The removed death-scene screams; the licensed video game; overlap with Missing in Action; Vietnamese stereotypes and POW exploitation; ineffective mortars
Aged Worst includes the reportedly removed triple scream after Co’s death, cut because test audiences laughed; the hosts wish it had survived.
The licensed Rambo video game is criticized, while a game transcribed as Akari Warriors is recalled as a better Rambo-like game; rushed tie-in scheduling is suggested as an explanation.
Missing in Action is said to have used essentially the same rescue plot earlier, while Cameron’s earlier script work prevents a firm plagiarism claim.
Other criticisms include Vietnamese stereotypes, POW exploitation and ineffective mortar attacks on moving people.
Both suggest a Stallone underacting award for the monosyllabic delivery, saying Cobra goes even further and Tango & Cash shows that greater expressiveness was available.
The overacting category is repurposed as the Rambo II underacting award, returning to the earlier Stallone critique.
One hottest take prefers rewatching Missing in Action 2, especially its climactic fight to the death, while admitting the whole movie is not especially good.
The other hottest take argues Predator borrows extensively: Mexico standing in for a foreign jungle, an older officer and suspicious bureaucrat, insertion trouble, hostages and an indigenous ally, lost modern weapons, bow and arrow, mud camouflage and a withheld finishing blow.
Casting What-Ifs includes Lundgren reportedly removed because of his Drago role, Lee Marvin declining roles across both films, and local Chinese-restaurant workers recruited as extras in Mexico.
The producers reportedly wanted John Travolta as Rambo’s partner, an idea Stallone vetoed; the hosts enthusiastically imagine buddy banter and a Quarter Pounder and metric-system exchange.
Steven Berkoff and Charles Napier are the candidates; Napier is favored despite discussion of whether knowing his name disqualifies him. His Cable Guy appearance is another supporting example.
Recasting Couch returns to Travolta as the partner and proposes replacing the closing song with Born in the U.S.A., while doubting Springsteen would approve.
Craig is said to be traveling and absent, so he has no flex selection. The first name alone does not independently identify a credited producer.
Half-Assed Internet Research reports Mexico and Thailand locations, the fatal accident involving special-effects worker Cliff Wenger, 425,000 opening-day video units, high video prices and a Soviet ban.
A claim about remaining Vietnam POWs is read from research, followed by explicitly unverified accounts of Crenna pantsing Stallone, a retaliatory cream pie and cast mud fights.
The on-set prank story is suggested as a Steven Seagal unbelievable-on-set-story candidate, with doubt that Crenna would behave that way.
The stated body count is 85 total and 74 attributed to Rambo; helicopter weapons are suggested as padding his tally.
Stallone receives affirmative Apex for 1985, jointly represented by this film and Rocky IV.
Vietnam movies do not receive Apex here: late-1970s quality and Platoon’s Oscar-winning period are preferred, with Full Metal Jacket and Casualties of War also discussed.
Reagan, Uncle Sam/America, Julia Nickson and the Cold War’s 1985 pop-culture moment receive affirmative answers; the lack of nuclear-weapons discussion slightly weakens the Cold War argument.
Martin Kove is placed at Karate Kid instead, and movie knives are placed a year later with Cobra and Crocodile Dundee, alongside knife advertising.
The Rancid Body Odor pick is the rescued POW rather than sewage-soaked Rambo, although nearly everyone is considered plausible and Co a possible exception.
Murdock is offered as a contrarian Body Odor alternative because of his constant sweating.
