Movies Sylvester Stallone Marathon: The Expendables

No 3 was the perfect way to end the franchise. Rocky proves he is the best by beating Clubber, while becoming friends with his rival Apollo.
III was the perfect end to the trilogy, yes, but IV was the perfect epilogue or encore to that trilogy. It was essentially one giant climax from beginning to end. It didn't have a lot of depth but it was maximum level fun and awesomeness pretty much throughout.

Look at it like this: I-III is the meat and potatoes. IV is the dessert.

4 was basically made because Sly became friends with Dolph. There was no point to the movie.
IV was written before Sly ever met Dolph. Once Dolph came in Sly was in such awe of him that he tweaked the script to make Drago less of an animalistic barbarian and more of a machine/man of the future. But the whole thing was already ready to go prior to Dolph.

As for the point, yeah, narratively it didn't need to exist. The story was already perfectly wrapped up in I-III. But like I said, it was a great post-trilogy epilogue and final bow for Rocky and the franchise. Just pure ecstasy.

A Russian hype job with no professional bouts gets to fight the 2 best boxers back to back in meaningless exhibition and unsanctioned bouts for no money lol

It fed into the whole Cold War aspect and mystery of the Soviets, and Drago had a ton of hype behind him from his amature days, including winning the olympic gold medal. The media was all over it, but what really set things into motion was Apollo and his desire to stomp out the Red threat before it really got going. It was an exhibition for a number of reasons, and it wasn't supposed to be a serious contest.

As for the money, it wasn't about money. And it was unsanctioned because the American boxing commission wouldn't sanction it. But it wasn't about that. It goes back to the whole warrior speech.
 
Movie 15: Rocky IV

rocky4-robot3.jpg


Synopsis: Rocky Balboa proudly holds the world heavyweight boxing championship, but a new challenger has stepped forward: Drago, a six-foot-four, 261-pound fighter who has the backing of the Soviet Union.

My Rating: 7/10

I think this is easily the most overrated Stallone movie of all time. It's good but not as good or great as most make it out to be. If anything this made me appreciate the director's cut of Rocky v Drago a lot more. The robot is stupid and it was good to cut her out. The seducing music when the robot comes on screen lol it's terrible.

I also think the entire fight with Drago is dumb and wouldn't ever happen. A scary Russian with 0 professional bouts gets to fight the 2 best boxers back to back, killing one, which was retarded. Apollo deserved better. He makes a comeback for an exhibition bout which means they should have been wearing protective gear. Either way it doesn't make sense at all for Apollo to fight him.

Rocky then decides to fight him for free which is laughable.

I do like the new theme song 'Burning heart' a lot. The training montages are still fun to watch. But I think all future viewings will be the directors cut version Rocky v Drago instead of Rocky IV. But this isn't a Stallone movie im dying to ever see again. Rocky 3 was the perfect ending to the franchise. Rocky 4 was just pointless and unnecessary. I also don't like in the beginning of every Rocky sequel they have to replay the ending of the previous film. The only time I liked when they did this was for Rocky 3.

Rocky 4 also did the bad sequel move of using footage from the previous films as flash backs which I can't stand.

I will say the actual fight Rocky v Drago is a really good fight. It's the best part of the movie.

Well, Lomachenko got a chance to fight for the world title in his second pro fight.
 
Yeah man, but we lost him a week before Christmas, he took a bad turn over night and we had to let him go. Heartbroken, and one extra kick in the teeth to end the year

Oh shit man, sorry to hear that brother.
I hope this year is out of your mind soon sir.
I wish I could do more to help you.
Maybe you can vent in some PMs with me if you feel like it.?
 
The opening scene always gets me. He's excited and happy to find Barry's home. They way he's fumbling through his pockets out of joy, is a glimpse into his humanity. Then, he discovers Barry's passing. You never see that side of him again.
IIRC, there’s a deleted scene where he and Delmar Barry fuck
 
III was the perfect end to the trilogy, yes, but IV was the perfect epilogue or encore to that trilogy. It was essentially one giant climax from beginning to end. It didn't have a lot of depth but it was maximum level fun and awesomeness pretty much throughout.

Look at it like this: I-III is the meat and potatoes. IV is the dessert.


IV was written before Sly ever met Dolph. Once Dolph came in Sly was in such awe of him that he tweaked the script to make Drago less of an animalistic barbarian and more of a machine/man of the future. But the whole thing was already ready to go prior to Dolph.

As for the point, yeah, narratively it didn't need to exist. The story was already perfectly wrapped up in I-III. But like I said, it was a great post-trilogy epilogue and final bow for Rocky and the franchise. Just pure ecstasy.



It fed into the whole Cold War aspect and mystery of the Soviets, and Drago had a ton of hype behind him from his amature days, including winning the olympic gold medal. The media was all over it, but what really set things into motion was Apollo and his desire to stomp out the Red threat before it really got going. It was an exhibition for a number of reasons, and it wasn't supposed to be a serious contest.

As for the money, it wasn't about money. And it was unsanctioned because the American boxing commission wouldn't sanction it. But it wasn't about that. It goes back to the whole warrior speech.

My Sly and Dolph friend comment was more so a joke/trying to make some sense as to why he made this movie lol

It's not a bad movie, it's just not as great as I once thought it to be. If Rocky 4 is the dessert, then I'm full and not hungry anymore after Rocky 3.

I might watch the directors cut of Rocky v Drago in the near future but I don't see much of an improvement of the movie minus taking out the robot.
 
Movie 16: The Expendables

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Synopsis: A CIA operative hires a team of mercenaries to eliminate a Latin dictator and a renegade CIA agent.

My rating: 6/10

Man I really wanted to like this a lot more but I feel like a 6 is still slightly overrating it. The film is corny, the dialogue is terrible, it's cheesy and not in a fun way, the story is ok I guess but this entire film is let's see how many big name action stars we can get in 1 movie.

Even the names in the movie is awful: Lee Christmas, Yin Yang, Toll Road, Paine, Hale Caesar. They're all awful lol

I did like the scene where Sly, Arnold and Bruce were all on screen together. It was quick but very memorable to see 3 of the biggest action names of all time finally together albeit very short.

This was not a good rewatch at all for me. I recall seeing this once in theaters and maybe another time after that, but this time it just felt very try hard and not good.

Stone cold is probably the best thing about the movie. Statham was pretty good too. Everyone else is mediocre or terrible. I'm not sure I want to even watch the 2nd one now although I vaguely remember it being a little bit better than this one.
 
Oof, "The Expendables". One of the most disappointing movies ever. Really thought that Sly would bring the old school 80's ultra violence after Rambo 4, but it was just this forgettable and soulless PG-13 modern day shitty action movie.
 
Movie 15: Rocky IV

rocky4-robot3.jpg


Synopsis: Rocky Balboa proudly holds the world heavyweight boxing championship, but a new challenger has stepped forward: Drago, a six-foot-four, 261-pound fighter who has the backing of the Soviet Union.

My Rating: 7/10

I think this is easily the most overrated Stallone movie of all time. It's good but not as good or great as most make it out to be. If anything this made me appreciate the director's cut of Rocky v Drago a lot more. The robot is stupid and it was good to cut her out. The seducing music when the robot comes on screen lol it's terrible.

I also think the entire fight with Drago is dumb and wouldn't ever happen. A scary Russian with 0 professional bouts gets to fight the 2 best boxers back to back, killing one, which was retarded. Apollo deserved better. He makes a comeback for an exhibition bout which means they should have been wearing protective gear. Either way it doesn't make sense at all for Apollo to fight him.

Rocky then decides to fight him for free which is laughable.

I do like the new theme song 'Burning heart' a lot. The training montages are still fun to watch. But I think all future viewings will be the directors cut version Rocky v Drago instead of Rocky IV. But this isn't a Stallone movie im dying to ever see again. Rocky 3 was the perfect ending to the franchise. Rocky 4 was just pointless and unnecessary. I also don't like in the beginning of every Rocky sequel they have to replay the ending of the previous film. The only time I liked when they did this was for Rocky 3.

Rocky 4 also did the bad sequel move of using footage from the previous films as flash backs which I can't stand.

I will say the actual fight Rocky v Drago is a really good fight. It's the best part of the movie.

Gotta disagree. I have it around an 8 or 8.5 and rewatched it recently. It's not as good as 1 or 3 but the pacing might be the best in the series and the revenge aspect adds another layer to the movie. It's just pure 80s fun.

Plenty of exhibition bouts dont have headgear. Actually most of them dont. Also Drago not having any pro bouts doesn't mean much. He was a Soviet amateur champion.

It is actually a mirror of real life with plenty of amateur champions coming in and beating pros with a lot more professional fights. Lomachenko won a title in his 3rd fight. Rigondeaux won it in his 3rd fight as well.

Also Rocky and Apollo were both way past prime at this point.


It's a little over the top but I always leave the film satisfied and motivated to work out.
 
Gotta disagree. I have it around an 8 or 8.5 and rewatched it recently. It's not as good as 1 or 3 but the pacing might be the best in the series and the revenge aspect adds another layer to the movie. It's just pure 80s fun.

Plenty of exhibition bouts dont have headgear. Actually most of them dont. Also Drago not having any pro bouts doesn't mean much. He was a Soviet amateur champion.

It is actually a mirror of real life with plenty of amateur champions coming in and beating pros with a lot more professional fights. Lomachenko won a title in his 3rd fight. Rigondeaux won it in his 3rd fight as well.

It's a little over the top but I always leave the film satisfied and motivated to work out.

The headgear isn't a big deal, but the movie itself is. It was pointless. 1-3 actually make sense for the story, it's rocky 4 where things get out of hand.

All of a sudden now Apollo wants to returns and who does he want to fight? A no name Russia with 0 professional bouts? 0.1% chance

Killing off Apollo was a bold but wrong move. Rocky defeats the Soviet union (yawn)
 
The headgear isn't a big deal, but the movie itself is. It was pointless. 1-3 actually make sense for the story, it's rocky 4 where things get out of hand.

All of a sudden now Apollo wants to returns and who does he want to fight? A no name Russia with 0 professional bouts? 0.1% chance

Killing off Apollo was a bold but wrong move. Rocky defeats the Soviet union (yawn)

Apollo wanted to fight Drago because he couldn't let go of fighting and saw how they were hyping him up. Him and Rocky have a conversation about this before the fight when he tries to talk him out of it "we cant do those things anymore".

I think Apollo just never got over ending his career on a loss. Its established in 3 pretty much, "when you beat me, I hurt all over".

So he saw Drago as an easy way to go out with some kind of win and his ego blinded him to the dangers of fighting drago and he underestimated him.

In fact you can make the same point in Rocky 1. Creed was the champ and cleaned out his division. Rocky was a club fighter with like a 60 and 40 record with nothing to indicate he should've gave Creed any trouble.
 
Apollo wanted to fight Drago because he couldn't let go of fighting and saw how they were hyping him up. Him and Rocky have a conversation about this before the fight when he tries to talk him out of it "we cant do those things anymore".

I think Apollo just never got over ending his career on a loss. Its established in 3 pretty much, "when you beat me, I hurt all over".

So he saw Drago as an easy way to go out with some kind of win and his ego blinded him to the dangers of fighting drago and he underestimated him.

In fact you can make the same point in Rocky 1. Creed was the champ and cleaned out his division. Rocky was a club fighter with like a 60 and 40 record with nothing to indicate he should've gave Creed any trouble.

Try and justify it all you want it was pointless and the movie wasn't needed. Comparing Rocky and Drago isnt the best comparison either. Rocky was hand picked to save a fight/card, Drago was picked because Stallone couldn't write a better storyline.

Also Rocky was on his way out in Rocky 3, his 1st fight with Clubber was suppose to be his retirement fight, so the rematch was suppose to be his last.

If anything Apollo would have came out of retirement to fight Clubber who challenged him in the ring, not some unknown Russian Jake Paul.
 
Try and justify it all you want it was pointless and the movie wasn't needed. Comparing Rocky and Drago isnt the best comparison either. Rocky was hand picked to save a fight/card, Drago was picked because Stallone couldn't write a better storyline.

Also Rocky was on his way out in Rocky 3, his 1st fight with Clubber was suppose to be his retirement fight, so the rematch was suppose to be his last.

If anything Apollo would have came out of retirement to fight Clubber who challenged him in the ring, not some unknown Russian Jake Paul.

Rocky was handpicked because he had a cool name.

But you're missing the point. You say Drago shouldn't have been able to give creed or rocky a good fight because he had 0 pro fights.

By the same logic Rocky shouldn't have been able to give creed a challenging fight at all. His opening fight is spider Rico and then we have to believe that because he did a few more pushups he can now take creed to the limit.
 
Rocky was handpicked because he had a cool name.

But you're missing the point. You say Drago shouldn't have been able to give creed or rocky a good fight because he had 0 pro fights.

By the same logic Rocky shouldn't have been able to give creed a challenging fight at all. His opening fight is spider Rico and then we have to believe that because he did a few more pushups he can now take creed to the limit.

He shouldn't have gotten the fight because he had 0 professional bouts, whether it would have been a good or bad fight is pointless because he didn't deserve the fight in the first place. That makes perfect sense to me.
 
He shouldn't have gotten the fight because he had 0 professional bouts, whether it would have been a good or bad fight is pointless because he didn't deserve the fight in the first place. That makes perfect sense to me.

But again I explained that already. 0 pro fights have nothing to do with it. He was an amateur champion and Creed didnt take him seriously anyway and Creed called him out not the other way around.
 
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