Creators: Larry Hama (Writer), Chris Mooneyham (Artist), Francesco Segala (Colorist), Sabrina Del Grosso (Flatter), Pat Brosseau (Letter)
Plot: On Cobra Island, Revanche meets with the mutated Serpentor and wants to team up and offers their services to upgrade the mutants into cyborgs. At the Pit, Duke realizes that the Revanche/Serpentor team will end up attacking the Pit so he has Spirit up the defence. In Springfield, a girl named Dawn returns to her family, though all may not be as it seems. Back at the Pit, the Joes are counter-spying on some of Serpentor's new, enhanced, troops as they are spying on the Pit and they debate on what to do. Meanwhile, at Snake-Eye's cabin in the Rockies, some more of Serpentor's forces attack Snake-Eyes and Scarlett, though find them to be difficult opponents. Back at Cobra Island, Alpha-001, Dr. Mindbender, and Serpentor watch a final broadcast from the troops, showing Scarlett and Snake-Eyes down, before it cuts out.
Story: Events are starting to take place and we can start to see how this arc might end. However, this is the third issue of mostly build-up so hopefully the next few issues we will see some payoff for all of it. I did enjoy the discussion about what to do with Serpentor's spies. Do you take them out? Or do you let them keep spying, unaware that you're aware of them and feed them false information? Also, we are told that Cobra Island is a "no fly" zone yet a helicopter is allowed to land? One would think it would have been shot down (or attempted to shot it down). And due to the cool fight scene with Snake-Eyes, the story is a bit shorter than the last couple issues.
Art: Mooneyham is still on track with his art. There are some really cool fight scenes throughout the issue, once when Revanche is demonstrating what they can do as a couple of blue ninjas fight a Battle Android Trooper and then the end battle between the blue ninjas and Snake-Eyes and Scarlett. And there is a great scene as the first of Serpentor's forces gets transformed and just the horror on his face, realizing it probably isn't a painless procedure. One down side is the shading is awfully dark. Lots of night-time scenes, or inside rooms that aren't well-lite. Hopefully that's not going to be an on-going theme for the art in the series.
Overall: After two issues of build-up, one would hope that issue would start to move the plot forward a bit more. And while it does, it's still fairly slow. We do have a few cool scenes, especially the two big battle scenes in the issue. I just hope that the color style doesn't stay dark and we get some good day-time scenes in the next few issues. Also, it was nice to see a couple pages of letters!