Every genre needs to evolve and adapt with the times to stay relevant, but that doesn’t mean action junkies can’t hold up the testosterone-fueled days of the 1980s as the best decade there’s ever going to be for cinematic shoot ’em ups, and almost all of them would rank Commando very near the top of the pile.
The battle between Arnold Schwarzenegger and Sylvester Stallone to establish dominance over the bullet-riddled medium was incredibly heated, to the point that the pair actively despised one another before eventually becoming the most wholesome of friends once their respective glory days were in the past.
Regardless of which one you prefer, it’s hard to deny that Commando endures as one of the most gloriously cheesy and delightfully excessive examples of cinematic carnage there’s ever been. Whether it’s mustache-twirling Bennett and his chainmail vest, the cacophony of one-liners, the fact the stunt doubles are regularly – and blatantly – nothing more than cardboard cutouts, or the over-the-top insanity of Arnold decimating an entire army on his own in the third act, it’s a masterclass in more is more.
Despite rapidly approaching its 40th anniversary and standing out as a product of its time like few others, Commando has rather remarkably managed to lock, load, and take aim at a new lease of life on streaming this weekend. Per FlixPatrol, the undisputed classic has rocketed up the ranks to become the fifth most-watched feature on Amazon’s worldwide watch-list, even if it’s so cheesy it could prove lethal to those with a lactose intolerance.