Of all the things I learned about the making of First Blood, the biggest surprise is that the sequel was only three years later. While both focus on the violence caused by the same central character, the two films could hardly be more different in tone. First Blood Part II came to define 80s action excess, but First Blood is clearly in line with 70s exploitation films. The key difference is the decision to change the book by David Morrell, where Rambo is the psychotic out-of-control villain and the Sheriff (Brian Dennehy) is the hero who must stop him and save the town.
In his draft that became the shooting script, Stallone made Rambo the underdog, a war hero now living as a social outcast battling an establishment filled with corrupt thugs and bullies. It’s still a tricky line to walk because the more we get of John Rambo the less we see him as a person shunned by society and instead see the troubled soul with psychotic tendencies, which is a negative image of Vietnam vets the filmmakers wanted to steer away from. This is why time with Rambo was constantly being edited out. As a result the film is remarkably short and Stallone hardly speaks until his outburst at the end.
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