How does the axe-clanging cult recruit; did Cobra invent the nitrous boost; did it invent Hero Ball; did it foreshadow evil LA cops; has any star been shot at more by bad aim; does the Night Slasher have the best horror-villain gimmick
How do you join or grow the axe-clanging serial-killer cult? Two axes and a mean look, like the Fight Club entry requirements.
Did the movie invent the nitrous boost later taken by Fast and Furious and video games? The speedometer taps out at 130; one thinks it invented it.
Did it invent Hero Ball? He still needs his partner to hit a couple of shots.
Did it foreshadow the era of evil Los Angeles cops, with a high-ranking cop masterminding a serial-killer cult? It planted the flag early.
Has any star been shot at more by bad aim than Sly? Arnold is the rival, but Arnold gets wounded while Stallone is never grazed, making Sly the pound-for-pound champ.
Does the Night Slasher have the best horror-villain gimmick? He checks most boxes; the only hole is lacking Buffalo Bill's pathology, but his late monologue is disturbing and he has one-punch power alongside Myers, Jason and James Gum.
Brian Thompson wanted more but Sly would not give him the time of day; Thompson appeared in The Terminator's early scene with Paxton and should have been bigger.
Opening crime-statistics monologue; the poster; the Night Slasher; match toothpick; Awesome 50 license plate; the name Marion Cobretti; Zombie Squad; the New Order; product placement; shooting range scene
The opening monologue lists burglary, robbery, violent crime, murder and rape statistics: grim, dystopian, Death Wish on steroids.
The poster ('crime is the disease, meet the cure') is one of the better movie posters of the last 40 years.
The Night Slasher was physically imposing and scary; perhaps Brian Thompson's bad experience with Stallone kept more from becoming of him.
Also listed: the match toothpick, the car's awesome 50 license plate, and the 'attitude problem' exchange that seems written for the trailer.
Marion Cobretti is a bad-ass name meant to be his Balboa, with jokes about Scorpetti and LSU's Cobretti as a draft-bound kicker.
The Zombie Squad is a great name with zero backstory; the New Order just gathers to clang axes like P90X, and the mole cop and knife-hand cut explain nothing.
The product placement roll call (Pepsi, a beer display, Toys R Us, Coca-Cola, a high-life sign) is just great, recalling Marty McFly ordering a Pepsi Free in Hill Valley.
Shooting range scenes are always awesome, as in Lethal Weapon and Narc.
Stallone's rewrite of the Beverly Hills Cop script was too expensive, explosive and humorless, so Eddie Murphy was brought in; Stallone kept the renegade-cop idea and made it into Cobra.
Cinematographer Rick Waite answered Stallone's complaint about delays by blaming Stallone fooling around with Brigitte Nielsen and showing off for his bodyguards; Stallone cleaned up for about two weeks.
Director George P. Cosmodos is described as a figurehead with Stallone effectively directing, and supporting cast and extras were reportedly forbidden to talk to Stallone on set.
Brian Thompson, who plays the Night Slasher, repeatedly asked Stallone about the character's backstory and was finally told the guy's just evil.
Stallone's mumbling required subtitles; he ran amok for about two months with nobody stopping him, and Thompson, a trained theater actor, was left with no motivation for the role.
The source material was the novel Fair Game by Paula Gosling, which was changed a lot, later made into a movie with Cindy Crawford and William Baldwin, and tied to Beverly Hills Cop's origins.
The movie almost got an X rating for violence, not sex.
The final scene was shot at the Pacific Coast Club in Long Beach; the car was a 1950 Mercury owned by Stallone, with three replicas built for the chase scenes.
Knife designer Herman Schneider made the Night Slasher's knife at Stallone's request; with finger holes and spikes like brass knuckles, it is called one of the best weapons in any core action movie and something drawn on school folders.
Drive's director was a huge fan, and the main character's toothpick was a Cobra homage.
A TV-series remake was mentioned with 2019 (transcribed 'Stallone animated in 2019'), but nothing had happened after two and a half years.
The body count is 52, with 41 killed by Marion Cobretti.
