10 Movie Franchises That Embarrassed Their Creators

2. Rambo

The first Rambo film, First Blood, was adapted from David Morrell's 1972 novel, and despite the conception that Sylvester Stallone broadened Morrell's tale of a Vietnam vet struggling to re-adjust to life back home, there's actually far less death in the movie - just one, actually - than the source material.

Sadly that can't really be said for most of the sequels, with First Blood Part II and Rambo III ramping the violence up to comical levels, while seemingly losing sight of the crucial humanist themes.

Morrell was allowed to review the scripts prior to release, however, and because he felt that they mischaracterised the protagonist, decided to write novelisations to make the character more consistent with his novel and the original film.

Morrel didn't opt to write a novel for 2008's fourth Rambo, however, as he felt that Stallone had returned to the essence of the character, and despite mixed reviews, the film was largely embraced by fans of the franchise.

But with the recent release of the critically-panned Rambo: Last Blood, Morrell couldn't resist but chime in, calling the film "a mess" and being "embarrassed to have [his] name associated with it."

Furthermore he added, "I felt degraded and dehumanized after I left the theater. Instead of being soulful, this new movie lacks one. I felt I was less a human being for having seen it, and today that's an unfortunate message...The sets here look cheap. The direction is awkward...Rambo could be called John Smith, and the film wouldn't change."

And he's not wrong. As far as takedowns go of movies that deviated from the author's original intent, that's about as damning as criticism gets. Fans haven't been much kinder to it, either.