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Film Title: G.I. Joe: Season 1.1

 Best for ages: 7 and up.

Movie Website: Click Here

Year Released: 2009

Rated: G (US)

SYNOPSIS

   In the early 1980s, Hasbro toys decided to turn one its most popular toy lines for boys into an animated TV series. G.I. Joe was that cartoon. G.I. Joe has been a popular toy line since its first conception in 1964. During the 1980s, however, Hasbro recreated the toy line with smaller action figures, each of which had an identity, and also created a villainous terror organization known as Cobra to be the enemy of the G.I. Joe team. This DVD is the first season of cartoons that pitted the good guys, G.I. Joe, Duke, Snake Eyes, Scarlet, Gung Ho and the rest of the G.I Joe clan against the Cobra Commander, his partner Destro, the Baroness, Zartan and Storm Shadow. This DVD set features 22 episodes of the cartoon based on The G.I. Joe: Real American Hero action figure line.

VIOLENCE/GRAPHIC CONTENT/language

   Violence/ Graphic Content

  There is everything from explosions, radioactive devices and areas, polar bear, snake and other animal attacks, fist fighting and wrestling, weapons fighting, guns flaring, planes crashing, war vehicles exploding, animals caught in traps-- anything violent that you can think of is pretty much done in all these episodes. But no one dies on screen and there is no kind of blood or gore. While there is a lot of animated war violence, the graphic content is very minimal and is done with a less-is-more ethic.

   Language

   Words like jerk, idiot and other less graphic insults are used between Destro and Cobra Commander. There are various threats issued, some of which are carried out.

OVERALL VIEWS

   What parents must remember is that this series was produced in the early 1980s when there was relatively little concern of the amount of violence and graphic content that was put into cartoons as long as there were no displays of any kind of blood, gore and death. The producers of G.I. Joe put their characters into fantasy war-like situations in which none of the main characters ever died in battle and any characters who were killed were foot soldiers or pilots who died in explosions off-screen and were not characters to whom the children watching the show related. I personally love these cartoons. There is a lot of fantasy involved and each character has his own unique quality and nickname. The G.I. Joe characters try to instill a sense of confidence, responsibility and respect for others in the shows and to show kids that fighting is not always the best way to solve problems. While it is not in this box set, I even can remember one episode in which G.I. Joe and Cobra teamed up to fight drugs. So while there is a lot of war-like violence and a lot of arguing and struggling of power between Cobra Commander and Destro, the cartoon also has a lot of positive elements.

   The DVD set has many features and even comes with an episode guide and a collectable tattoo set. There is a total of 22 episodes in the four-disc set as well as special features which include "Knowing Half the Battle” PSAs that appeared at the end of each episode when the cartoon was on television, a featurette called "Looking Back," with the show's writer Ron Friedman, a printable script for the "Jungle Trap" episode, the original G.I. Joe Toy Fair presentation as well as archival Hasbro toy commercials.

   G.I. Joe is not a cartoon that young kids should watch. When I was a kid, I watched these cartoons every morning before I went to school and now, after watching these episodes for the first time in over twenty years, I'm surprised that my mother let me watch the, but back then, these cartoons did not seem to be big deal. For the most part, if it's of really big concern, I would best recommend this DVD set for boys and girls who are mature enough to be able to handle the animated violence. I would say over the age of seven would be fair.

BUY THIS MOVIE.