After commanding a mission to plant a vortex cone near the Panama Canal, the Baroness flees in a Moray hydrofoil. G.I. Joe pursues, capturing her with a helicopter mounted magnet. Despite being rendered immobile and disarmed, the Baroness jumps out to the ocean far below her. Thinking her gone, Flint and Lady Jaye take the Moray to find the base she was headed for after the latter Joe has disguised herself as the Baroness. While at the Cobra base, the disguised Lady Jaye is exposed, causing her and Flint to steal a F.A.N.G., only to barely escape a collision with some fuel drums. They make a more successful getaway with a Rattler, but to Mainframe's chagrin, the floppy disk is damaged.
Despite this, the Joes proceed with a mass attack with unmanned robots; but they end up being overwhelmed by Cobra's more advanced equivalents while Flint and Lady Jaye are captured, and the rest are forced to hide in one of their robots. Inside the Cobra base, Flint and Lady Jaye are dropped into the den of a mutant octopus that the latter manages to render unconscious long enough for it to inadvertently distract Dr. Mindbender and two Vipers.
Duke looking on without reaction as a B.A.T. chokes Flint, while Lady Jaye ineffectually punches it.
Meanwhile, while Wet Suit decides it's time for him to act, only to pick the Vortex Cone's backup system. After Mainframe devises a way to read the floppy, Due to ever-decreasing oxygen tanks, Leatherneck and the other Joes give up on waiting for the signal from Flint and Lady Jaye. Despite Destro pointing out that the Seal's error, Cobra Commander is infuriated into activating the Vortex Cone. After giving the correct panel to Wet Suit, the weapon and underwater base are destroyed, leaving only one last problem... Lifeline making Flint and Lady Jaye think Shipwreck needs an amputation, which turns out to just be the removal of an enemy robot's arm from the sailor's ankle.
"Ohhh, how could you do that to a poor little floppy disk?"
"That's nothing! You should see what Cobra did to ME!"
--Mainframe and Lady Jaye disagreeing over who suffered more on their last mission.
Notes[]
Animation and Technical Errors[]
The Vortex cone countdown starts at 48 hours, shown as 48:00:00. It then goes to 48:59:59. This is wrong as it should tick down to 47:59:59. Moreover, Hawk gives orders to the Joe team a few seconds later, and the clock behind him reads 46:28:94.
Wild Weasel spots the Joe task force and radios in a description of a battleship, three cruisers and six destroyers, but doesn't seem to notice the aircraft carrier.
When Wet-Suit begins to work on the underwater auxiliary panel, his wetsuit changes from the normal aqua to the generic orange and black wetsuits seen in The Worms of Death.
While hiding inside the Joe robots, Stalker is miscolored as Caucasian in one scene.
Lifeline is shown swimming through the Cobra base with a spear gun, this could be seen as inconsistent with his no violence philosophy.
Shipwreck is shown caught by a B.A.T while in the cobra base, Leatherneck shoots the arm off the B.A.T and the battle continues. Later Lifeline runs past Flint and Lady Jaye saying "I've got to cut an arm off Shipwreck." We then see Shipwreck out of his wetsuit with the B.A.T arm holding onto his pants leg. How did they get the wetsuit off without removing the arm? Did they cutting suit's leg? Also why is Lifeline using a hacksaw, this won't remove the hand from Shipwreck's leg.
Continuity Errors[]
Mainframe's supposed "free-floating head" disc drive is a technological marvel that is unrealistic with real world technology.
At 6:42, you can notice Cobra Commander in the background operating a microphone for himself.
Miscellaneous Notes[]
This particular episode is a strange mixture of first and second season concepts, that does not easily fit into the overall continuity. This was due to the writer, Tom Dagenais, being seriously ill at the time he was writing the episode, and not being able to finish it in time for the first season. Dagenais finished the episode before he passed away, and it was ready in time for the second season, but had to receive some minor changes to incorporate the new characters who had been introduced in the second season[1].
Several factors make it more similar to first season episodes:
The green wetsuits used by G.I. Joe troops, look very much like the environmental and space suits used in Star Trek: The Original Series.
The story focuses on older characters such as Flint, Lady Jaye, Destro, the Baroness, and Cobra Commander
The Joes are using Dragonfly helicopters instead of the newer Tomahawks
Cobra is using Rattlers instead of the newer Night Ravens
Firebats are colored silver instead of the red from Season 2
Blueshirts are the primary Cobra infantry troopers
Cobra Commander appears to still be in charge of Cobra, with no mention of Serpentor, and Destro and the Baroness reporting to the Commander throughout the entire episode.
On the other hand, there are some aspects of season 2 present
Second season characters such as Dial Tone, Leatherneck, Mainframe, Wet Suit, and Hawk appear in limited roles
the Joe assault on Cobra Undersea Base Delta uses Conquest jets
Dr. Mindbender appears, albeit unnamed, and Flint and Lady Jaye seem familiar with him and his methods
Vipers appear in limited roles
B.A.T.s, which were explicitly created in "Arise, Serpentor, Arise!", are used against the Joes.
Some dialogue seems to have been assigned to newer characters with no thought given to their personalities:
Wet Suit's uses the term "cowabunga", an expression more in line with Torpedo's character
Cobra Life magazine centerfold.
On balance, this episode appears to be an older script hastily edited to fit into the new set up.
The robots the Joes use are never really explained or used again.
Cobra puts out a magazine named Cobra Life. Hints in this episode suggest it's adult in nature. In the first half of the episode, the male trooper reading it made a very interesting "ooooh" noise over it, and later he's holding it as if looking at a centerfold.
