Trivia / Cobra

• Actor-Shared Background: Ingrid is a model, and so was Brigitte Nielsen.
• Cut Song: The official soundtrack release includes a track called "Skyline" which is not heard anywhere in the movie. This is because scenes in which this track was used were cut out from the movie during re-editing. Originally there was a scene in which Cobretti is sitting in his home, looking at a sunset (there is a similar scene in the beginning of theatrical version in which he is cleaning up his gun and then looks at streets outside of his house) and soon, right after Nightslasher and his gang members killed the second victim and cops show up at the scene, Cobretti gets the call from his police chief or somebody else to go and meet with them and it is in this scene where the "Skyline" track is heard. "Skyline" was also originally used in some other scenes including the ending but from some reason it was removed and replaced with the song "Voice Of America's Sons" by John Cafferty.
• Defictionalization: Replicas of the Night Slasher's sinister weapon are still being produced to this day.
• Deleted Role:
  • Al Leong was initially cast as one of the lead villains. His role was eliminated following protests by an advocacy group that objected to the casting of an Asian villain. Much to his anger as he never got to work with Stallone because of the actions of said advocacy group.
  • Much of David Rasche's role was cut from the final version. In the behind-the-scenes documentary, an additional scene featuring him is shown being filmed.
• Executive Meddling: The original cut ran for about 120 minutes - but came back from the MPAA with the kiss of death X rating. Warner Bros. told Sylvester Stallone to edit it down to an R rating and, in order to compete with Top Gun, shorten it to 90 minutes or less to allow for more screenings per day, both in an attempt to attract a greater audience. The film's final theatrical length was 87 minutes.
• Follow the Leader: Cobretti clearly went to Harry Callahan's Boy Scout Camp as a child, and apparently loved the mentor so much that, once he grew up, he took Callahan's partner Reni Santoni, and even once again named him Gonzalez. He took Dirty Harry's villain Andrew Robinson as well, though the latter is now merely a well-meaning jerk and a compulsively By-the-Book Cop.
• Playing Against Type: Andrew Robinson may have been a dick, but he was a dick on the right side of the law.
• Stillborn Franchise: The Cannon Group at one point planned a sequel.
• Technology Marches On: Towards the film's climax, Cobretti uses a Jatimatic SMG outfitted with a cumbersome laser sight that's almost as big as the gun itself. At the time, this was a cutting-edge piece of technology. Over the years laser sights became smaller, shrinking to about the size of a small flashlight. It can be jarring for modern audiences to see this beastly accessory sitting atop the gun.
• Throw It In!: Cobretti slicing his pizza with scissors.
• Underage Casting: Ingrid is revealed through a police file to have been born in 1955, making her about thirty. Her actress, Brigitte Nielsen, was born in 1963 and was in her early twenties at the time.
• Wag the Director: George P. Cosmatos was pretty much a director in name-only. Sylvester Stallone was really the one who called the shots.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Much of this film was taken from Sylvester Stallone's version of Beverly Hills Cop. When he left that project, he brought his ideas into this film, and that film was turned into a comedy starring Eddie Murphy.
  • "The Touch" by Stan Bush (yes, that song) was originally planned for this movie.
  • Stallone's first draft had a lot of differences from later drafts and the film. These include the opening shootout taking place in a movie theater instead of a grocery store and a lot more people getting killed, Cobra mentioning how some psychopath he was trying to catch killed his girlfriend, an additional big action sequence taking place during a night on a boat where Cobra and Ingrid are hiding when they get attacked by Nightslasher's cult members but Cobra and Gonzalez manage to kill them all, and a different ending in which it's revealed that Monte was actual leader of the New Order cult and when he tries to kill Ingrid he gets shot and killed by Cobra.
  • The movie was originally supposed to run for 120 minutes, but that edit came back with a X rating, making it commercially unviable. Both Stallone and the studio agreed to cut it down to 87 minutes to bring it down to an R rating instead, in an attempt to make it easier to compete with the then recently released Top Gun. Stuff lost during the cut include much of the story and characterization of the related to the characters that wasn't Cobretti himself.

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