The ultimate boys’ toy is coming to the big screen in the shape of GI Joe – the US version of the doll the British know as Action Man.

Actress Rachel Nichols, a former model who was seen earlier this summer as a green-skinned alien in Star Trek, is a member of the GI Joe team out to defeat the evil Cobra organisation, headed by Sienna Miller.

The 29-year-old plays Scarlett, whose ninja skills and talent with a crossbow come in useful when dealing with deadly assassins.

We caught up with Nichols last month on a day that began with her and her co-stars being sped down the River Thames for a photo opportunity at HMS Belfast.

That was quite an entrance you made this morning…

Oh my gosh, they did not adequately prepare us for this morning! It was so much fun: I’m from New England, from a world of boats and oceans, so I had a real laugh. It was hysterical: there were these little dinghies, we’re bopping through the water and all of us got drenched. It was a riot to start a day of press that way.

GI Joe is called Action Man in the UK. We don’t recall there being an Action Woman…

Scarlett is the one female GI Joe, the one girl in the group of boys, and I was very much the one girl in a group of boys when we made the film. She grew up with the boys, she’s a tomboy, she’s really smart and she beats a lot of them at most of their games.

The gallery is now up-to-date with the most recent images of Rachel Nichols promoting G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra. I especially adore the press conference pictures!

New photos of Rachel and her cast mates attending the premiere of G.I. Joe in Japan are now available here in the gallery. Enjoy!

Busier than a hooker on Valentine’s Day last week, I assigned Drew Turney the (not-so-difficult) task of talking to the lovely Rachel Nichols for me. Nichols, who you’ll know from TV-ville (“Alias”, “The Inside”) was in Sydney to promote the comic-book inspired “G.I Joe” – and in this one-on-one chat with Moviehole’s Drew, you’ll get the full low-down on it. Enjoy the chat…

Drew here, Is she just another hot babe clad in black leather in a tentpole toy movie or something more? After some ‘I know her, she’s that girl’ roles in everything from teen chick flicks (Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants 2) to sci-fi (Alias, Star Trek), I ask just who Rachel Nichols just who she thinks she is…

Drew: How hands on were you in the production?

Rachel: Very much so. Stephen [Sommers, director] loves to put the actors in the stunts and scenes as much as possible and I did everything they’d allow me to. It was really hard work but all of us got along so well that it didn’t feel as hard as it was and we had a really good time.

Drew: There were obviously a lot of digital effects in the film, so how many stunts could there possibly have been for you to take part in?

Rachel: You’re right there was a fair amount that had to be CGI but people don’t realize how much was actually real. The sequence where there are cars and hummers flying through the air? We actually did that. I think we set some sort of record for launching the most cars into the air for any movie. There were a lot of real explosions and there was a lot of real water, believe or not.