User blog:G-Monster/Pure Evil Proposal Destro (G.I. Joe Film Series)

Hey Guys so I got someone to propose from a movie a while back. The movie in question is GI Joe The Rise Of Cobra.

What's the work?
G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra is a 2009 action flick about that ragtag military group known as the G.I. Joes. Basically it revolves around the Joes trying to stop the nefarious plans of the M.A.R.S. Industries. Now the person behind said industries is James "Destro" McCullen.

Who is he? What Has He Done
James "Destro" McCullen is a weapons developer, arms dealer and owner of M.A.R.S. Industries, who uses his company to mask his war mongering ways and growing terrorist activities. Now then here's all of things that he has done in the movie as well as it's  supplementary material.

McCullen has been supplying terrorists and war criminals with weapons for years, and one of these incidents is shown in a prequel comic to the movie. Meeting with a group of French terrorists, McCullen, realizing the French police have zeroed in on the buy, allows the terrorists to use some M.A.R.S. weapons to blow the cops away and ultimately tricks the terrorists into getting themselves killed as they mishandle the weapons, which McCullen is just fine with given they were planning to cheat him.

Calling for a hovercraft for his rescue, McCullen crashes it through a building and kills a variety of French police officers, nearly downing a helicopter in the process as well but restraining himself so as to not give himself too much of a rep with the local police, instead using a surviving terrorist as a human shield to enable his escape.

Now, onto the events of the film, he teams up with the mysterious "Doctor". McCullen has the Doctor develop the powerful "Nanites", nanobots capable of reducing their surroundings to ashes in seconds, and prepares a scheme with them. Using the nanites, McCullen has the Doctor turrn entire groups of ordinary men into Neo-Vipers, injecting the nanites into them and turning them into supersoldiers. As supplementary material reveals, the Neo-Vipers are controlled by the nanites to be "perfect" soldiers, keeping the men completely aware of their surroundings and their wills—as well as any pain they feel—but unable to do anything without McCullen's go-ahead. The Doctor also installs kill switches into the Neo-Vipers, and McCullen doesn't hesitate to order a captured Neo-Viper be executed through this method to keep him quiet.

Creating four nanite warheads and selling them to the military, McCullen arranges for Neo-Vipers to massacre the military convoy transporting them, with only a handful of the soldiers surviving thanks to the interference of the G.I. Joes.

Using his connections with the military to locate the G.I. Joe headquarters known as the Pit, McCullen sends his army to slaughter their way into the Joe base and retrieve the nanite warheads. Upon reobtaining the warheads, McCullen has Storm Shadow and the Baroness test it out by firing it on Paris, planning to wipe the entire city off the map, and though the Joes stop the nanites from spreading, they nonetheless destroy the Eiffel tower and kill many people.

Capturing the G.I. Joe soldier Duke, McCullen gleefully reveals his plans to turn him into a controlled Neo-Viper to be used as a tool, while bragging about the fact that Baroness—Ana—is under his control to an extent through nanites as well, and he mocks Duke over his failed romance with her.

Having Storm Shadow kill Baroness's "public" husband Baron Decobray when his use runs out (but mostly due to his jealousy over Baroness), McCullen prepares to fire the remaining three nanite warheads at Beijing, Moscow and Washington, D.C. to throw the world into chaos, at which point McCullen's true master plan will be in motion: Using the master of disguise Zartan to replace the President of the United States, allowing McCullen to control America through him and spread M.A.R.S. Industries' control of the weapons industry worldwide and bring "order" to the world.

As the nanite missiles are stopped by various Joes, McCullen is shocked as Duke manages to break Ana's nanite mind control, leading the Doctor to hold Ana hostage with the nanites. McCullen seems surprisingly ok with this despite his seeming care for Baroness, and uses the distraction of Ana's life in danger to mock Duke over how he failed the woman before grabbing a blowtorch and trying to burn Duke alive (with Ana in the firing zone here), but luckily Duke blasts McCullen in time to redirect the flame and setting McCullen on fire.

The Doctor then uses the chaos of the Joes overwhelming the base to inject nanites into McCullen and turn him into his loyal slave, dubbing him "Destro" before proclaiming himself to be the Cobra Commander and assuming control of M.A.R.S. Industries.

McCullen is eventually captured and locked away in prison with the Commander, before being left to die by said Commander during a prison break that destroys the entire prison, killing "Destro" seemingly for good.

Freudian Excuse or other redeeming features?
None here. McCullen has a single flashback in the prequel comic to time with his father, but he shows no actual care for dear old dad, merely listening intently to stories of his ancestors and how they were all war mongers and weapon developers, a legacy McCullen proudly embraces.

He seems to have something of a romantic attraction for the Baroness/Ana, but it's ultimately a very possessive one, murdering her public husband, spying on her, keeping her under the control of nanites and, finally, culminating in him showing zero concern over the Doctor using her as a hostage and threatening her life.

There is a scene where the Doctor recommends selling nanite missiles on the black market to make extra cash, and McCullen basically responds "No, there's enough wars and chaos in the world. We need order now.", but nothing redeeming about this. McCullen has no problem financing terrorists and selling weapons to them, he's just gotten a new desire in life to rule the world and sees no need to throw more chaotic variables into the equation like nanite missiles in the hands of terrorists while he's trying world domination.

Heinousness?
Now I'm sure that there will be some arguements that McCullen is ultimately a pawn of "the Doctor"/Cobra Commander, who was using M.A.R.S. for his own purposes.

However after watching the movie and looking at the supplementary material, I think McCullen makes it. McCullen may be getting played by the Doctor, but everything he's doing is still of his own volition, without the Doctor's influence. The Doctor is slinking and sliding his way to manipulate events, but it's McCullen who gave the orders to fire the nanite missiles, has the military convoys massacred, chooses the highly-populated targets, commissions the Neo-Vipers be created. The Doctor may pull The Starscream, but McCullen is never actually taking orders or being influenced by the Doctor beyond advice and sly words in his ears.

True, the Doctor/Cobra Commander goes onto use a Kill Sat on London and threaten other cities, but given his resources and how he "only" has 4 nanite missiles? McCullen chooses targets with high bodycounts (in the millions is made explicit), and orchestrates murder throughout the film.

Final Verdict?
I think McCullen keeps