Rambo to Start Hunting Horrors?

We live in strange times. Sylvester Stallone wants to do another Rambo sequel. No surprise there. Now he's talking about making it PG-13, which is nearly impossible to fathom, especially after the all-out bloodbath that was last year's Rambo. But even more perplexing is that it looks to be heading into the direction of sci-fi action horror with John Rambo tracking a genetically engineered monster run amok. We're a long way removed from First Blood now.

Coming Soon scored the following synopsis for what is currently being titled Rambo V: The Savage Hunt, a Rambo sequel that would see the Vietnam vet recruited back into service to use his tracking skills to assist a Black Ops squad in pursuit of a marauding man-animal created by military scientists conducting genetic experiments involving human savagery.

"John Rambo could track anyone - or anything - on earth. Now the military desperately needs him for a mission that his ultra-sensitive instincts tell him he should refuse. A beast is loose somewhere north of the Arctic Circle. It has already decimated a secret research facility and annihilated a squad of elite military guards. And the raging creature is headed south toward civilization, ready to wreak bloody devastation.

It's a job that Rambo and his 22-year-old hunting partner, Beau Brady, can't turn down, but they and a highly-skilled special forces kill team discover that the prey is a terror beyond their wildest imagination - a half-human abomination created by a renegade agency through a series of outlawed genetic experiments. It has man's cunning, a predator's savageness, and a prehistoric power that has transcended the ages. And even if Rambo and Beau survive its unrelenting hunger for human blood, they'll still have to confront the grim reality that it may have grown immortal."

I suppose after making the bad guy of your previous outing a drug-peddling, opium-addicted, mass-murdering rapist/pedophile leader of a third-world army of genocidal thugs, there really is no way to top yourself in the villainy department than to make your next opponent an actual inhuman monster.

Ain't It Cool News also ran with the story and received a voicemail from Stallone himself (which you can listen to by clicking here) elaborating a bit on the sequel's far out there premise.

Not so coincidentally, Stallone previously optioned a book entitled Hunter by James Byron Huggins, and from the sounds of things, Rambo V: The Savage Hunt is a re-working of that novel to fit into the Rambo-verse. Here is an excerpt from the Amazon.com book review that certainly makes it sound like the two are just about one and the same:

"The first time we meet Nathaniel Hunter, the world's greatest tracker, he and his giant black wolf, Ghost, arrive at the scene of a massive search for a lost boy. With primordial strength--an almost frightening animal strength brought to life with a single word--the enormous wolf turned, massive muscles bunching and hardening beneath the heavy black coat. The huge head, as broad as an anvil, went to the ground as it padded toward the treeline." No wonder Sylvester Stallone has bought James Byron Huggins's latest thriller for the movies! What a role--and the part of Hunter isn't bad, either...

"Hunter, a historic-looking mountain man who dresses in stylish leather garments designed by himself, finds the boy quickly and is ready to set off for Manchuria in search of a rare Siberian tiger when an even more dangerous target surfaces in the wilds of Alaska. An illicit medical experiment has gone wrong, and the attempt to combine the recovered DNA of one of our more violent and predatory predecessors with that of modern man has resulted in a creature whose amazing powers of brain and muscle are matched only by its survival instincts."

And, yes, that poster you see above is the real deal, albeit one hastily slapped together for the Toronto Film Festival.

Personally, I find myself a bit intrigued by the concept yet am having a hard time wrapping my head around the notion of Rambo in a Predator-esque scenario. Crossing genres with this iconic character may not work. Audiences might not be willing to accept the notion of Rambo, the force of freedom, battling a sci-fi monster. Be kind of like bringing back Ralph Macchio for a new Karate Kid sequel where a middle-aged Daniel-san is called in to use his “wax on, wax off” skills to thwart a kickboxing Yeti.

It should be noted that the producers behind this and the previous Rambo sequel are also the same people responsible for such notable Syfy Channel offerings as Mansquito, S.S. Doomtrooper, Skeleton Man, and the Shark Attack franchise. I suppose Rambo fighting monsters was inevitable.

- The Foywonder