Despite their success at the box office, all three ofSylvester Stallone’s blockbuster franchises —Rocky,Rambo, andThe Expendables— encountered the same problem a few sequels down the line. After struggling to find work as an actor for years,Stallone made his own luck by writing the firstRockymovieas a starring vehicle for himself. Not only didRockylaunchStallone’s movie career; it made him an A-list star. He became the third person after Charlie Chaplin and Orson Welles to be Oscar-nominated for writing and starring in the same movie.
Whereas many movie stars today rely on familiar I.P. likeStar Warsor Marvel superheroes to give them a reliable series,Sylvester Stallone generated his own franchises. He’s arguably a one-man franchise in and of himself and that brand has been spun off into a few sub-IPs. AfterRockybecame popular enough to score decades’ worth of sequels, Stallone kickstarted theRamboandExpendablesfranchises as a backup. All these franchises have been dependable hit factories for Stallone over the years, but they all eventually ran into the same problem after a couple of movies.
Rocky, Rambo, & The Expendables All Got Way Too Silly As The Movies Went On
They All Started As Grounded, Earnest Movies And Eventually Got Too Goofy
TheRocky,Rambo, andExpendablesfranchises all went through virtually the same process. They started with a grounded, earnest original movie that subverted the genre’s tropes, which was then followed by a much bigger sequel. From the third movie onward,they all devolved into a string of cartoonish sequels where Stallone and everyone around him were unstoppable superheroes.Rockystarted as the story of an underdog boxer who accepts a championship match he has no chance of winning and just wants to put up a good fight and prove he’s worthy of being in that ring.
10 Most Underrated Sylvester Stallone Movies
Although he’s best known for cinematic icons like Rocky and Rambo, Sylvester Stallone’s career is packed with highly underrated releases.
First Bloodstarted Rambo’s story with a grounded critiqueof the unfair treatment of returning Vietnam War veterans. It sees Rambo taking the corrupt police force of a small town (and later the National Guard) on a manhunt through the woods. The firstExpendablesfilm, by its very nature, was a little broader and more self-aware about its upending of action movie tropes — that was the premise. But its action was gritty and somewhat realistic, and it wore its heart on its sleeve as the tale of a ragtag group of aging mercenaries with a ride-or-die bond.
Stallone has starred in eightRockymovies, fiveRambomovies, and fourExpendablesmovies.
That all changed with the sequels. TheRockysequelspitted Rocky against increasingly outlandish villains and featured ludicrous concepts like a birthday robot and Rocky winning over a Soviet crowd with a rousing, jingoistic, pro-American speech. TheRambosequels sent the character back to Vietnam and turned him into a remorseless killing machine.TheExpendablessequels essentially becameAvengersmovieswithout the colorful costumes. These franchises all got more cartoonish as the sequels went on, and abandoned the grounded tone that made them so popular in the first place.
Rocky & Rambo Becoming More Cartoonish Doomed Stallone’s 2 Best Characters
Rocky Balboa & John Rambo Used To Be Relatable, Three-Dimensional Human Characters
In their first movies, Rocky Balboa and John Rambo were relatable, three-dimensional human characters that paved the way for two of Stallone’s finest dramatic performances. Rocky was the underdog desperate to prove himself and Rambo was the ex-soldier who resented the fact that the only thing he was good at was killing. ButRocky’s sequels turned him into Captain America in boxing gloves, and Rambo’s sequels turned him into a human weapon. InFirst Blood, Rambo only killed one person — and even then, it was an accident — but in the sequels that followed,Rambo racked up 254 on-screen kills.
In his bookCinema Speculation,Quentin Tarantino criticizes the laterRockysequelsfor feeling more like “single-issue comic books” than real movies. He specifically pointed toRocky IIIandRocky IV, which he felt abandoned the grounded tone of the first two films to pit Rocky against “supervillains.” Notorious outlaw Clubber Lang and towering Soviet superman Ivan Drago are both more like one-note villains of the week than a well-rounded, three-dimensional opponent like Apollo Creed. Lang and Drago were motivated by nothing more than destroying Rocky. Apollo had a much more nuanced motivation; he wanted to fight the underdog as a publicity stunt.
The Rocky Franchise Was Able To Find Itself Again With Rocky Balboa & Creed
Rocky Went Back To Its Roots Eventually
After five increasingly wackyRockymovies, Stallone finally brought the series back to the original movie’s grounded tone with 2006’sRocky Balboa, the story of an aging Rocky trying to prove himself once again. TheRockyfranchise renaissance has continued withMichael B. Jordan’sCreedseries, which, three movies in, remains realistic and emotionally grounded and has avoided falling into its predecessor’s stylistic pitfalls. IfSylvester Stallonecan get theRockyfranchise back to its grounded roots, maybe he can do the same with theRamboandExpendablesfranchises, although their futures are uncertain.
