G.I. Joe: Retaliation - 4K Blu-ray Review

[Michael Scott]

G.I. Joe: Retalitation



Movie:
4K Video:
Video:
Audio:
Extras:
Final Score:

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Movie
G.I. Joe: Retaliation is kind of a strange sequel. It kind of half reboots the franchise with new characters, but also acts as a true sequel to Rise of Cobra. Rise of Cobra had some OBVIOUS flaws that fans didn’t like, such as Cobra Commander’s horrible mask at the end, the sloppy “Yo Joe!” lines throughout, and Marlon Wayans. Jon M. Chu took Stephen Sommer’s cheeky summer blockbuster, amped it up to 11 with The Rock, and made a slightly more G.I. Joe esque film that still doesn’t QUITE hit the mark. But at the end of the day is still a fun summer popcorn movie.

Cobra Commander and Destro are locked up and behind bars, but as we saw at the end of The Rise of Cobra, Zartan (Arnold Vosloo) posing as the President of the United States (Jonathan Pryce) with his nanotech abilities. He’s working at getting the other nations into a stalemate where they are forced to destroy their nuclear weapons. Not so that we can live at peace, but so that he can break out Cobra Commander and they can rule the world with their high tech weapons satellites known as “Zeus”.

Zartan (as the President) sets off an assassination of the Pakistan president, killing off Duke and leaving only a handful of the Joes alive in order to kick start his initiative. Framing the Joes for the attack, Zartan disavows them and lets the world know who they are. Now only a few Joes are left, including Snake Eyes (Ray Park), Roadblock (The Rock), Flint (Dr. Corona), and Lady Jaye (Adrianne Palicki). Together they have to band together with Storm Shadow (Byung-hun Lee) to take down Cobra Commander and Zartan before the two take over the world.

Retaliation moves away from the gimmicky nature of The Rise of Cobra (which was kind of endearing, as cheesy as it was) and goes back to a full blown, rip roaring, summer action movie. It’s a little closer to the original G.I. Joe feeling, but still feels a bit more like a summer action movie, than a true “Joe” movie. It’s superficially complex, but really a simple story at heart. The Joes are in trouble, and it’s time to kick butt, and make sure Cobra Commander doesn’t take over the world again. Basically your average everyday mission for the Joes. It’s big, it’s bold, it’s brash, and yet it feels smaller and more constrained than The Rise of Cobra.

The fight scenes are a lot better done, and make the film feel bigger than it really is. The mountain fortress fight with Stormshadow, Jinx and Snake Eyes is incredible, and probably the highlight of the film, but that final assault on Cobra Commander’s stronghold is nothing to sneeze at. I liked the little things that they did with the movie too. Cobra Commander actually looks and acts like Cobra Commander (instead of a off ex soldier) and his helmet is a nice nod to the originals (my goodness, that helmet from the first movie’s reveal was hilarious). Snake Eyes got rid of that stupid plastic lips on his helmet, and once again, he and Storm Shadow are the biggest hits of the movie. That’s not to say that the Rock wasn’t a massive draw, as he really was. Back in 2014 he was THE go to guy for an action movie, and while he’s fun, he’s also just “The Rock” in a G.I. Joe movie instead of molding into the character of Roadblock. That being said, this is big, this is dumb, but it’s TOTALLY a blast and I enjoyed it way more than The Rise of Cobra. It’s still one of my go to popcorn flicks and for good reason. The one thing that actually bugged me (and a lot of fans) was killing off of Duke. Usually they kill off a character like that offscreen, or just write him out, but they actually KILLED him off on screen, one of the franchise's most popular characters! I had forgotten about it till now, but it was actually at the request of Channing himself, who agreed to be in the film to pass the torch as long as the producers killed him off, because he didn't want to be shackled to the franchise. Not sure whether I agree with his decision, but it's too late to be crying about spilled milk.




Rated PG-13 for strong sequences of action violence and mayhem throughout




4K Video: Video:

Hmmm, just like The Rise of Cobra, Retaliation has a fairly mediocre video encode for the 4K UHD release. I’m not sure if they’re using an old master or what, but the end result is a film that is barely better than the Blu-ray (even though that Blu-ray is absolutely amazing, so while the UPGRADE isn’t that massive, it’s a great looking image simply due to the fact that Blu-ray was so stinking good). Detail levels are mildly improved, and the colors with the Dolby Vision and HDR application look a little richer. However, the detail upgrades were REALLY mild. You could see some scenes that looked absolutely amazing, and then the next you’d see a darker warehouse scene that just looked the same as my Blu-ray. I A/B’d the two discs and the difference in quality is frustratingly slim. Don’t get me wrong, if you A/B the two discs you’ll see the more stable colors and the minor upticks in quality, but if you weren’t staring at one, then the other, it would be really hard to tell them apart. It also could just be this reviewers eyes, but the darker scenes looked a bit brighter than the Blu-ray, making the darks just a little washed out.






Audio:

Now, the same thing happened here that happened with The Rise of Cobra. That being that Paramount just recycled the old Dolby TrueHD 7.1 track instead of giving us a new Atmos or DTS:X mix. HOWEVER, I’m not going to complain as Atmos is NICE, but not really needed when you have an incredible 7.1 mix like Retaliation does. It’s a total powerhouse of a mix, with an aggressive sound that just rips the walls down. The bass head in me loves how every single second of the film just pulsates with power, and slams you back into the seat with midbass (I made notice that in The Rise of Cobra review that the mix felt like a ruler flat bass response, while this one has elevated mid bass slam that everyone seems to love), and the surrounds are pretty much on fire the entire track. The middle fight between Storm Cloud and Snake Eyes is an epic fight and the bass response as the two duke it out in the mountain fortress is awe inspiring. Everything is still evenly balanced, as dialog can still be heard perfectly, and the mains don’t overpower everything. Great mix.





Extras:

• Audio Commentary by director Jon M. Chu and producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura
• G.I. JOE: Declassified
-- Mission Briefing
-- Deployment
-- Two Ninjas
-- The Desert Attack
-- COBRA Strikes
-- The Lone Soldiers
-- The Monastery
-- Fort Sumter
• Deleted Scenes

Final Score: ​

Retaliation is a fun popcorn movie that isn’t closer to an ACTUAL G.I. Joe film than The Rise of Cobra was, but is much more entertaining at least. It’s a big dumb action movie that has the Rock in it, and lots of explosions. Also it happens to be one of the last movies that Bruce Willis actually gave a care about expending any effort in before he went the Steven Seagal route of DTV garbage. The 4K UHD transfer is really a lateral transfer from the Blu-ray so I hesitate to tell anyone to upgrade, but it’s still a fun movie.


Technical Specifications:

Starring: Channing Tatum, Dwayne Johnson, Channing Tatum, Adrianne Palicki, Byung-hun Lee, Jonathan Pryce, Elodie yung, Ray Stevenson, Ray Park
Directed by: Jon Chu
Written by: Rhett Reese, Paul Wernick
Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1 HEVC
Audio: English: DTS-HD MA 5.1, German, Spanish, French, French (Candadian, Spanish (Latin), Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Russian DD 5.1
Subtitles: English, English SDH, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Spanish, Cantonese, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Korean, Mandarin (Simplified), Mandarin (Traditional), Norwegian, Russian, Swedish, Thai
Studio: Paramount
Rated: PG-13
Runtime: 110 Minutes
Blu-ray Release Date: July 20th 2021

Recommendation: Fun Watch

 

[Todd Anderson]

Well color me surprised. I'm going to have to check this puppy out!

 

[Epoxy1]

Much better than the first film. This one actually had decent acting and a coherent story.

 

[tripplej]

Thanks for the review. I would have skip this one but now after your and David's review. I am interested.

 

[mechman]

Another one I'll add to the list. Is the Rock in everything nowadays??

 

[Michael Scott]

pretty much

 

[Todd Anderson]

Hard not to like the Rock. Something is oddly comforting about most of his characters.

 

[mechman]

I picked it up even though I already had the Blu-ray.

 

[Epoxy1]

Hard not to like the Rock. Something is oddly comforting about most of his characters.

Couldn't agree more. The guy just oozes charisma and makes you want to like him