“It’s a dull, degrading film, filled with post-it-note stereotypes.”
Fifth franchise installment Rambo: Last Blood hasn’t exactly proven to be a big hit with critics, currently sitting at just 28% on Rotten Tomatoes with a big green splat next to its name. Our own William Bibbiani is among the film’s detractors, writing in his 1.5 star review for B-D: “The violence is astounding but the film looks cheap and the script is derivative.”
William’s review continues, “But when you consider every hateful sentiment Last Blood cynically attempts to cash in on, this film goes from bad to much, much worse.”
As it turns out, another of Last Blood‘s detractors is David Morrell, the man who created the character of Rambo when he wrote the novel First Blood back in 1972. Taking to Twitter over the weekend, Morrell let it be known that he agrees with the critics who have been slamming Last Blood: “The film is a mess. Embarrassed to have my name associated with it.”
“I hated the film,” he later tweeted. “Waterworld is a masterpiece compared to this.”
Morrell expanded on his thoughts in a chat with Newsweek, digging a bit more into why he feels so strongly about Last Blood being a low point for the Rambo franchise.
“I felt degraded and dehumanized after I left the theater,” Morrell told the site. “Instead of being soulful, this new movie lacks one. I felt I was less a human being for having seen it, and today that’s an unfortunate message. The sets here look cheap. The direction is awkward.”
“From multiple perspectives, this film fails miserably,” he added.
For what it’s worth, Morrell also tweeted that 2008’s Rambo is “better than critics allowed,” noting that its action sequences went on too long but the film understood its title character.
