According to CBR.com, the Snake Eyes spinoff film will be an origin story for G.I. Joe’s resident ninja. Thus, the man who played him in both live-action films, Ray Park, wouldn’t be returning. Fans feel that he was one of the few bright spots in a franchise that was clearly all substance and no style.
Ironically, Paramount Pictures received similar criticism with Michael Bay’s Transformers series, but the studio has moved past these problems, fixing things via Travis Knight’s Bumblebee solo outing. Simply put, Bumblebee has laid the template for Paramount to follow to get G.I. Joe back on track.
Everyone agrees that Bumblebee excels because it’s a well constructed, simple narrative that ultimately gears to children. It’s the same thing that made the original 80s cartoon so incredible. Stunning visuals and touching storytelling. Lovers of the old cartoons and toys are enjoying this nostalgic trip because it has that classic appeal to it. No one is sexualized. The violence is cartoonish. And it’s a simple story with lots of fan service that makes you laugh and cheer. It’s the Transformers movie that Transformers fans have been waiting for.
This is the kind of invigoration G.I. Joe requires after The Rise of Cobra and Retaliation. Paramount can map out Snake Eyes’ story in the same vein as Bumblebee, using a popular character to wash away the past and provide a course correction. We’ll be seeing the ninja on his first missions, which will also highlight how he lost his voice in battle, but that doesn’t mean that other G.I. Joe favorites won’t figure into the story.
Ultimately, detailing Snake Eyes’ story is a fresh start. Politics and terrorism aside, G.I. Joe stories will need something more so as not to repeat the mistakes of old and come off as generic. This is what Paramount recognized with the Autobots and Decepticons in Bumblebee. So, once the Snake Eyes film goes back to basics and the classic core of G.I. Joe, there’s a lot of potential to be mined to make him and his peers finally a unit that’s believable as America’s Real Heroes.
SOURCE: CBR & my own viewing of the Bumblebee film.