Despite their success at the box office, all three of Sylvester Stollones blockbuster franchise – Rocky, RamboAnd The Expendables – Encountered the same problem several sequels down the line. After struggling to find work as an actor for years, Stallone made his own luck by writing the first Rocky Movie as a starring vehicle for itself. Not only did Rocky launch Stallone’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 IP like Star Wars Or Marvel superheroes to give them a reliable series, Sylvester Stallone generated his own franchises. He is arguably a one-man franchise in his own right and the brand has spanned out into several sub-IPs. yet Rocky Stollone became popular enough to receive decades of sequels Rambo And Expendables Franchises as a backup. All of these franchises have been reliable hit factories for Stallone over the years, but they all eventually ran into the same problem after a couple of movies.
Rocky, Rambo, and The Expendables are all very silly as the movies go on
They all started out as grounded, serious movies and eventually became too goofy
The Rocky, RamboAnd Expendables Franchises all went through almost the same process. They started with a grounded, serious original movie that subverted the genre’s tropes, which was followed by a much bigger sequel. From the third movie onwards, They all devolved into a string of cartoonish sequels where Stallone and everyone around him were unstoppable superheroes. Rocky Started 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 the ring.
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First blood Started Rambo’s story with a grounded critique of the unfair treatment of returning Vietnam War veterans. It sees Rambo take the corrupt police force of a small town (and later the National Guard) on a manhunt through the woods. The first Expendables The film, by its very nature, was a bit broader and more self-aware of its eschewing 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 alliance.
That all changed with the sequels. The Rocky Sequels pitted Rocky against increasingly outlandish villains and featured ridiculous concepts like a birthday robot and Rocky winning over a Soviet crowd with a rousing, jingoistic, pro-American speech. The Rambo Sequels sent the character back to Vietnam and turned him into a remorseless killing machine. The Expendables Sequels essentially became Avengers Movies Without the colorful costumes. The franchises became increasingly cartoonish as the sequels went on, abandoning the grounded tone that made them so popular in the first place.
Rocky & Rambo become more cartoonish doomed Stallone’s 2 best characters
Rocky Balboa and 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. But The Rocky sequels turned him into Captain America in boxing gloves, and the Rambo sequels turned him into a human weapon. in First bloodRambo 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 book Cinema speculationQuentin Tarantino criticized the latter Rocky Sequels for Feeling More Like “Single-issue comic books“Like real movies. He specifically pointed out Rocky III And Rocky IVWhat he felt was abandoning the grounded tone of the first two films to pit Rocky against “Supervillains.“Notorious gangster Clubber Lang and towering Soviet superman Ivan Drago are both more one-note villains of the week than a well-rounded, three-dimensional adversary like Apollo Creed. Lang and Drago are motivated by nothing more than destroying Rocky. Apollo has 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 and Creed
Rocky went back to his roots eventually
After five increasingly wacky Rocky movies, Stallone finally brought the series back to the original movie’s grounded tone with 2006’s Rocky BalboaThe story of an aging Rocky trying to prove himself once again. The Rocky Franchise renaissance continued with Michael B. Jordan’s Creed Series, which, in three movies, remains realistic and emotionally grounded and has avoided falling into its predecessor’s stylistic pitfalls. If Sylvester Stollone Can get these Rocky Franchise back to its grounded roots, maybe he can do the same with these Rambo And Expendables Franchises, although their futures are uncertain.