[stopdead]

I was predicting that I would enjoy this Silent Missions the most and I was right. It wasn’t perfect, but for me it is the best story and art of the bunch. And fun to see Lady Jaye and Wild Weasel (and the Rattler!) in action. I think the only thing that would have made the issue better would have been—don’t hate me—words.

[Bryon]

I really liked this one. It was the best yet, if we are not counting issue 21. My ranking:

21
Roadblock - great story and art
Spirit - great art, good story
Beach Head - great story, pretty good art
.
.
.
Jinx - kinda weak story, not my favorite art style

Jinx wasn't bad. Just meh.

[FunkyBunch]

Quote:

Originally Posted by stopdead

I was predicting that I would enjoy this Silent Missions the most and I was right. It wasn?t perfect, but for me it is the best story and art of the bunch.

I would replace the word "best" with "least stylised". It is closest to the Amercian Adventure comics style TMthat we are used to in ARAH, and indeed the artist was in a regular issue, ARAH 314.

Most Stylised to least stylised across the series -
DaNi/ Jinx (lots of contrasty blacks and very designed layouts - in the family of noir books like sin Cuty or 100 bullets)

Phil Hester / Beachead - non conventional layouts. Use of contrast / negative space.

Wes Craig / Duke - Distintive style, high contrast colours. A bit of simplification of detail/ distortion in expressions.

Leonardo Romero / Spirit - a clean, simplified modern / classic style in the vein of Chris Samnee or Tom Reilly.

Andrew Krahnke/ Roadblock - a more traditional Joe style with focus on story-telling first. but with exaggeration in proportions, a bit of "cartooning" in faces rather than trying to be overly true to life.

[J James]

The pacing was good and the storytelling was very clear.

For me this one suffered the same as the Beachhead issue... why is it silent? The premise wasn't justified. I kept imagining everyone talking to each other.

I liked the art and it was very fun.

For me these are currently ranked:
Spirit
Roadblock
Jinx
Beachhead

I think the Spirit issue was close to a whole package. Roadblock could have been a loud SFX issue without dialogue I guess.

Jinx might have been my very favorite but the timer and pacing were way off and it took me all the way out. I'll revisit Beachhead but I just remember the storytelling not being that clear and the same "this isn't a silent issue" problem.

[vxc961]

I loved this one--I think it's a fun exercise, and while I understand the sentiment that some of these didn't make sense being silent, I'd be sick of it of they were each ninja stories. In fact, I usually only read ARAH once and then put it away, but I found myself going back through each of these silent issues a few times.

And my final thought...I LOVED the Jinx issue! I'll had have to head over to thread and see why people may have been a bit down on it. Talking Joe did a great interview with DaNi that made me want to seek out more of her work too.

[stopdead]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FunkyBunch

I would replace the word "best" with "least stylised". It is closest to the Amercian Adventure comics style TMthat we are used to in ARAH, and indeed the artist was in a regular issue, ARAH 314.

Most Stylised to least stylised across the series -
DaNi/ Jinx (lots of contrasty blacks and very designed layouts - in the family of noir books like sin Cuty or 100 bullets)

Phil Hester / Beachead - non conventional layouts. Use of contrast / negative space.

Wes Craig / Duke - Distintive style, high contrast colours. A bit of simplification of detail/ distortion in expressions.

Leonardo Romero / Spirit - a clean, simplified modern / classic style in the vein of Chris Samnee or Tom Reilly.

Andrew Krahnke/ Roadblock - a more traditional Joe style with focus on story-telling first. but with exaggeration in proportions, a bit of "cartooning" in faces rather than trying to be overly true to life.

Yes, “least stylized” as well. Both are true for me. I don’t care for “stylized” art in my comics so there you go.

[SquishyOH]

The Roadblock issue, I have already started sketching out word balloons to complete this issue. It is clear what is happening, yet at the same time this issue is the one that most screams out "misprint without the lettering". I could see future competitions to see who could complete this issue with the most entertaining dialogue. Beachhead= non-English speaking kids, Jinx= all-ninja, Spirit=no talking animals. The Roadblock issue has none of these reasons to be silent.

Two things that stand out for me with this issue (other than missing dialogue):
1. The bolts holding the rear hatch are going to have a safe working load of several thousands of pounds each. Roadblock is shown with superhero strength pulling that door straight off. Sure you could pry a door like that off if it was ajar or you had a pry bar for leverage or even showing blast damage to fracture the bolts ahead of time, but just pure shear strength of the bolts would require super-human strength. Editor should have asked for something humanly possible.

2. I am fine with Roadblock knocking down a Rattler with his 50-cal. But the Rattler goes down soft and mainly intact so it wasn't in a nose-dive. If the Rattler lost power and descended it should have ended up miles away from Roadblock and Lady Jaye. How the heck did the Joes sprint miles to check the wreckage and yet Wild Weasel was still parachuting down?

Would have been nice if the Rattler had stopped and used the VTOL to wait for Roadblock and Lady Jaye to appear. If the Rattler had been hovering and not flying hundreds of miles per hour then the post-crash fight timing would have been more believable.

It was fun and all, but could have used a couple edits to bring things out of fantasy superhero comics and make it a bit more grounded.

Could have also used some words.

[FunkyBunch]

Mark and Tim talk to creator (and returning guest) Andrew Krahnke about G.I. JOE: A Real American Hero ?Silent Missions - Roadblock released Wednesday, April 23rd, 2025.

Recorded as talking heads video, and sharing lots of images on screen, but as normal an optimised audio only version also available.

YouTube link https://youtu.be/wXr6bn3wm20

Direct Audio link http://cast.rocks/hosting/15498/ROADBLOCK-SM.mp3

Or via your podcast platform of choice - https://talkingjoe.co.uk/#Podcasts

[SquishyOH]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FunkyBunch

Mark and Tim talk to creator (and returning guest) Andrew Krahnke about G.I. JOE: A Real American Hero ?Silent Missions - Roadblock released Wednesday, April 23rd, 2025.

Recorded as talking heads video, and sharing lots of images on screen, but as normal an optimised audio only version also available.

YouTube link https://youtu.be/wXr6bn3wm20

Direct Audio link http://cast.rocks/hosting/15498/ROADBLOCK-SM.mp3

Or via your podcast platform of choice - https://talkingjoe.co.uk/#Podcasts

Hey, I watched all the way to the end of the interview where you mentioned my quibbles about superhuman strength and airplane crashing timelines!

And you handled it perfectly with Mr Krahnke. It is nice to hear directly from the creative team and your interviews cannot be full of "why did you make mistake X and Y" and put those folks on the spot to justify their choices. That would be uncomfortable and keep guests away. Roadblock was a fun read and that should be the focus.

You almost did just that with the missiles/bombs questions, but fortunately you seemed to already know that Andrew got it right and it was a fun exercise to demonstrate just how complex it is to draw a Joe comic. I would have given him a pass as the ordnance could be switched up to multiple configurations in real life, but it is cool that he followed the toy references so closely.

Looking forward to your Silent Duke episode as it appears to use characters from a period I wasn't collecting and I missed several of the references. Should be a good chance for me to catch up on some names I had no idea existed.

[Josh Z]

Went to the comic store last night and am catching up on some of these Silent issues I missed.

This one was okay, but Roadblock's proportions looked ridiculous. He's basically The Thing from Fantastic Four with darker skin and a mustache. They even give him superhero strength. I'm surprised he didn't just jump up and catch the Rattler, then crumple the whole plane up in his hands.