G.I. Joe Sssilent Missions: Crimson Guard #1 // Review
It doesn't really matter how prominent they are, the lackeys of super villains. Don't really get a whole lot of respect. Even the most elite among them only seemed to be there too, add an extra level of texture to the endless masses of identical people that the heroes shoveled their way through to get to the big villain. The elite lackeys get a closer look courtesy of G.I. Joe Sssilent Missions: Crimson Guard #1. The entirely textless issue is brought to page and panel by writer Gabriel Hardman and artist Matt Hollingsworth. It’s an enjoyable part of the ongoing homage to the classic ”Silent Interlude” issue of the original Marvel G.I. Joe series.
It is a solemn moment with Cobra Commander and a few of his elite guard when G.I. Joe shows-up. The Crimson Guard have to scramble out of the immediate vicinity. Escape isn’t as easy as it might seem what with the whole place crawling with specially trained Joe personnel. The Crimson Guard are going to have to keep their heads firmly planted in their training if they’re going to be able to survive. Danger is lurking everywhere and it seem to be looking for them...
Hardman doesn't have a whole lot of room to move around with a one shot story that is essentially a single event marked by multiple individual encounters. Things move briskly across the page with a number of different characters showing up around the edges of everything. The Crimson Guard actually managed to come across like their a bit more than vaguely competent. This is kind of a novelty, given the fact that they are essentially high-level lackeys of Cobra Commander.
The design of the armor that the Crimson Guard wears doesn't allow for a whole lot of personality or individuality or emotional expression to cross the page. This can make the issue feel very cold and distant as the central characters don't really have much of an opportunity to engage the reader. And while this is the case, Hollingsworth keeps the action moving quickly enough that the reader is caught up in the momentum of it even if there isn't a whole lot going on emotionally. To be fair, it is action. But even action requires some sort of an engagement in order for the readers to care at all about what's going on. Thanks to Hollingsowrth’s art, the lack of emotional connection isn’t really that big a deal for the Crimson Guard.
Most of the fun in this particular series of ”Sssilent Missions” lies simply in watching them tell a number of different stories without any text at all. And there are 1 million ways to do that. The series of one shot doesn't necessarily do a good job of providing a range of different experiences. That being said, it's still a lot of fun. The basic elements of action don't necessarily require a whole lot of dialogue or background or anything like that. It's been a lot of fun seeing how streamlined everything can be in commercially-driven sequential art.
