Street Fighter X GI Joe #6 Review
Welcome to the final issue of this strange little crossover. Last time around, the tournament came to an end as Jinx, utilizing the power the Satsui No Hado, was able to overpower the evil M. Bison. However, upon learning that the good guys were working to rig the tournament in their favor in order to put a stop to Bison’s plan, Rufus became enraged and challenged Guile to a fight for third place. Guile won easily, but due to Cobra’s plan to steel Bison’s Psycho Drive device going wrong, Rufus absorbed a ton of raw psycho energy and transformed into some kind of monstrous version of himself.
We open with Rufus, who has now swelled to enormous size causing him to resemble some kind of warped hybrid of the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man and Yosemite Sam. The Joes and the Street Fighters can only run away in horror from Rufus’s incredible power. As if the morbidly obese colossus weren’t gross enough already, Rufus begins puking up purple ooze that mutates into psycho-powered copies of various G.I. Joe and Street Fighter Characters. The heroes fight back as hard as they can, but Rufus creates the psycho fighters faster than they can be defeated. Realizing that they’re getting nowhere, Guile suggests that the heroes focus all of their attacks on Rufus. After a series of attacks, Jinx and Ryu finally finish off the monstrous Rufus off with a double hadoken attack. When the dust clears, all the heroes are accounted for but Bison and the agents of Cobra seem to have disappeared. Rufus, who has returned to normal, has returned to his usual cocky ways as he believes that if the heroes had to rig the tournament to defeat him, then he truly must be the greatest martial arts master in the world. If may be allowed a moment to reiterate my point from the last review, if Snake Eyes hadn’t thrown the match against Rufus and just allowed himself to be defeated by Jinx, then we wouldn’t have had to deal the attack of the 50 foot Rufus in the first place. Meanwhile, Cobra is revealed to have escaped with M. Bison’s body and plan to hand deliver him to Cobra Commander for study.
Our comic ends with Ryu, Ken, Snake Eyes and Jinx training together as watches from the shadows, declaring that he’s looking forward to meeting this powerful new challenger who has embraced the power of the Satsui-No-Hado.
What Works: Well, I can certainly say that this series did not end up going in a direction I was anticipating, which if nothing else, kept it interesting. What Doesn’t: As I’ve made perfectly clear, I can’t stand Rufus and it annoys me that the final big bad of this mini-series wasn’t M. Bison or Cobra Commander as one would logically assume but rather, some loser character who no one likes mutated into a horrible monster. Mind you, I’ve seen something similar done in the Justice League/Master of the Universe crossover in which the annoying character from the television show, Orko, was made the villain. The difference being, while that was done to great effect and actually made sense with the established lore of both Universes, this just came out of nowhere with little-to-no warning. In addition, the powers that Rufus demonstrates are not consistent with those of M. Bison or any other individual who utilizes psycho power. Put simply, while this turn of events is unexpected and unusual, it just feels forced and frankly, a bit lame.
What’s more, I don’t really like it when crossovers like this end with unresolved plot threads such as Cobra being in possession of M. Bison’s body or Akuma planning to go after Jinx. Unless they plan to have another crossover in the future, then really, all such plot threads accomplish is leaving the audience feeling cheated.
Overall: 3.5/5
While certainly unpredictable, this finale didn’t really do much for me.
Final thoughts on the Mini-Series:
Speaking as someone who has loved Street Fighter since the age of three, I have honestly tried my best to give this mini-series the benefit of the doubt. However, if you were going to crossover these two universes, I do not believe this type of story was the best way to do it. Given what little I know about G.I. Joe, it just feels out of place to see the Joes participating in a Martial Arts Tournament. Speaking of which, the Joes, with the exception of Jinx and Snake Eyes, feel like an afterthought in this comic with the Street Fighters hogging most of the spotlight. Even the more prominently featured characters could easily have been replaced with other Street Fighter characters with only minor changes needing to be made to the story. I think one of my initial reactions to this series was correct. This series is much more flash than substance and while that flash is entertaining, it wasn’t enough to elevate the mini-series above simply mediocrity.