G.I. Joe Retaliation’ Trailer: Looks Better Than the First One

Next summer, director Jon Chu (Step Up 2 & 3) will attempt to craft a better G.I. Joe movie than the one put together by director Stephen Sommers (The Mummy) back in 2009. To combat fan skepticism (which remains on red alert status at the time of writing this), Chu and CO. have promised that their sequel, G.I. Joe: Retaliation, will give the franchise a fresh start, with a better cast, better story and most of all, better action than its predecessor.

With today’s G.I. Joe: Retaliation trailer, we’re getting our first look at whether or not the actual film lives up to all the promises.

G.I. Joe 2 comes to us with mostly a new cast of characters, though the story will continue from where Rise of Cobra left off, in the sense that Cobra Commander (no longer played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt) is now the masked leader of the terrorist organization, and his crony, master of disguise Zartan (Arnold Vosloo), has infiltrated the highest echelon of the U.S. government, posing as the president. With Cobra pulling the strings of power, and still running lawless throughout the globe, a new Joe force is tasked with saving the day.


Check out the trailer for G.I. Joe: Retaliation below: 

As you can see in the trailer, one lure of G.I. Joe 2 is the improved cast - with fan-favorite action stars like Bruce Willis, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Ray Stevenson replacing the likes of Marlon Wayans, Dennis Quaid and Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje - and the returning players having been whittled down to favorites like Snake Eyes (Ray Park) and Storm Shadow (Byung-hun Lee). Of course, Channing Tatum returning is something that will still have many haters of the first film groaning -  and it’s fair to say the “hot girl” quotient has dipped a bit, with the addition of Adrianne Palicki and Elodie Young not quite covering the subtractions of beauties like Rachel Nichols, Sienna Miller and Karolina Kurkova. But I digress.


The other thing of note is the action glimpsed in the trailer: Director Jon Chu has made it clear that more practical effects and grounded, gritty, militaristic battle action is his intention for G.I. Joe: Retaliation. If nothing else, this trailer proves we will be getting just that. However, will the change in approach help G.I. Joe 2 stand out as an improvement over its predecessor? Or does the cartoon/comic source material deserve more fantastical representation…say, like, accelerator suits?


I’m sure the Internet will pool the popular opinion of the fanboy masses, after they’ve had a chance to view this trailer.


G.I. Joe: Retaliation will be in theaters on June 29, 2012