When I, the Rooster, first got wind that a storm from Mount Olympus was brewing, I shuddered with trepidation. One of the mightiest among the pantheon of 80s movie stars decided the time was right to descend upon mortal men in a thunderous clamor to once again remind us what we've been missing since the decade that brought Die Hard
, Commando, and Rambo: First Blood Part II—an action flick with real action stars. My concern was due to the fact that it was Sylvester Stallone who was leading the charge. Nothing against Sly. Quite the contrary. During his heyday, he was among many action heroes I admired. What I feared the most was what my reaction would be to his latest film The Expendables.
. And even though the violence and gore is the most brutal that this series has ever seen, it is evident Stallone is commenting on both the political and artistic baggage which has often weighed down the character.
. Rambo is still living in Thailand, though he is no longer living in a monastery nor stick-fighting to support himself. He has now retreated further into Thailand's jungles where he runs a small crew that sells snakes to a local snake-fighting showman. Thought he couldn't verbalize the demons haunting him before? He is even less prone to talk now. Which is why when a group of missionaries call on him to ferry them up to Burma, rife with the destruction of a genocidal civil war, he wastes little time in his monosyllabic refusal to take them up there. But when one of the missionaries, Sarah, connects to him on an emotional level, he gives in. He journeys up the river, evoking images of 
, for this is Rambo's heart of darkness we are voyaging into. Ten days after he has dropped his passengers off, Sarah, and her fellow missionaries have disappeared, possibly being held captive by the Burmese army. Guess who must rescue them?