So, I did something I hadn't done before. I sat down and I watched every Rocky movie one right after the other to follow the through storyline and see how each movie plays out. I'd seen the first three a few times but never all together. I'd never seen the fourth or fifth movies and it's been at least ten years since I've seen Rocky Balboa, but what's weird is that even as cheesy and terrible as some of the movies are - I really enjoyed the experience. The first Rocky still holds up and it's very clear why it's so highly regarded. I even thought Rocky II was a capable sequel that deserves nearly as much praise as the first one. Rocky III is where the series started to venture in to cheese territory, especially with the acting "chops" of Hulk Hogan and Mr. T, but the boxing sequences are still top notch. Rocky IV ventures into new territory where the film takes a turn of not focusing on Rocky as a three-dimensional character and focuses solely on flashbacks, boxing scenes, and several training montages to truly awful 80s music. But the dynamic of Rocky vs. Drago made the movie fun - even if it doesn't hold a candle to the previous three. Rocky V shouldn't exist - plain and simple, but that street fight at the end makes it at least a tad watchable and Rocky Balboa is fine. The movies tended to get worse as they went on, but then came a 9 year hiatus where Sly Stallone realized that people didn't come out for Rocky movies anymore (especially when he's pushing 70), so they went back to the drawing board and they brought us Creed. Creed was the surprise hit of 2015 and was so much better than it should've been, but with Ryan Coogler at the helm, he knew what made a great Rocky-universe movie. It's not the boxing (though that helps) it's the characters. Creed II does a lot of the good that the first movie did, but it also falls into a few of the traps that the Rocky sequels did as well.
Creed II picks up right where the last one left off. Adonis Creed (Michael B. Jordan) is now the Heavyweight champion of the world, having won every fight he's been in since the one he lost at the end of the last movie. But a figure from the past has returned and called him out to fight - Viktor Drago, the son of Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren), the man who killed Apollo Creed in the ring, wants to fight Adonis and reestablish the good Drago name. After Rocky took the fight to Russia and gave Ivan the what-for, Drago was ostracized by the entirety of Russia. He was sent away an outcast and lost everything, including his wife. His last hopes lie in his son, Ivan, to reclaim the great Drago name and put them both back on the map. Rocky encourages Adonis not to take the fight as he doesn't want to see what happened to Apollo happen to Adonis. Adonis, riding an ego high, takes the fight anyway and sees his entire world come crashing down. Together, he and Rocky must train, both mentally and physically, to rid themselves of their personal demons and take down Drago again, once and for all.
I really liked the angle Creed II takes in setting up the sequel. We already got to follow Adonis's character change from feeling like a "mistake" in the world and having to live up to the Creed name. So, what better choice to make than have Drago reappear? Who better to have fight Creed than the son of the man who killed his father? What better inner struggle to give Rocky than having to choose whether or not to train Creed to fight the son of the man who killed his best friend? I can't imagine what it must've felt like sitting in a theater and watching Drago kill a beloved movie character in Apollo, so for fans of the Rocky franchise this is like a Christmas morning type of plot. And it's organic. It's the natural progression of the story so that the same beats of Adonis's character aren't hit, but new ones can be established. Just as Creed has finally made a name for himself, one that separates his own legacy from his father's, Drago comes in. Most of the internal and external struggles of each character in this movie do stem from plotlines of the past and don't actually feel forced. The anger and fear that Adonis overcame in the previous movie comes rushing back from the duty he feels he must undertake by fighting Drago in order to (for lack of a better term) avenge his father. It was a great choice by the filmmakers and one that lends to a very good film.
The boxing sequences are out of this world. It's not as cool as the first Creed where Coogler gave us two rounds of a single take, but the intensity of each swing of each duck of each miss of each hit is upped in Creed II and though it doesn't feel like a REAL boxing match, even for someone who has seen every Rocky movie and has figured out the formula of how these fights go, I found myself gripping my armrest several times and exclaiming "oh!" out loud just as many. Jordan and Stallone also have the same great chemistry in this film as the last one, with Stallone taking an even smaller role than before. The rift between them hurts even more because you want to watch them as allies, not enemies. But the best part of the movie, strangely, is the Drago family dynamic. First, Lundgren KILLS It in this movie (no pun intended). His intense stoicism coupled with scarcely revealed vulnerability is amazing. Dolph has long been a joke in the movie world, but he's terrific in this. No, seriously. As an older Drago, he wants nothing but to restore his good name and the only way to do this is to train his son harder and tougher than he ever was for fear of losing everything again. He wears this toughness and fear equally and there's a strange vulnerability to the character we haven't seen before. And Viktor (Florian Munteanu) is almost... ALMOST a sympathetic villain. He maybe has five lines in the movie, but his entire character is in his eyes. He could be scowling and growling, but in his eyes you see a little kid in fear of letting his father down. He doesn't care about the Drago name or the Drago fame, he just doesn't want to let down his dad. The Rocky franchise has made a name in making every opponent Rocky or Adonis faces be these despicable, unnaturally evil characters so we WANT Rocky or Adonis to beat them to a pulp. Finally, we get a sympathetic opponent, and this brings a new layer of depth to the film, one that each movie previous hasn't explored. I absolutely loved the Drago dynamic and (don't quote me on this please) would theoretically love a movie with just them.
But for all the good Creed II has going for it, it also hits a lot of the same beats as the other Rocky sequels. You know exactly how the story is going to go. When the first fight between Creed and Drago happens only 45 minutes into the story, I knew Creed was going to get demolished, have to pick up the pieces of his life, insert training montage, and then fight again. There's also the inner conflict of each character. And while they are mostly organic to the story, they're not explored as deeply or as expertly as they were in the first Creed. There were pieces of exploration, but they were only surface pieces hidden behind excellent performances. The one that I didn't buy at all is the one involving Rocky and the fact that he hasn't spoken to his son in several years and now doesn't even know how to. This goes against everything the Rocky character is. He's the simple, nice guy. He gives love harder and faster than anyone. He feels a duty and he carries it out to the millionth degree. Rocky isn't the type of character to become estranged from his son, especially one that has a connection to his late wife, Adrian. I didn't buy it for a second, so I didn't care when it was explored.
Even though Creed II hits some of the sour notes of the inferior Rocky sequels, it still hits more notes from the first Creed. It's a great time at the movies with some of the best boxing scenes we've seen in theaters in a long time. I'm not sure where they'd go from here, but if this was the last Creed film, then they certainly ended on a high note. It's making a bunch of money, so I doubt this is the end. And I don't care if this is a spoiler or not - Rocky lives throughout the film. It's getting late enough into the series that I keep entering each one worried that they're finally going to kill off Rocky. As long as the movies can keep up the same quality as these first two, and the filmmakers have the good sense and wherewithal to not kill a movie icon... I can be on board for another Creed or two.
B-
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