Yo, Cobra!

COBRA, VOLUME 1: COBRA CIVIL WAR

Collects G.I. JOE: COBRA WAR #0 and COBRA #s 1-4

The relaunch that followed on the heels of the shocking assassination of Cobra Commander and helped reshape IDW’s entire G.I. Joe line, this is the perfect starting point for anyone who hasn’t yet discovered the brilliance of the COBRA comics.  IDW got the rights in 2009, and G.I. JOE: COBRA, launched by creators Christos Gage, Mike Costa, and Antonio Fuso, was an immediate sensation, at least for me.  It was a revolution, a comic book that fully embraced the concept of putting character first.  Anyway, you can read those early issues, or the quick recap of what they led to in this volume.

Suffice it to say, but COBRA is the first time the bad guy has been fully embraced as a driver of the narrative.  In an age where the bad guys are flaunting their ability in the real world to drive things, sticking it to anyone who saw how the Great Recession was caused by blatant greed worse than anything twenty years ago, COBRA is the exploration of the mentalities that help justify these decisions.  In fact, this volume spells it all out pretty nicely.

Cobra Commander is dead, and Cobra is an organization that abhors a vacuum, but has no idea how to fill it.  Everyone involved is a rampant narcissist.  From Crystal Ball to the Baroness to Serpentor to Major Bludd to Tomax Paoli, and others besides, including a double agent working within G.I. Joe itself, this volume is a primer on everything Costa (Gage departed the project a little while back) has been doing so brilliantly with very little fanfare.

Anyone else would have buckled under and started doing the expected years ago, but Costa has maintained a consistent level of excellence, and that has in turn dictated the course of IDW’s entire Joes line.  DC got Costa to do exactly the kind of generic book in BLACKHAWKS that he has contradicted with every twist of this fascinating exploration of motivation and justification. 

Any self-respecting comic book fan ought to be reading COBRA by now, yet I can still find those on the Internet who find it easy to dismiss this material, which astounds me, and just goes to speak to the power of tradition that leaves some capable of following material that doesn’t even come close to this depth, but flashes the expected in lieu of inspiration.  Maybe it’s for that very reason, that COBRA defies logic in every way, features a measured, deliberate approach that may actually convince the skeptical that it’s more safe than it actually is.  Some people will only respond to bombast.  Well, when it counts, COBRA can do that, too, and affect the course of things it has long defied.

I know, I’m making it all sound grandiose.  That’s because COBRA is.  It’s essential reading, and a seminal experience for our times.