S2E27: Rambo: First Blood Part 2

As someone who's listened to the aliens extended cut commentary I can totally believe that James Cameron wrote a version of this film. It's like a scratch a liberal confessional on that DVD track.

"Americans didn't create Rambo. I did." - Uncle Sam

As a kid I watched the Saturday morning cartoon for this movie where Rambo silently pulled his knife and went after dudes and also sounded weirdly like Rodney Dangerfield

Rambo killed the highest ranking baltic German noble in the red army.

(Starts episode) ...is...is this the Paul Walker song? You sons and daughters and nonbinary children of a bitch it is.

I joined this patreon singularly because I want to ensure you finish the Rambo series. These movies get so bad and yet so good.

Y’all are not ready for how bad Rambo 5 is going to be…

you hate America but love our Virginia-area Vietnamese restaurants

HUGE congrats to Abby for being cast in the new Star Wars Acolyte project!!

Minor point of fact- Kaczynski was the University 'n Airline Bomber, hence UNABOM.

The bit about "it was a lie, just like the whole war" really highlights the absurd right-wing American position of "I hate the government (and possibly federal agencies like the FBI) and think everything they do is bad, but I love and unconditionally support the military and cops, and everything they do is righteous." These are the same thing. The only way you can draw a distinction where you love one and hate the other is if you believe that wearing suits and working in an office and ostensibly following rules is weak and bad and that carrying a gun and doing violence to people directly is cool and good

Too much death here, but also not enough, because Rambo's deal with "do we get to win this time" is "damn, I wish I'd gotten to kill more people"

Everything is good and normal and fine and good and ESPECIALLY normal in the US, why do you ask

Apparently Trump signed a law that a lot of federal properties have to fly the POW/MIA flag all the time now, so I guess we're stuck with it forever because nobody in congress wants to be accused of insufficient troop respecting.

Okay I really hope you decide to watch Copland as I've learnt so much more about it post watch. There are two cop funerals, Stallone won an Oscar for it, and the re is a character only referred to as "Superboy". Plus some phenomenal actors are involved and it might redeem John Rambos acting somewhat after this dogshit film

Alice got the dates wrong on The Paranoid Style vis-à-vis the Paris Peace Accords and the POW-MIA conspiracy. Paranoid Style was written in 64 about Barry Goldwater, the POW-MIA conspiracy theory appeared in 72, and the Paris Peace Accords were in 73.

yeah anecdotally the POW/MIA flag is all over the place -- seen it flying outside basically every post office in my city, for instance -- i think it's been sort of laundered into a generalized Respecting Da Troops situation, i certainly thought that's what it always had been until someone told me about the prison camp myth. so every time i buy stamps i walk past a flagpole with this artifact of the usamerican dolchstosslegende on it, because we are a Normal Country. i would also like to state that the bo gritz incident should be a movie and specifically a coen brothers joint

I started singing "I'm afraid of Americans" to myself at the same time Abi did, hell yes

Growing up in America in the '80s, it didn't really occur to me until I was much older how much Vietnam shattered America's psyche, in the same way that a fish doesn't realize that it's wet.

After I heard you were doing the Rambo series, I had to finally pull the trigger on subscribing to the Patreon because it seemed like an unfathomable cruelty to listen to people subject themselves to this series and not pay money. Vile movie. Horrendous politics and future entries do not get better.

Growing up in Reagan era East Texas this was the greatest movie ever made according to chatter on the 5th grade schoolyard. There's also it's even dumber twin Braddock: Missing in Action 2. Can't wait for Rambo 3 next!

The hosts were too kind on misogyny. Just on its face, for a movie where the only woman with a speaking role talks like a caveman and gets fridged 4 is too kind. The lack of sexualization isn't an absence of misogyny from the movie, it's more reflective of the movie's fascism. Same thing that the shower scene in Starship Troopers was making fun of.

Hugely recommend going to Vietnam to all listeners- buying a coconut coffee from a chain called Cong Ca Phe that is themed after the Viet Cong (as the heroes they were) was a sudden and violent reframing of my shitty American understanding of that war.

This movie helped turning so many brains into mush.

I was really excited to see how you all would react to the 2nd one of these being such a radical, and radically shit, departure from the 1st.

The use of See You Again is doubly funny to me bc Paul Walker is also a terrible guy who people uncritically love. Also, The Fast And The Furious franchise would make an amazing KJB season. 2 street racing movies, a bisexual heist movie, a non-bisexual heist movie, and 6 spy movies with 2 more in the works. All of them chock full of themes and politics. That being said ya should at least do 2 Bi 2 Curious, that movie is actually great

I mean, we didn't need 20 years to do the same for Iraq, so y'all may be overstating the time needed for us to ignore the war-crimes we did. Edit: Also, 'The Paranoid Style' is a historically questionable piece. It flat-out misrepresents the Populists as wild-eyed racists instead of critically examining that claim and who made it.

RE: People trying to rescue POW/MIA- In the Hells Angels documentary "Hells Angels Forever" NYC chapter president Sandy Alexander says they sent a letter to the government offering the motorcycle club's services to go rescue all the MIA/POWs in Vietnam. The government never responded. HOWEVER! Someone made a movie about it, called (wait for it...) 'NAM ANGELS. It's as bonkers as it sounds.

I heard the Vietnamese POW myth as a kid in the 00s

UNADEVON

Terrestrial leeches are definitely a thing, and I've definitely heard a story from my dad about how his Vietnam vet friend got "sucked off" by one.

Listening to the opening like, is it Ted or Burlusconi

You guys need to do Copland as a bonus during the Rambo series. It's not great, but there are THEMES there to unpack

It's wild how Sydney Schanberg, the guy who was the basis of The Killing Fields, wound up being the most "credible" proponent of the Vietnam POW/MIA myth. Wonder if he ever bothered to talk to Rick Perlstein, before he died?

I think it deserves one more smarm point for the scene where he's supposed to say he's soy and gay but instead threatens cia guy. That is a very American version of smarm.

Morbidly excited to see where the tags escalate from here if we're getting "Unwatchable shit" in there this early.

I never thought I'd listen to a bit about Ted Kaczynski before someone started talking about a Rambo movie.

the first rambo is the only even slightly good one and the three of you have made a terrible mistake

cottagecore hero, old man teddy, he's writing confused fascist primitivist manifestos with da angels now

It's ok, as an American I hate Americans too.

All youse needed an American guest on to yell at during this one. Someone like Liam who could roll with the punches.

Death to America

Your statement hurts my feelings but i understand.

Theodore Kaczynski, RIP. Miss you, big man. Gone but not forgotten.