How Sylvester Stallone Really Feels About Noah Centineo's Young Rambo Movie

The "Rambo" movie brand had clearly run its course with the cheap-looking, racially-insensitive "Rambo: Last Blood" in 2019. Many of the film's reviews correctly called out its stereotypical portrayal of Mexicans, which felt as broadly offensive as the treatment of people of color in Charles Bronson's "Death Wish" movies. Of course, the "Rambo" films aren't exactly known for their nuanced portrayal of non-white people. Aside from Ted Kotcheff's superb "First Blood," which launched the franchise, they've always been jingoistic celebrations of American might embodied in an absurdly muscular one-man army.

Now, the performer behind that beefcake is being forced to cede one of his signature roles to a younger actor for a prequel currently titled "John Rambo."

You're probably familiar with this new Rambo actor, Noah Centineo, if you watch the Netflix action series "The Recruit" or were a devotee to the streamer's "To All the Boys" rom-com property. He's hardly a newcomer at this point, unless, like me, you've never seen the roles that made him semi-famous. Evidently, Sylvester Stallone is in the same camp as I am, because, as he's admitted to Entertainment Tonight, he knows very little about Centineo.

You can't blame Stallone for not being terribly interested in "John Rambo." He had an idea for a "Rambo" prequel film, but Millennium Media, which controls the rights to the franchise, decided to move on from the 80-year-old movie star and tell the tale of how Rambo became Rambo. Did we really need to get this granular with Rambo? Stallone thinks so. He's just not sure "John Rambo" is going to do it his way.

While speaking to ET, Stallone acknowledged that Centineo has "quite a challenge" ahead of him. But he's hopeful that, if "John Rambo" follows the story he concocted years ago, it may prove to be a prequel of merit. Per Sly:

"I always thought of Rambo as very highly popular, he was the captain of the football team, he was getting straight A's [...] He was just that kind of guy, a valedictorian. And the war broke him down. It turned him into this havoc machine. He suffered from PTSD. So, I want to see that evolution of 'I can't wait to go to war. This is going to be fun. This will be over in three weeks.'"

A while back, Stallone floated the idea of an AI de-aging process that would've allowed him to play Rambo at the age of 18 (via Variety). This, obviously, sounds awful, though it is in keeping with Sly's vanity. (Remember that this is a guy who once got tricked into starring in "Stop! Or My Mom will Shoot" because Arnold Schwarzenegger knew how to play his rival's ego like a Stradivarius.) I'm slightly encouraged about "John Rambo" because it's being directed by "Sisu" filmmaker Jalmari Helander, but Rambo was the perfect type of character defined by action. I feel like we're done with him. And if you want to watch a movie about young men getting turned into killers, there's always Stanley Kubrick's "Full Metal Jacket."

More on "John Rambo" as it develops.