SNAKE EYES #3
Written by Chuck Dixon, art by Robert Atkins, covers by Atkins, Agustin Padilla.

Snake Eyes captive! Will the death of the most dangerous Joe be the key to who assumes the role of Cobra Commander? Vikrim Khallikhan is betting it is. The COBRA CIVIL WAR builds toward its violent climax with Snake Eyes and Team Foxtrot trapped at the top of the world with a fortress of Vipers between them and survival.

32 pages, $3.99.

Are we going to start getting SE flashbacks now? This reminds me of issue 10 of Marvel a bit.

Remember when the new main series was under 15 issues or so and it had tons of throwbacks to situations in the Marvel series? I would like to keep seeing that from time to time. It's fun to have a fresh story with little twinges of nostalgic moments.

Khalilkhan is a very intriguing character. I agree with an earlier comment made that he has a Cobra Commander vibe to him. Plus, he can hold his own with SE? If it were up to vote and not body count, I'd vote for him. This series is really growing on me. Really hoping we don't have a love triangle going though with SE-Scarlett-Helix. NOT COOL.

After posting Robert's amazing cover here, I hoped that would be the one that I got from my NSLCS. Unfortunately, no such luck. I got the Padilla cover instead. That's not to say that cover wasn't good, but it just couldn't hold a candle to Robert's. With Dixon doing a terrific job with the previous two issues, I was really looking forward to seeing what this issue had in store for me.

Dixon started things off with some exceptional character interaction with Lix, Alpy, and IB. You really felt the sense of urgency with getting Pine clear and also H wanting to go back and get S-Eyes. Dammit I promised I wouldn't point out the shortening of code names. Okay, last time I swear.

The interaction gets even better when we switch to captive Snake Eyes and Khalikhan. Dixon does such a good job on this guy that I have completely forgotten how easily he dispatched Snake Eyes in the previous issue. I am really starting to like Khalikhan as a possible CC. He certainly has the bravado. The art here was just spectacular. Robert nailed the emotions in Snake Eyes' face and we got a glimpse of why he wears a mask.

The next scene is when Padilla took over. To his credit, the panels were done pretty well and I could follow the battle easily. The only problem here were the grenade explosions. This is just a pet peeve of mine. Grenades DO NOT create a fire ball. They burst into a cloud of what I can best describe as dust. This happens way too many times in the movies and just shows the person responsible hasn't done their homework. No different than Stallone firing a LAW inside a chopper or Norris shooting both sides of a door with his M203 without having to reload inbetween.

I don't know about anyone else, but I MUST get me one of those false bottom foot things! I was put off a bit at first to see how easily Snake Eyes took out the two COBRA Vipers, after hearing many times that he previously had struggled against just one. Then the scene shifted to Khalikhan who now had Slice and Dice with him and they asked why he ALLOWED Snake Eyes to escape. I couldn't help but be impressed here with how Khalikhan is handling this situation. This isn't a typical Snake Eyes shoot-em-up escape, but a test under what appears to be, at least somewhat, controlled conditions.

Back outside the art changed up again. I was really hoping that disc thingy would have put a slug right between Helix' eyes, but no such luck as she evaded all the lead projectiles. Maybe next time. One criticism of the art has to be the very last panel on page 13. Suddenly there were 6 disc thingys instead of one and they didn't appear to be designed the same either, with 4 barrels instead of 2. Anyway, Helix did a brilliant non-superhero move by attaching some C4 to the disc thingy and ridding the team of their snow-clad pursuers.

Snake Eyes continued his "escape" with Khalikhan taunting him every step of the way, ala ARAH CC. Robert was back on the art chores, thankfully, and Dixon really shined here. We get more of a glimpse of just how badass Khalikhan is, and that IDW COBRA is far more credible than their ARAH counterpart. Read and learn Mr. Hama.

Dixon ends the issue with the ever-impressive cliff hanger trifecta. Snake Eyes is squaring off against Slice and Dice, Helix is heading back to the base, and Iceberg is about to be overrun with Trouble Bubbles. Kudos to Dixon, Robert, and IDW for taking a chance on this title. Three issues and I am all in. This title already is better than 90% of the Origins issues and is really pushing ARAH and COBRA as my favorite. I for one cannot wait for the next issue to see what happens next!

So you have a NEW Arashikage connection here: SS, Snake Eyes, Zartan and Vikrim Khallikhan, and probably Satori. Where do you think Vikrim learned his fighting art form? It had to be the Arashikage clan OR another rival clan that knows how to counter their techniques. IF this is the case, then there is some kind of rivalry going on here, albeit a private one between Satori and Vikrim. Even Oyabun Satori asked if he would trust SS to cooperate with Zartan even if he was in the midst of their employ. One has to be BLIND not to smell something fishy.

Even Oyabun Satori asked if he would trust SS to cooperate with Zartan even if he was in the midst of their employ. One has to be BLIND not to smell something fishy.