Thanks to Netflix, I’ve been able to introduce all sorts of old cartoons to the kids. One of our most recent forays has been into the world of G.I. Joe. They love the cool stuff, and the way each episode ends with a cliffhanger, but this morning, we ran into a small problem.

“Man,” my oldest son said. “Cobras can’t hit anything!”

Cobra is the evil organization bent on world domination, and we were watching Duke, the leader of the G.I. Joe’s, run from about fifty of them. He ran in a straight line, with their bullets and lasers zooming past him on all sides.

“Yeah.” I laughed. “Good thing, too.”

Duke climbed up the side of a wall and stole a hang glider. The Cobra soldiers climbed into their own hang gliders to follow.

“What are they doing?” he asked. “They have planes.” He pointed at the screen. “They have planes right there! Why are they using hang gliders?”

“Maybe their planes weren’t ready?” I asked. The 80’s cartoons weren’t exactly known for their realism, but I had to admit that this was getting pretty silly.

“That must be it,” my youngest said.

Duke sailed down into a wilderness, where the bad guys were waiting for him with tanks and what looked like hundreds of men, all shooting at him, all missing.

Duke jogged through the woods, laser beams flashing all around him.

“They’re terrible!” the boys groaned. Apparently, they were now cheering for Cobra.

To be honest, I kind of was, too.

It’s not that we wanted the Cobra soldiers to kill Duke, mind you, just wing him a bit.

You know, just so they wouldn’t feel so bad about themselves.