{"id":5424,"date":"2016-03-10T09:28:16","date_gmt":"2016-03-10T03:58:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=5424"},"modified":"2026-07-17T21:38:36","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T16:08:36","slug":"rambo-last-blood-review-sylvester-stallone-has-passed-his-expiration-date","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=5424","title":{"rendered":"Rambo: Last Blood Review: Sylvester Stallone Has Passed His Expiration Date"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I<\/span><\/p><\/div>

t is with a heavy heart that I announce John Rambo is dead. This is not a spoiler for the nonsensically titled <\/span>Rambo: Last Blood<\/span><\/i>, that hits theatres today; it\u2019s merely a declaration by a lifelong fan that the franchise has passed its expiration date. Eleven years after Sylvester Stallone\u2019s last outing as the <\/span>Elon Musk<\/span><\/a> of innovative murder techniques, he\u2019s back as Rambo in a film that makes you feel as if you\u2019ve gone back in time while you\u2019re watching it. As a self-professed fanboy, I have to admit my high hopes for the film met the same grisly fate as the unnamed henchmen whom Rambo slaughters by the dozen. Again.<\/span>\n\nAt this point in the franchise\u2019s timeline, the only thing that\u2019s likely to kill Rambo is repetition. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, and the <\/span>Rambo <\/span><\/i>franchise has ignored the diminishing returns with every new film, to the point that watching <\/span>Last Blood<\/span><\/i> feels like being served leftovers from the earlier, better films in the series.<\/span>\n\nPerhaps the best thing to be said about <\/span>Last Blood <\/span><\/i>is that it is framed as Rambo\u2019s final outing. With a grand total of zero original ideas in its 104-minute runtime, it\u2019s become glaringly obvious that the well for this character has run dry. The highlights of this film are inferior photocopies of the scenes from its predecessors.\u00a0<\/span>\n\n

With a grand total of zero original ideas in its 104-minute runtime, it\u2019s become glaringly obvious that the well for this character has run dry.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\nWant to see Rambo in a tense cat-and-mouse game with a squad of <\/span>armed attackers<\/span><\/a>? The entirety of 1982\u2019s <\/span>First Blood<\/span><\/i> does that a hundred times better. Rambo vs Foreign-looking Bad Guys sounds fun, does it? Then just watch <\/span>Rambo III<\/span><\/i> and watch him dismantle the Soviet Army \u2013 the irony of watching a patriotic American film from 1988 glorify Afghanistan\u2019s mujahideen is an added benefit. Perhaps you just came for the gory, gruesome, up-close-and-personal kills Rambo is known to execute, but then 2008\u2019s <\/span>John Rambo <\/span><\/i>offers that in droves.<\/span>\n\nOut of all these tired, recycled tropes, the worst one is the treatment of the <\/span>women characters<\/span><\/a>. There is very little room for women to begin with in a hyper-masculine fantasy like the <\/span>Rambo <\/span><\/i>series, but <\/span>Last Blood <\/span><\/i>fails the Bechdel Test harder than Alia Bhatt failed the Rapidfire Round on <\/span>Koffee with Karan<\/span><\/i>. And much like in 1985\u2019s <\/span>Rambo: First Blood Part II<\/span><\/i>, this film also falls into the trap of using female suffering and trauma as mere window-dressing to the male lead\u2019s redemption arc.<\/span>\n\n

\"rambo_last_blood_review\"\n

\n

Perhaps you just came for the gory, gruesome, up-close-and-personal kills Rambo is known to execute, but then 2008\u2019s John Rambo offers that in droves.<\/p>\n

Lionsgate<\/p>\n<\/figcaption>\n<\/figure>\n\nEven when <\/span>Last Blood<\/span><\/i> isn\u2019t cannibalising its own franchise, it still feels derivative. Without giving too much away \u2013 the film can be seen as a pale imitation of two other movies. There\u2019s the first half, which plays out like <\/span>Taken<\/span><\/i>, minus the key ingredient that made <\/span>Taken <\/span><\/i>work: Liam Neeson. And there\u2019s the second half, which is like a <\/span>Black Mirror<\/span><\/i><\/a> take on <\/span>Home Alone<\/span><\/i>, where the mischievous eight-year-old has been replaced by a murderous 70-year-old.<\/span>\n\nIf that last sentence was absurd to read, please understand it\u2019s no less absurd than having to suspend your disbelief that 73-year-old Sylvester Stallone is a relentless killing machine for an hour and 40 minutes. In 2019, Rambo\u2019s tough guy aura is as convincing as Stallone\u2019s hair plugs. It\u2019s disappointing how the character has remained locked in stasis and fallen hopelessly out of touch with the times. After all, in the <\/span>Creed <\/span><\/i>franchise, Stallone has allowed his Rocky Balboa character to grow old gracefully. Meanwhile, Rambo continues to spout cheesy one-liners while committing multiple <\/span>homicides<\/span><\/a> and hang around way too many explosions for a senior citizen. Maybe it\u2019s time he considered retirement.<\/span>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Eleven years after Sylvester Stallone\u2019s last outing as the Elon Musk of innovative murder techniques, he\u2019s back as Rambo in a film that makes you feel as if you\u2019ve gone back in time while you\u2019re watching it. Watching Last Blood feels like being served leftovers from the earlier, better films in the series.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":43,"featured_media":5427,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[82],"tags":[7025,9249,9250,7033,1421],"class_list":["post-5424","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pop-culture","tag-creed","tag-rambo","tag-rambo-last-blood","tag-rocky-balboa","tag-sylvester-stallone"],"yoast_head":"\nRambo: Last Blood Review: Sylvester Stallone Has Passed His Expiration Date<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Eleven years after Sylvester Stallone\u2019s last outing as the Elon Musk of innovative murder techniques, he\u2019s back as Rambo in a film that makes you feel as if you\u2019ve gone back in time while you\u2019re watching it. Watching Last Blood feels like being served leftovers from the earlier, better films in the series.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=5424\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Rambo: Last Blood Review: Sylvester Stallone Has Passed His Expiration Date\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Eleven years after Sylvester Stallone\u2019s last outing as the Elon Musk of innovative murder techniques, he\u2019s back as Rambo in a film that makes you feel as if you\u2019ve gone back in time while you\u2019re watching it. 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