2020 has been a year of endless curveballs – and among the more recent surprises came news that Sylvester Stallone is working on a Director’s Cut of Rocky IV that will excise one of its greatest ‘80s excesses: the robot butler Sico that becomes a companion to Burt Young’s Paulie over the course of the film. In his social media post announcing the new version of the film in August, Stallone wrote in the comments: ‘The robot is going to the junkyard forever. No more robot.’
Speaking to Empire in the November issue, on sale Thursday 1 October, the creator (and voice) of Paulie’s robot offered his thoughts on the android-free cut. “I was in my office when I found out,” says Robert Doornick, founder of International Robotics. “I was deluged with messages: ‘How can Stallone do that?’ But I know why he’s doing it, because I know he loves the robot. By causing turmoil among the fans of Sico, it generates more publicity. And by removing the robot from the movie, it saves money in royalty fees, because he is a member of the Screen Actors Guild. Sico receives cheques all the time – and of course he sends them over to me.”
Is it all a royalty cheque conspiracy? Will the no-robot cut ever make it out for public consumption? Does Rocky IV even work without the growing connection between drunken man and reprogrammed servant machine? Maybe Michael B. Jordan's Donny will fight it in the final bout of Creed 3 – only time will tell.
Read Empire’s full story on the Rocky IV robot scandal – including an excerpt from the never-produced script for Doornick and Young’s proposed spin-off sitcom about Paulie and Sico – in the November issue, on sale Thursday 1 October and available to pre-order now.