and refuses to cooperate with the government over her research. But there are other organizations interested and one of them—calling itself Cobra—carries out a daring kidnapping on the train, led by the Baroness (who got in disguised as a reporter). Later, we see two Generals (Austin and Flagg) discussing the situation; they can’t let Cobra extract knowledge from Burkhart, but they can’t just let Cobra kill her (or send an assassination team of their own) since it would be bad PR. So they decide a rescue is the only option and for that, they need the top secret G.I. Joe team. We get a look at the roster (which includes Snake Eyes, Scarlett, Stalker, Breaker, Grunt, Flash, Rock and Roll, Short Fuse, Zap, Steeler, Clutch, Grand Slam, and the
leader, Hawk) and find out the Joes are stationed under deep cover at a motor pool in Fort Wadsworth (which was a real Army base in Staten Island, New York). There’s also someone named Shooter on the team—which may be a reference to Jim Shooter—but we never see them in the series. Years later in the Origins miniseries, Larry Hama would show us Shooter and explain why she (yes, she) was never seen in the regular series. We see some of the Joes in their downtime before they get together for the briefing. Cobra is holding Burkhart in an old Spanish fort on some Caribbean island. (No, not Cobra Island … that comes later.) Hawk hands out the assignments and reminds the team—some of whom aren’t happy about rescuing someone they consider a traitor to the United States—that it’s not their job to judge Burkhart, and that her opinions are protected by the Constitution just like every other American’s. As the Joes approach the island, Cobra Commander (whose face 
is hidden behind a cowl) tells Burkhart he was expecting a rescue team and seems almost happy that they’ve shown up. (Burkhart figured the military would just blow the island to hell with her on it.) Stalker starts things off by taking out the beach guards with a rocket pack, giving the others a clear path. Breaker and Flash screw up the RADAR (making it look like everything’s always clear), while Snake Eyes and Scarlett sneak into the fort and start taking out guards. Stalker, Grunt, and Short Fuse blast the airfield to hell, but Cobra Commander anticipated that and had a dummy airfield built for the Joes to destroy. Hawk leads the rest of the team in an amphibious assault, pushing straight through Cobra’s defenses towards the fort. Stalker’s team finds
some villagers massacred by Cobra, but Stalker won’t let them deviate from the mission to bury the bodies. When Snake Eyes and Scarlett blow the generators, Cobra Commander puts his plan into action, sending Burkhart to the airfield. The Joes rescue her, but “Burkhart” turns out to be Baroness in disguise. Cobra Commander plans to take the real Burkhart out on his personal helicopter, leaving behind a pile of explosives for her rescuers. When Snake Eyes and Scarlett find them, Cobra Commander threatens Burkhart and they throw their weapons down. But Burkhart warns them about the bomb and gets shot by 
Cobra Commander. Scarlett puts a shaken throwing star into his hand just as the rest of the team bust through the door. Burkhart is fine and is actually grateful to be rescued, even by the military. In the confusion, Cobra Commander and Baroness slip through a secret hatch and take off, leaving Burkhart and the Joes to pile into the helicopter and get out just before the whole island blows up.
“Hot Potato” – Larry Hama/Don Perlin/Jack Abel
This is a bonus story, about a team of Joes in some unnamed Emirate in the Middle East run by a crazed dictator named Sharif. He’s supported by Cobra,
but Scarlett, Snake Eyes, and Rock and Roll have gotten hold of a tape that could help defuse things in the region … if they can get it across the border. Unfortunately, Sharif’s forces have caught up to them and Scarlett is wounded. She orders the others (at gunpoint!) to leave her behind and get the tape over the border by running through ten miles of desert. They head out but Snake Eyes soon turns back to help Scarlett fight off Sharif’s soldiers. (Instead of being pissed off that he disobeyed orders, she’s quite touched by the gesture, so maybe this is the beginning of their romantic feelings for each other.) Rock and Roll gets the tape across the border where Hawk, Clutch, and Stalker are waiting. Rock and Roll grabs a motorbike and heads back into the desert to help Snake Eyes and Scarlett, who are about to be overrun. Sharif calls in an 
air-strike, but Hawk and Clutch show up to blast the jet from the sky, telling the others that Stalker got the tape out of the country. At the end of the issue, we get profiles of some of the Joes (Scarlett, Breaker, Flash, and Stalker) giving their military training and weapons specializations. The deeper psych profiles that later appeared on the action figure cards aren’t included here. There’s also a schematic of the Pit, the Joes’ secret headquarters at Fort Wadsworth. This issue is a good introduction to the team and I like how Larry Hama doesn’t hold back too much on the realities of the situation: he delves into politics and morality (with the Joes discussing the possibility of just killing Dr. Burkhart to keep Cobra from extracting the knowledge from her), and showing the Joes actually killing some of their opponents (although that’s kind of glossed over), and even having Snake Eyes and Scarlett contemplate suicide when Sharif’s men are about to overrun them.
G.I. Joe #2 – “Panic at the North Pole” – Larry Hama/Don Perlin/Jack Abel
This one starts with an American military base in the Arctic being wiped out mysteriously, with all the records missing. Generals Flagg and Austin wonder if the Russians (who have their own base not too far away) might be responsible, so they send in Stalker, Scarlett, Snake Eyes, and Breaker to recon the Russians (and retrieve the missing files, as long as they can do so without initiating contact). While they’re watching the Russian base, they see an Eskimo with a .30 machine gun pop in for a minute and take off again. (I know the word Eskimo is considered racist nowadays, but that’s the word used here so it’s what I’m
going to stick with, even though the proper term is Inuit.) The Joes figure nobody’s in the base since the Eskimo got in and out with no disturbance, so they go down to check it out. They find all the Russians frozen to death and a high-tech radio that can affect human brainwaves. But the frequency modulator is missing, as are all the Russian files … and the missing American ones as well. Stalker figures the Eskimo was sent by the Russians to retrieve the files and the modulator, so he leads the team after him. They send photos to Washington and get a dossier on the Eskimo, whose name is Kwinn (which I’m assuming is a reference to the Manfred Mann song). They find Kwinn, but he’s expecting 
them and gets the drop on them. He takes their weapons and supplies and smashes their radio, telling them what happened with the Russians. Apparently, they were beaming fear waves at the American base, which made the Americans paranoid enough to kill each other, leaving the base vulnerable to the theft of their files. But the machine malfunctioned and the Russians got a dose of their own medicine, leading to them freezing to death when their heating unit broke. Kwinn was hired to retrieve the modulator and the American records, and to cover everything up. He takes off on a dog sled, leaving the Joes to freeze. Stalker refuses to give up on the mission, telling the others to cannibalize Kwinn’s downed plane to build an ice boat. They manage to get in front of Kwinn and lay an ambush with some explosives he left behind, but he anticipates them again and they end up fighting. Snake Eyes gets his Uzi
back, but Kwnn has removed all the firing pins from their guns and added them to his weasel skull necklace. Kwinn admits that he’d like to just hand over the modulator (since the idea of the Russians controlling fear bothers him), but he’s a man of honour and has to fulfill his contract. Later, Kwinn delivers the modulator and the files to the Russians, thus fulfilling his contract with them. He tells them the Joes are on their way to get the stuff back and when the Russians complain, Kwinn says he did everything he could to hinder their progress, leaving them five miles back with no supplies and no firing pins in their 
weapons. But he also stopped one mile away and left his necklace (with the firing pins still attached) in a cairn as an offering to the spirits. He tells the Russians they might be able to get to the cairn before the Joes, since they only have one mile to go, but then he reminds them the Joes are trained trackers and the Russians aren’t. In the last scene, we see the Joes have retrieved the firing pins and are on their way to take care of the Russians (although we don’t get to see the ensuing slaughter).