GI Joe Extreme Volume 2, #4:
All This and World War II

Summary: A group of bombers are flying over what we can presume is Germany during World War Two. Sgt. Savage parachutes into enemy territory. Now, he says, he's going to earn his pay. A group of German soldiers spot him. Sarge thanks them for rolling out the red carpet, but he won't be staying. He opens fire on the Germans, gunning some of them down. He knifes a few of the others and steals the uniform from one of them. Unlike most folks who pull this dodge, he realizes that it's only a matter of a head count before the Germans figure out that he's not really one of their own. Still, it will buy him a little time.

Sarge shows up at the Nazis' HQ, wishing he could blow the whole rats' nest sky high. But, business before pleasure after all. Looking through a set of Nazi files, Sarge grouses about the disorderly state of the Nazis' files.

Sarge is interrupted by a Nazi who tells him "You will surrender or die!"

Sarge's reply is to throw a stack of files in the Nazi's face. As he shoots it out with the Nazis, he scrabbles through the files, searching for the right one. As he finds it, he begins to vanish only to reappear in a lab wearing a VR helmet? "Whew!" he says. "I 'd need a straight razor to cut that any closer!"

"You made it back Sarge! That's all that counts!" says Metalhead.

Eagle Eye asks Sarge how it was, was it weird? Sarge tells him he thought it would be, but it wasn't. It was like being there.

Metalhead says that's just how he planned it. So far, Metalhead says, the Virtual Reality Trainer (VRT) checks out aces. As soon as Sarge completed the first round he poppled out, just as planned.

Mayday says the VRT sounds more like a video game than a training device. Metalhead says "You gotta have goals..." Now that the system checks out, he figures they'll try it with three people: Quick Stryke, Mayday and Eagle Eye are going in. Sarge asks if he can go back in. Metalhead agrees and they suit up.

The Joes hop into the VRT aas "General Clancy" finishes giving them their orders. The Joes head out to their waiting plane, which of course would be a museum piece in real life.

One of the Joes opens a folder showing a dossier for a Professor Rhineman. The photo is dated circa 1939.

Mayday checks out the cockpit, where a VR pilot is flying the plane. As she shows up, the plane is attacked and the pilot is killed. Mayday takes control of the plane.

The plane is hit by a lightening bolt. Metalhead breaks into the session, telling the others that there's a problem: a REAL lightening storm has trapped the Joes within the VRT. Their only way out is to complete the game. But, if they die in the game, they'll die for real.

Mayday gets them through the dogfight, but crashlands the plane. The Joes take off on foot. "At least it can't get any worse," says Eagle Eye.

Of course, it then gets worse. A group of Nazis surround the Joes. They're lead by a Colonel Krieger who takes the Joes to a prison camp. Inside, the Joes spot Professor Rhineman.

Cartoon Note: Krieger is the real name of the villain from the Sgt. Savage cartoon/toyline. 'course, then he wasn't a Nazi Colonel, he was the man who betrayed Sgt. Savage and his men to the Iron Army and who became General Blitz.

Krieger tells his men to assign their "guests" to proper lodgings, he will "attend" to the American female himself. Stupid man... Mayday proceeds to clock the Colonel while Savage takes the opportunity to whale on the guards.

The Joes proceed to whup Nazi ass. Sarge (or maybe Eagle Eye, I can't really tell which) holds Krieger at gunpoint. The Nazis hold their fire at Krieger's order and the Joes tell the Professor to come with them. The professor raises a very good point: "But...where shall we go?"

"You know, the professor has a point," says Sarge (or maybe Eagle Eye). "Where are we gonna go? We're in the middle of Nazi Germany."

"Tell me about it,' says Quick Stryke. "But we're in dis too deep to turn back now."

Mayday tells the guys to remember the game. All they have to do is get Professor Rhinemann out of there, now. They leave the camp, but Sarge stays behind to hold off the Nazis, only to be gunned down by the Nazis. The bullets hit and it looks like Sarge has indeed bought the farm.

Back in the real world, the Joes make it back out of the game, but Sarge isn't moving. Quick Stryke is ready to tell the others the bad news, but Sarge sits up. The others thought hewas dead, but apparently once they got the professor out of the camp, the game ended and nothing that happened afterward counted. As the Joes fly off, Metalhead rather nervously asks if Sarge knows it was just an accident. Sarge doesn't reply, which probably means Metalhead is going to be looking over his shoulder for a while, fearing Savage Justice! BWAH!

Commentary: The art style on this issue was different and it suited the story very well. The scenes in World War Two have a very nice feel to them. It's nice to see Sarge in his natural habitat. It's also nice to see a tie-in back to the Sgt. Savage line ala Col. Krieger.

Sgt. Savage is one of my favorite characters in the Extreme line (and the Savage line far as that goes). I'm a sucker for World War II era soldiers, blame it on a childhood spent watching Hogan's Heroes (RIP Sgt. Carter) and reading Bill Mauldin's "Up Front" (if you haven't read this book, go and get a copy ASAP) and generally soaking up the ambiance of the last "good" war.

It also helps that the Sgt. Savage cartoon paints the Sarge as a very sympathetic guy stuck in a future that's as incomprehensible to him as the 25th Century was to Buck Rogers.

It's a shame the series basically ended with this issue, since it would have been nice to see other issues that focused on each of the main Joes (and heck, let's toss in Iron Klaw and the boys too while we're at it). Not necessarily origin stories (we already got that for GI Joe and Inferno in "From the Ashes"), but stories that would showcase each character and let us know more about them. Kinda flesh them out and all that good characterizing stuff.