Zarana

One day, Zarana hopes to afford a whole shirt.
Zarana is a Cobra-affiliated human from the G.I. Joe portion of the Generation 1 continuity family.

Had her life taken a different turn, Zarana could have been the next Carissa Carr. Instead, she ended up joining the Dreadnoks alongside her brothers Zartan and Zandar. She's an excellent actress and can flawlessly impersonate anyone—until her innate nastiness shows through, exposing her as an impostor and a jerk.

Fiction

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Marvel Comics continuity

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G.I. Joe and the Transformers

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Zartan ordered Zarana to pick up the Dreadnoks after they were chased away from Power Station Alpha by G.I. Joe. Using a disguised semi truck, she did so, then chewed her loutish charges out for their failure afterwards. Blood on the Tracks Later, she picked up the Baroness after the latter had destroyed Power Station Alpha. ...All Fall Down!

Marvel Generation 2 comic

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You go ages without a superhero team and then two come along at once!

Since most of Cobra high command had defected, Zarana was, for a while, a sort of second in command to Cobra Commander. Like Slice and Dice, she thought Scarlett was only pretending to defect and was really a spy. Final Transformations During this period, Zarana hunted ex-Cobras Destro and the Baroness alongside her fellow terrorists and was thwarted by a Ninja Force attack; all pretty normal for Cobra until a half-dead Megatron showed up! Unfoldings!

Zarana got to hang around during Cobra's dealings with Megatron, and made the quite intelligent points of: a) It's a bad idea to try and buy off an alien war machine, and b) once they had Megatron partially disassembled for repairs, why not keep doing it instead of relying on his promise of the Ark tech? She was overruled. Realignments She later had fun pointing out that the Commander had missed a disguised Ark (and was told to shut up) Goin' South and had to remind him not to antagonise Megatron if he wanted that tech. Sucker Punch

It all went to pot when an Autobot strike team and G.I. Joe turned up, and Zarana pointed out that the Cobra base at Milleville can't be secret if alien robots know about it. She also got to smugly point out how she was right that Scarlett was a plant (and not so smugly get beaten up trying to stop Scarlett). Final Transformations

G.I. Joe vs. the Transformers

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BOOT TO THE HEAD!

Disguised as Doctor Wise, Zarana infiltrated the United States Military's top-secret Area 52 facility. She activated a beacon that transmitted the base's location to Cobra, and she was soon joined by Zartan and Cobra Commander in attacking the base's security forces and the Autobot Bumblebee. The three Cobra operatives beat them back and activated the dormant Serpent Organic Robot, only to have it attack and incapacitate them. The Art of War #1 Recovering, the three were soon captured by a group of Joes and Autobots, but an attack by Serpent O.R. allowed them to escape in their Buzz Boar. The Art of War #2

2005 IDW continuity

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Born into poverty in London, Zoe and her twin brother Zack grew up in an abusive orphanage, refusing to speak to anyone but each other. Out of fear of being separated from each other, the two fled the orphanage as teenagers, making a life for themselves on the street by begging, stealing and pulling hustles; it was here that Zoe took the lead in their relationship, protecting the smaller and weaker Zack from being picked on, as well as discovering her talents of disguise and deception. Eventually, however, the twins fled to Australia using tickets bought by Zarana's admirers in order to escape arrest by the London police; on arriving, the two soon fell in with the vicious Dreadnoks, taking on the names Zarana and Zandar and making use of their stolen technology to enhance their particular skills. Zandar and Zarana profiles

Some time after the Dreadnoks' leader Zartan abandoned them, Operation: Deadfall, Part 3 Zarana and Zandar travelled to New York City to engage in an arms deal with the biker gang known as the Heathens on Randall's Island on the instructions of "{{#if:||the One}}". This was picked up by G.I. Joe's {{#if:||Threat Matrix}} program, leading the team to interrupt the deal before the twins received their payment. The two fled on their custom Dreadnok motorcycle, which contained holographic technology that they used to turn themselves invisible to evade the Joes, Threat Matrix, Part 2 but explosives fired at them by Duke disrupted their cloaking and made them visible once more. The twins attempted to fight back, but Quick Kick knocked them out with his nunchaku, allowing them to be arrested by the Joes. Threat Matrix, Part 3 In the aftermath, it turned out that the weapons that the Dreadnoks were selling to the Heathens were worthless junk, though they protested that they had done exactly as "the One" instructed them. Threat Matrix, Part 4

At some point, the twins reunited with the other Dreadnoks, and were eventually approached by Crystal Ball, a member of Cobra High Command, who sought to use the gang to help him take over the Inner Mongolia region of China; the Dreadnoks agreed in order to establish their own "outlaw nation". Zandar and Zarana profiles In order to lure the G.I. Joe team to Crystal Ball's headquarters, the twins disguised themselves as the native Mongolians "Ying" and "Yong"; though Cover Girl was suspicious of their British accents, they managed to bring the Joes to the Dreadnoks' manor, where the rest of the gang ambushed the team; while the Dreadnok heavies engaged the Joes, Zandar and Zarana slipped out. G.I. Joe vol. 5 #2 After the G.I. Joe team escaped in a jeep hot-wired by Cover Girl, the Dreadnoks pursued them on their motorbikes, with Torch riding in Zarana's sidecar. G.I. Joe vol. 5 #3 The Dreadnoks were fended off by the Joes' resident Transformer Skywarp, at which point the earth started shaking and split open; though Zarana and Zandar recognised what was happening and ordered the others to retreat, the gang were all grabbed by a "Fatal Fluffy" when it emerged from the ground, dragging them in. As Zarana was pulled under, she yelled that Crystal Ball would pay for lying to them. G.I. Joe vol. 5 #4

The Dreadnoks managed to escape from the monster, as the Fatal Fluffy "didn't like the taste" of them. When a United States army transport taking the Baroness and Crystal Ball to the Hague was attacked by Cobranarchists, Zandar pretended to be a civilian trapped by rubble from the anarchist's bombs, with Zarana calling for help. When Duke ran over to rescue him, Zarana knocked the ex-Joe to the ground with a bladed weapon, and the Dreadnoks prepared to take custody of Duke's prisoners. G.I. Joe vol. 5 #8

Toys

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Collaborative

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  • Soundwave Dreadnok Thunder Machine with Zartan and Zarana (2024)
    • Accessories: Cutting weapon, backpack, battle stand
  • Known designers: {{{1}}}{{#if: |, {{{2}}}}}
Part of the Transformers Collaborative line, this 3.75" Zarana figure comes in a set with a properly scaled Soundwave Thunder Machine, her brother Zartan, and Ravage.
Zarana herself is a newly recreated replica of her original 1984 toy, part of the concurrent G.I. Joe Retro Collection and its "O-Ring" subline. She comes packaged on her own Retro Collection card inside the main Collaborative box to the glee of Joe collectors. She comes with faithful recreations of her original cutting weapon and backpack along with a new battle stand, and can ride inside Soundwave's cockpit in vehicle mode or ride his back in robot mode.

References

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