Danny McBride's new G.I. Joe movie will be based on the Marvel comics
Paramount’s Transformers/G.I. Joe crossover quietly stalled, three live-action films never stuck, and the fix is a lifelong superfan setting his reboot in Cobra’s Springfield — the same comics Robert Kirkman used to build Hasbro’s biggest comic hit ever.
Paramount has been trying to make G.I. Joe work on the big screen for fifteen years, through two studio regimes and a Transformers crossover that went nowhere. Their newest plan is the most promising one yet, and it comes down to a simple idea nobody tried before: let someone who actually loves G.I. Joe adapt the comics.
That someone is Danny McBride.
McBride is writing and directing — his first feature
Paramount teased a new G.I. Joe at CinemaCon in April, and it’s now official: McBride will both write and direct the reboot. He was originally hired just to pen the script, then got handed the director’s chair too, making this his feature directorial debut. He co-wrote it with two of his Righteous Gemstones collaborators, Jeff Fradley and John Carcieri, and Lorenzo di Bonaventura — who produces the Transformers films — is producing.
It’s a clean reboot with no ties to the earlier movies. Duke is confirmed to appear; the rest of the casting is unset, with only rumors so far about who leads. And it could start shooting before the end of the year.
Why the old G.I. Joe movies never stuck
Here’s the thing the “the movies flopped” shorthand gets wrong: two of them made money. They just never built anything.
G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (2009) with Channing Tatum grossed $302 million on a $175 million budget — a hit, but critically savaged, and it arrived right as the Marvel machine was redefining what a franchise looked like. G.I. Joe: Retaliation (2013), a soft reboot with Dwayne Johnson, pulled $376 million and still couldn’t get a third film off the ground. Then came Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins (2021) with Henry Golding, which grossed just $40 million and died on impact. That one sent the whole franchise dormant.
So the honest scorecard is: never critically respected, never able to sustain a series, and capped off by an outright bomb. Fifteen years, three swings, no franchise.
The Transformers crossover that fizzled out
The plan that was supposed to save it was the crossover. Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (2023) ended with a secret-agent character handing Anthony Ramos‘ hero a card bearing the G.I. Joe logo — recruiting him into the organization and, supposedly, launching a shared Hasbro movie universe. Paramount officially announced the crossover at CinemaCon 2024.
And then it just… stopped. There have been no real updates on it in years. Earlier this year, Ramos himself admitted he’s as clueless as fans about whether it’s happening. It didn’t help that both Rise of the Beasts and the animated Transformers One underperformed, leaving Paramount gun-shy about how to move forward. Director Steven Caple Jr. reportedly developed a concept, but nothing came of it.
The clearest sign it’s dead: McBride’s reboot pointedly ignores that continuity. The movie universe the crossover was built on has been quietly abandoned.
The comics did what the movies couldn’t
Now for the irony that makes all of this worth paying attention to. While Paramount spent a decade failing to unite Transformers and G.I. Joe on screen, someone else already did it — in print.
In 2021, Robert Kirkman‘s Skybound acquired the comic rights to both brands and launched the Energon Universe in 2023, a fully connected continuity where the Transformers and the Joes share one world. It became Hasbro’s most successful comic line ever: over 7 million units sold, a Transformers run that’s won two Eisner Awards, and a G.I. Joe Kickstarter that ranks as the most-funded comic campaign in the platform’s history.
CBR called it one of the great comics success stories of the decade. Kirkman puts it right alongside The Walking Dead and Invincible. There’s even an adult animated adaptation in development.
Let that land. The crossover Hollywood couldn’t build is thriving on the page, selling millions, winning awards — and Hasbro’s live-action screen strategy has been a graveyard by comparison.
Springfield is the smart bet
Which is exactly why McBride’s approach is the right one. He’s confirmed his script draws heavily on the comics, with the Cobra-controlled town of Springfield as its primary setting — a deep-cut plotline from the classic Larry Hama run, in which Cobra secretly owns an all-American town in plain sight. It’s grounded, paranoid, and character-driven, the opposite of the globe-hopping CGI spectacle the earlier films chased.
In other words, the movie is finally raiding the same well that’s making the comics a hit instead of trying to reinvent the brand from scratch. After fifteen years of Hollywood insisting it knew better than the source material, the plan is to just adapt the source material.
Can a comedy guy stick the landing?
The obvious risk is McBride himself. He’s best known for comedy — Eastbound & Down, Vice Principals, The Righteous Gemstones — and he’s never directed a feature, let alone a tentpole. Handing a first-timer a legacy action franchise is a real gamble.
But the case for him is better than the résumé suggests. His screenwriting actually leans dark and horror-tinged, not goofy. And he’s a genuine, bone-deep superfan — he’s said G.I. Joe was his thing as a kid, that he loved it “more than Star Wars, more than anything.” For a franchise that’s spent fifteen years being handled by people who clearly didn’t care about it, having someone in charge who reveres it is not a small thing.
For the first time in a long time, the person steering a G.I. Joe movie loves G.I. Joe, and he’s copying the homework that’s already working. Whether a comedy veteran can turn that into a blockbuster on his first try is the real cliffhanger. But it’s the first G.I. Joe plan since 2009 that starts from the right place.
Article compiled and edited by Derek Gibbs (entertainment editor) and the Clownfish TV newsroom.
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Hat Tips:
The Hollywood Reporter / Deadline / TheWrap (July 2026) — McBride confirmed to write and direct, feature debut, di Bonaventura producing, Paramount’s multi-script development, no connection to prior films
ScreenRant / GeekTyrant (July 2026) — McBride’s comics inspiration, Springfield as the primary setting, Duke’s inclusion, the abandoned Dreadnoks pitch, and his Happy Sad Confused fandom comments
Variety — past-film grosses and the Skybound/Kirkman comics resurgence note
Collider / MovieWeb / ScreenRant — the stalled Transformers crossover status and Ramos’ “in the dark” update
Image Comics / Popverse / Nerdist — Energon Universe sales, Eisner wins, 7M+ units, Hasbro’s biggest comic line ever, and the animated adaptation