Insert Annoying Title Here

First Blood Part II

Sly Stallone hits the big screen again today with the ridiculously named action thriller Bullet to the Head.  Despite this film’s uncreative and most likely appropriate name, it doesn’t even begin to approach the most maddening film title of all time: Rambo: First Blood Part II.

At least Bullet to the Head has a good excuse, being based on and named for the French graphic novel Du Plomb Dans La Tete which roughly translates to (you guessed it) Bullet to the Head, but is often referred to as Headshot.  1985’s First Blood Part II is a sequel to Stallone’s original Rambo flick First Blood.

Not only does the sequel have a dumbfoundingly confusing title (how can their be a second first?), Part II has nothing to do with the earlier film, except for the inclusion of John Rambo and his perpetually sneering superior Col. Trautman (played by Richard Crenna).  In fact, it doesn’t even take place on the same continent!

Rambo returns from the events of the earlier film (which took place in Washington) as he is sent back to Vietnam in order to rescue some POWs.  Stallone and James Cameron’s script isn’t completely horrible, but it has no relation whatsoever to First Blood, so how the hell can this gruesomely explosive body count of a film ever be called part II?

Sly slaps the most upsetting and unsettling film title of all time on his first of three sequels to First Blood.  And even though the original film is a pretty good action flick, the laughable sequel only begins with the headache of a title.

Though, Rambo: First Blood Part II is not even close to the worst film of all time (it’s not even the worst of the Rambos), it’s title will put it among the most irritating films in memory.  The very least the producers could have done is include an absurd subtitle, First Blood Part II: STILL BLEEDING has a ring to it.

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