Why is this considered the weakest of the series? Was this movie not as memorable as First Blood Part II? Was Zaysen not a good villain compared to Podovsky from First Blood Part II? Or did 9/11 give people a change of heart about this movie?
shareProbably a mixture of all those things you mentioned. Most people think it's just not as good as the first two Rambo's. The characters and the script just weren't as good as First Blood & Part II, either. Finally, 9/11 and its link to Afghanistan just makes people really uncomfortable.
I think they should remove the "dedicated to the gallant people of afghanisatan" epilogue from any future TV screenings or home entertainment releases, if just to stop people from thinking this movie is actually praising the Taliban. I'm not sure how many people actually downgrade the movie based on that notion alone, but it seems to be a lot going by the internet.
He was my C.O. in Nam. CIA listed him as MIA but the V.A. ID'd his M.O. and put out an APB.
I thought they already removed that, though.
shareNo, it's still there. It's always been there, even after 9/11. It's strange because I heard that Stallone refused to do a documentary feature on Rambo III for the DVD release (this is post 9/11, so I can imagine that's the reason why). I guess he forgot to take it out, which would make sense considering how much Sly distances himself from this film.
He was my C.O. in Nam. CIA listed him as MIA but the V.A. ID'd his M.O. and put out an APB.
Yep, it's still there. I caught this on AMC just the other day.
shareI think the main culprit is that it wasn't as fun as Rambo: First Blood Part II. Although I'm not one of them a lot of people found the movie boring which is funny cause there is more action in III than there is in II. It just takes a while longer for any of it to happen.
I also think the desert setting made the film overall less appealing. Most people prefer Rambo in a jungle/forest setting.
I thought Rambo III was pretty fun to watch. I really enjoyed that the most compared to First Blood Part II, and it was my personal favorite until Rambo IV came along.
shareThe third movie.. err.. what's the point of the third movie? To make more money out of a franchise? These franchises always become so weird - the more movies they add, the more they skew everything, until they become a cheap parody of themselves. They should've left well-enough alone.
The third movie doesn't have anything the first two movies have - it doesn't feel like it has quite earned its right to exist. Why more Rambo? Why weren't two movies enough?
It all feels like a superficial, made-up conflict just to get Rambo involved with this whole boring desert warfare with horses and sand - lots and lots of sand and multiple helicopters. What was a surprising and almost shocking surprise in the previous movie, is now just an everyday thing you see all the time.
The first movie had intensity because of hundreds of people hunting one man - can he escape, etc.? The second movie had amazing action sequences, like that helicopter chase. The third movie.. anything this third movie has, the first two movies had in better quality. It's all already done, we don't need more. Third movie is something no one asked for, the story was already tied up and neat, but they had to make more money - and this motivation shows.
Nothing is interesting, and nothing is done interestingly. It's all just boring running around in a desert, accomplishing nothing - at least, that's how it feels compared to the more meaningful first movies, that seemed to really change history, or at least show us something exciting and interesting.
Jungle is always going to have more opportunities for variety and interesting shots than some desert mountains in a sunny weather. Big bunch of sand is always going to look the same.
The problem with these 'franchises' is that they didn't become big because some exec wanted a new Yacht; they become big because some visionary expressed his vision on the celluloid, and it resulted in a good movie that people wanted to see and got something out of watching it.
Then some guy with bags of money takes over, and orders sequels, and just waits for money to roll in. They do these calculated decisions, cold, heartless business-decisions, without any vision, insight or even understanding of the characters or what made the movies great. Then we end up with atrocious sequels or 'prequels' or movies like Rambo III.
Even the titling is completely messed up - they should at least keep the 'First Blood' with the titles. This is what happens, when a movie doesn't come from some genius's vision and insight, but some businessman's wallet and greed.
I also saw on the documentary on the DVD that just before the film was released, relationships between the USA and USSR started to improve and that made things uncomfortable too. But I love this movie it's tons of fun.
shareZayson was a weak villain, I liked Padovsky and Teasle better, the story was silly (especially Rambo becoming a Buddhist) and it just felt like a generic 80's action flick than a Rambo film. As an action film I like it, as a Rambo film I hate it, it should have been a Commando Sequel.
"I really wish Gia and Claire had became Tanner" - Honeybeefine
And what about Tint in Part IV? I saw he's even worse than Zaysen in terms of ruthlessness.
shareTint was an evil sadistic scumbag, zayson was over the top and cartoony. I liked tint better.
"I really wish Gia and Claire had became Tanner" - Honeybeefine
Complete Monsters. We sure love to hate them, don't we?
shareIf there's one thing I don't like about Tint, other than his villainy, it's that he lacks combat experience and doesn't fight Rambo unlike Podovsky and Zaysen. In the final battle, he's running for his life and hiding from the fight going on. Though I do like the look on his face when he gets gutted, he looks at Rambo as if to say, "Who... the *beep* are you?"
shareWas Teasle really a villain in the traditional sense? Teasle struck me as more of an antagonist (i.e. an obstacle or irritant for Rambo, but not somebody who deserves to be killed), who was more prejudiced than out and out evil or malevolent. If anything, Officer Galt was the more true or pure villain in First Blood.
https://villains.fandom.com/wiki/Art_Galt
I guess that I would compare Teasle to somebody like Lt. Gerard from The Fugitive, in which he would clearly be the main hero/good guy in another story.
I'll insist Teasle was a villain in First Blood. Which is a shame since he is sympathetic in the novel the movie is based on. I'll go on with the things that make him a villain in the movie.
1. His best friend Gault being a sadist. Anyone who is friends with someone like that is not a good person.
2. Him telling Rambo that he has to walk 30 miles away to get food which makes him an unsympathetic jerk in my eyes.
It is a shame cause in the novel when Rambo walks back into town the first time he goes to a diner where Teasle meets him and lets him get food. He then drives him back out of town again and warns him not to come back. Later in the book after he survives the ordeal in the woods (where unlike the movie Rambo kills all of Teasle's fellow officers and his stepfather who brought the dogs to track Rambo, he listens to Trautman and actually regrets his actions with Rambo and wishes he treated Rambo better. He does get angry at Rambo at the end but after getting shot by him, he somehow lets go of his hatred of Rambo and feels a fatherly love for Rambo. Also forgot to mention that in the woods when he learns Rambo is a Vietnam vet, he simply thinks to himself, "Why didn't he tell me that?"
Now, compare that to the movie where he refuses to listen to a word Trautman says, insists he had every right to mistreat Rambo, and in the end would rather be blown away by a machine gun than to admit to any wrong doing, and you're a bit mad how villainous he is. And they intentionally made him an unsympathetic jerk because it was popular to portray policemen in a negative way.
The third movie was disliked back in the 80's, because it felt like an unimaginative sequel and had nothing to do with nam. I’m a fan of the first two but haven’t seen this film in its entirety since 1989, I intend to watch it again sometime though.
shareI think it was because people were confused by the title.
They hadn't seen Rambo 2, so a lot of people thought they'd missed a film in the series and therefore didn't bother with this one.