VV: G.I Robot Analysis
"Now you know. And knowing is half the battle!"
– G.I Joe
G.I Robot, the American’s Nazi-slaying robot of DC Comics.
Does he really need an introduction with a name like that? G.I Robot is here to kick Nazi butt, and maybe even some others, on his way to DEATH BATTLE! But what does he really bring to the table? Well, we’re checking out today on Valve’s Versus!
Before We Begin
For this blog, we’ll be tackling G.I Robot from the current DC canon, with looks at (in particular) the second G.I Robot. This will be the main iteration we look at, disregarding any other iterations. This will extend to G.I Robot from the Creature Commandos show, though we will reference him visually, as my intention with the blog is to take a dive into what he gets from the comics specifically as he’s very underresearched in that regard. He spans across the Weird War series with the Commandoes, and has some one-off appearances, though the intention is to focus on specifically that era of Creature Commandoes due to its widely-agreed canonicity as the comic line is self-contained and ends with the Creature Commandoes being launched into deep space vaguely by an ICBM.
Background
He doesn’t have a voice box.
Name: J.A.K.E
Age: One year old.
Height: About six feet or so. That's what the soldiers told me!
The second GI Robot produced to fight in World War 2.
Might have emotions, but no one really knows.
Likes: Killing Nazi soldiers, his pet robots, and his fellow soldiers.
Dislikes: Nazi soldiers, and the other allies too!
After the original GI Robot was slain in combat, J.A.K.E II was sent to the US Soldiers by a sacrifical pilot to support the war effort. After being put together, his first mission required him to defend his fellow men from an advanced robot created from the original J.A.K.E’s blueprints. While this robot was effectively immune to J.A.K.E’s firepower, he was able to ultimately destroy it. Afterwards, he would constantly support the American effort, and eventually became an unofficial member of the Creature Commandoes. He’d been forced into an early retirement after taking severe battle damage, having himself shut down since the World War, but he would have more efforts put into developing greater G.I Robots in the future.
Equipment
Flamethrower
G.I. Robot displayed the usage of a flamethrower during the World War, using it to burn down an enemy craft, though it could not burn through Krakko the Robot Samurai.
Machine Gun
One of G.I Robot’s most iconic tools is his hand’s machine gun, which he uses to take out any Nazi soldiers in his way. Through his individual fingers, he can project high velocity rounds useful for taking out any enemy in his way. He can also shoot out specific Anti-aircraft rounds, which as the name implies are explosive bullets intended to take out aircrafts with large explosions.
Torpedoes
Through underwater machinery, G.I Robot can produce miniature torpedoes to launch at enemy ships. He can shoot these in and out of water, allowing him to blow up any soldiers (or sharks) in his way.
Missiles
In addition to his torpedoes, he can shoot out rockets. The difference? Water!
They’ve also been described as mortar shells, further differentiating them from the underwater torpedoes that he can shoot out.
C.A.P.
Assembled by the scientists who made J.A.K.E, C.A.P is a robot dog that supports him in missions. Like J.A.K.E, it can swim through waters without harm, though it’s more of a companion than direct combatant. For no real reason, C.A.P can eject a smaller cat out of itself.
Abilities
He’s a Robot
As a robot, J.A.K.E is unfeeling and remorseless when killing any soldier, though it’s often been hinted that he holds some human emotion. In addition to this lack of weakness that humans hold, he is highly resistant to damage, allowing him to pull through against physical damage like decapitation and is entirely bulletproof or withstand effects of the environment such as trudging through the harsh ocean waters. He can instinctively aim at and take down enemies, though he isn’t restricted to just fighting soldiers, as he’ll do anything he calculates is required for a mission’s sake. J.A.K.E is also described to have radar-eyes and sonar-ears, implying he has at least some enhanced senses allowing him to sense even the slightest of changes in the environment given the context. His feet can also passively evade the explosions of mines, making him unbothered as he walks through the Japanese-occupied forest. He can even sniff things within a mile, which is weird for a robot but whatever.
Despite what was first mentioned, it’s actually notable that J.A.K.E has empathy. He displays this to his animal friends, he was thought to have cried over others, and was even programmed to never hurt women. Maybe, he should fight Sanji… These instances are only implied to the reader, however, and aren’t specifically answered in the series because it truly is an interesting question: does robot question why man kills man? Does it feel pain like us when it has to kill its fellow robots?
Feats
Overall
A more developed and sophisticated version of the first G.I Robot.
Has killed hundreds of allied soldiers to protect his fellow men.
Member of the Creature Commandoes, fighting alongside them to combat Hitler.
Fought dinosaurs!
I mean... I think he fell in love with Ms. King Kong.
Power
The G.I Robot could swing its head with the force of a wrecking ball, completely breaking down the highly-resistant Krakko who was an advanced version of the original J.A.K.E
His fingerguns could produce torpedoes, which blew up an enemy ship.
Single-handedly guns down an airplane when caught off guard by it.
Physically restrained the propellors of a U-Boat with his hands, halting it and the boat.
Seen above, produces a large explosion to defeat a sea monster.
Lifts and throws around the Sumo Robot, catapulting him at high speeds into a booby trap.
Speed
Outdraws an aircraft gunner before he can hit any soldiers, destroying him instantly.
Durability
Notes
Scaling Discussion and Problems
G.I Robot probably doesn’t scale to anything notable, unfortunately, and is something I was pretty disappointed in finding out. As mentioned in the scaling section, he doesn’t particularly do much, and there’s not really any reason for J.A.K.E to scale to any of the Creature Commandoes or any physical street tiers. Even in his appearances in other comics as a mass-developed unit (Generation Lost) or an individual fighter for the Creature Commandoes (Final Crisis), these don’t really have him do anything that would give him direct physical scaling to anyone notable. Thus, he really should only scale to direct feats. Given that the original G.I Robot’s life ended in him vaguely being sent to space with the Creature Commandoes, the Creature Commandoes themselves also being widely inconsistent afterwards, and his lack of distinct appearances makes it very dubious that any later appearances should be acknowledged as canon in the first place.
You could definitely reason with a full composite that he might have some appearances acknowledging him as or scaling him to this “street tier umbrella” present in DC scaling, but his actual main canon appearance doesn’t properly give enough context or reason for him to scale to other Commandoes in sheer strength. It would actually be a lot more reasonable for him to be on a lower-end within the context of a general look, because he’s superior to regular humans in general because he’s a robot (duh) but in extended media is still notably weak enough for peak humans to overwhelm him with brute force (The War That Time Forgot).
Summary
Overall, G.I Robot is a pretty solid character. He’s very self-contained in scaling which makes him a really simple character to cover, and with a character who’s “canon” is as messy as it is now, is surprisingly easy to look into for those who want to dive into his appearances. He’s not too much of a powerhouse, but for an early 80s Nazi-slaying hero, he’s definitely a stand-out.
Potential Opponents
Rudol von Stroheim (JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure)
It’s p’aight.
The general gist is cyborg nazi vs robot nazi killer. It’s not a matchup that needs much more elaboration, and it holds a greater specific focus on the animated iteration of G.I Robot. It’s a very simple matchup that I don’t think needs to dive into specifics about their characters or anything. It’s not really close, but I’m sure if you scale G.I Robot to other characters through a composite it could be closer though Stroheim would have an aggressive advantage in speed and this only closes out the stat gap. It’s a bit disappointing in that regard to have the Nazi win against the Anti-Nazi, but obviously Stroheim is a cool dude so I’m willing to let it slide. It’s probably my general preference because of the similar media gap, but I did come across another idea in my head while writing that I’m a big fan of.
Rudi Jager (MachineGames’ Wolfenstein)
This one’s pretty simple, but for that, you’ll need to understand who Rudi is and I don't expect you to. His whole basic gist is that he’s a Nazi dog trainer– the only thing he holds love and empathy for– who works side by side with his cyborg dog to punish prisoners, and he’s the right hand man of Greta (the main villain of the MachineGames Wolfenstein series). In the game, he’ll face Blaskowicz once through torture where he murders his beloved dog, and comes back once again to attempt to kill Blaskowicz in a big mech suit. He ultimately gets killed by tearing apart the armor, and executed on-the-spot with a pipe being shoved through his head. I don’t expect most people to know all of this given Wolfenstein– let alone the MachineGames era– is very underrated.
I’m personally a big fan of this idea by virtue of having a matchup cover over the fact that these two only feel empathy about their animal companions as ruthless killers, and Rudi is also equipped with a mech suit with all sorts of parallels in arsenal. In general, both also fit the same general theme as relatively grounded World War 2-era which shift because of the scientific developments made in their times (both feature robot soldiers on both sides via stealing weapons from the other and etcetera) and you even have the whole complimentary theme of Rudi’s opposition to Blaskowicz being a pretty solid parallel to G.I Robot with the whole “nazi killing machines” (though one is in a more literal sense) and teaming up with a set of criminal outcasts.
I think, at least in general, the idea of one of the only Nazi soldiers in the series presented with any sense of empathy is a pretty solid clash when their whole army is built around emotionless leaders and cyborg robots vs. one of the only robots presented with empathy which is unfamiliar to any of his soldiers due to lacking it for humans is seen as a core trait is pretty cool. You can definitely play around this in Rudi, like how he looks at BJ, as seeing G.I Robot as a careless monster even worse than a Nazi soldier who’s fighting for nothing because all his men are dead, who wouldn’t respond in anything more than breaking down Rudi’s armor and (if you go for a composite) throwing in banter about how much he hates Nazis and will kill each and every one of them occupying the state. It’s also pretty close, though I can’t comment on that too much due to working on a Wolfenstein blog, though mind that MachineGames’ Wolfenstein series is fairly grounded and Rudi wouldn’t scale to anything too notable since he only appears in the second game.
And that’s… pretty much it. G.I Robot is a fairly minor character, so I think having two respectively minor characters in their series makes sense. I hope you enjoyed reading! ✌️
Metalder is also a pretty good opponent for him
ReplyDeleteGreat blog dude.
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