The Cobra Conspiracy; what's in a name?

[Lighthammer]

I was thinking about this earlier this week and really just got around to posting now.

I love the direction of G.I. Joe Renegade. It's really been my favorite new series in a long time.

One of the few things that gets to me about this series however, is how you, as the viewer, can subscribe to the idea that "Cobra" is a world peace organization. Certainly, in context of the show, it has all the tools in place to disguise it's true intents, but one really has to sit back and think "How can someone name a company after a bread of snake and *NOT* question it's intent"?

I'm finding myself questioning why TPTB didn't decide to use M.A.R.S. (Destro's front company) as the front name or make up a new name for the front name. I find that either would have been better choices and allowed the audience to really get into the story a little easier.

This has really been my only complaint with the series so far :-\.

[GregX]

I was thinking about this earlier this week and really just got around to posting now.

I love the direction of G.I. Joe Renegade. It's really been my favorite new series in a long time.

One of the few things that gets to me about this series however, is how you, as the viewer, can subscribe to the idea that "Cobra" is a world peace organization. Certainly, in context of the show, it has all the tools in place to disguise it's true intents, but one really has to sit back and think "How can someone name a company after a bread of snake and *NOT* question it's intent"?

I'm finding myself questioning why TPTB didn't decide to use M.A.R.S. (Destro's front company) as the front name or make up a new name for the front name. I find that either would have been better choices and allowed the audience to really get into the story a little easier.

This has really been my only complaint with the series so far :-\.

Um... it's more realistic than you might be aware of:

http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/faqs/faq_consumer_cobra.HTML
http://www.cobrainsurance.com/

[sparkykandy]

^ After looking at those two links, it makes me wonder if COBRA (in the Renegades universe) actually stands for something, or if it's just a name. If it actually stands for something, that might be a reason why people aren't suspicious.

[GregX]

^ After looking at those two links, it makes me wonder if COBRA (in the Renegades universe) actually stands for something, or if it's just a name. If it actually stands for something, that might be a reason why people aren't suspicious.

Actually, I think my links are proof that people would not find the name suspicious period. I've never heard anyone suggest that Cobra is a terrorist organization (the real Cobra). No one has ever batted an eye at the name.

[Lighthammer]

You know, I totally didn't think of the COBRA insurance federal insurance program.

But I think in context of the show, Cobra is more of a household name like Merc Pharmaceuticals and seems to have a series of off brands like Walmart products.

The name just seems to be a lot more widespread then worker's comp.

[Ed Liu]

I think it also depends on where they started from and where they went afterwards. If they began their life as a military/defense contractor, calling themselves "Cobra" wouldn't be so unusual. It would make them and their products sound all bad-ass and stuff. From there, figure they just started using their R&D and manufacturing facilities to go into civilian/consumer-oriented products. And Evil, of course .

Besides, not every world culture will consider snakes to have sinister or evil connotations. The Meso-American deity Quetzalcoatl is a feathered flying snake and the legends surrounding it make it out to be a beneficial god. South Asian culture doesn't really consider snakes to be sinister figures, either. As one example, while the Buddha was seeking enlightenment under the bodhi tree, the forces that sought to deter him whipped up a huge storm to shake him from his meditation, but the World Serpent (a giant Cobra) came up and used his hood to enfold and protect the Buddha. There's also the Rod of Asclepius, symbol for medicine and healing, and the caduceus, which is the symbol of commerce and trade (but is also interchanged with the Rod of Asclepius, thanks to the military adopting it as a symbol for medicine). Both involve snake iconography in a non-negative fashion.

It's just a question of branding. Plus, everyone who knows recent G.I. Joe knows that the Bad Guys are Cobra and they're not going to change that just because of the shift in focus for them.

[TheVileOne]

Stallone was Marion Cobretti codenamed THE COBRA and he was a good guy and he was awesome. So nothing suspicious about that .

I actually had similar thoughts to Knight Hammer at one point. Because in this series, COBRA just isn't a military contractor they are basically Wal-Mart, Target, Costco, K-Mart, arms dealers, and drug cartels all rolled into one. COBRA for being like a retail or grocery store chain does sound sort of ominous or harsh. But then in real life you have a federal insurance program called Cobra.

So one hand you think a big company named after a deadly snake would raise some eyebrows, but then the company's face and fraudulent founder is named DeCobray. So the company's name has root in the founder's alleged name as well.

[AlgeaX]

Corporations in the real world call themselves all kinds of weird names and people rarely question it. We being life long geeks, hear the word "Cobra" in a G.I. Joe cartoon and immediatly the ominious music starts playing in our heads. But from the perspective of people living in the Renegades universe, it's no weirder then having a brand of sneakers named after a Greco-Roman war goddess.

[Lighthammer]

Stallone was Marion Cobretti codenamed THE COBRA and he was a good guy and he was awesome. So nothing suspicious about that .

I actually had similar thoughts to Knight Hammer at one point. Because in this series, COBRA just isn't a military contractor they are basically Wal-Mart, Target, Costco, K-Mart, arms dealers, and drug cartels all rolled into one. COBRA for being like a retail or grocery store chain does sound sort of ominous or harsh. But then in real life you have a federal insurance program called Cobra.

So one hand you think a big company named after a deadly snake would raise some eyebrows, but then the company's face and fraudulent founder is named DeCobray. So the company's name has root in the founder's allegend name as well.

A point I was trying to be careful about is it is really obvious Cobra is pushing the Walmart variety of products but they are advertising them as a corporate name.

It's kind of like how GE (General Electric) or Kraft both have their hands into a very, very, very, very diverse market but sometimes you don't know until something in the media points it out. A good one I love to point to people is if you follow the money, GE ultimately owns Activision-Blizzard.

We know there's a structure somewhat like this as Scarlet points out to Roadblock in an episode that the Chilidog (or something similar) he enjoys so much is made by a company whos parent company is Cobra.

There's a lot of smoke and mirrors in terms of 'hiding the name' goes, but its not so obvious to the viewer except for those subtle hints.

I think that Cobra Pharmaceutics promo The Hub did back in October and November made it seem a little too much like the Cobra Corporation was a very big figure head when in essence of the series, I think its downplayed a lot.

[Don_East]

Personally, I think they should've used Extensive Enterprises from the old cartoon.

In fact with the whole evil business angle, I'm surprised that Tomax & Xamot haven't been used much.

[Zorak Masaki]

Apparently, Tomax and Xamot WILL appear, but theyre going to be evil cult leaders instead:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4STg3aGfRHk
(Its from the hub's channel so i can post it)

[TheVileOne]

Yup. Also Fox and Newscorp. own Rotten Tomatoes and IGN. Everyone owns everything .

You make a good point about how one big conglomerate can own a bunch of different companies with different names. However I guess since this is a cartoon they sort of simplified it in just having COBRA be one name or company instead of say EXTENSIVE ENTERPRISES and MARS being divisions of COBRA INDUSTRIES.

[Monte]

Despite mention how this would not be too strange in the real world, it is still something that irk's me... Realism vs believability

Really it might have been useful to have cobra as a criminal group aswell as legit company as a front... that way if the company needed to do anything underhanded, they could let the terrorist group take the blame should investigations ever find a source of the attack... the company would just need to make sure nothing ever ties them to the terrorist group; also possibly might need have the terrorists target cobra once in a while just to throw off any suspicion that the terrorists are helping out the compnay

^ After looking at those two links, it makes me wonder if COBRA (in the Renegades universe) actually stands for something, or if it's just a name. If it actually stands for something, that might be a reason why people aren't suspicious.

The name likely comes from its owner Adam DeCobray (aka cobra commander)

[Lighthammer]

Despite mention how this would not be too strange in the real world, it is still something that irk's me... Realism vs believability

Really it might have been useful to have cobra as a criminal group aswell as legit company as a front... that way if the company needed to do anything underhanded, they could let the terrorist group take the blame should investigations ever find a source of the attack... the company would just need to make sure nothing ever ties them to the terrorist group; also possibly might need have the terrorists target cobra once in a while just to throw off any suspicion that the terrorists are helping out the compnay



The name likely comes from its owner Adam DeCobray (aka cobra commander)

Based on how much meaning is being built into this series, I'd tend to suggest that Cobra itself has a much deeper meaning as well.

IF ANYTHING, I'd tend to think "Adam DeCobray" probably modeled his name off of Cobra.

[TheVileOne]

That's a good point since there's no evidence proving that CC's real name is even Adam DeCobray at all. We know the whole face of the company is a made up facade. So the name is likely a fake dummy name as well.