Creed III

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So just to give a really quick recap, the 'Creed' films are the next phase of the 'Rocky' saga, and have done the passing of the torch concept almost perfectly. 'Creed' is the passing of the torch itself, with a similar underdog story to 'Rocky', featuring Adonis Creed (Michael B. Jordan) and Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) as his trainer. 'Creed II' sees our new, established champ fight in a grudge match against his father, Apollo Creed's (Carl Weathers) killer, 'Rocky IV's Ivan Drogo's (Dolph Lundgren) son, Viktor (Florian Munteanu).

'Creed III' manages to polish up Adonis' backstory a little bit more, as it opens in 2002, where a young Adonis (Thaddeus J. Mixson) sneaks out at night with his friend, Damian Anderson (Spence Moore II). Together, they head to an underground boxing event where Damian competes - boxing name "Diamond Dame". Here, we learn of Dame's aspirations to go professional and, seemingly out of nowhere, Adonis attacks a random guy named Leon, based on some kind of evident bad memory. This ends up being the background story that goes on throughout the film, and it pieces itself together bit by bit as the film unfolds.

​Fast-forward to 2020 where we see Adonis win a rematch against "Pretty" Ricky Conlan (from 'Creed'), and shortly thereafter, retires from the sport. His main focus now is his family; wife, Bianca (Tessa Thompson) and hearing-impaired daughter, Amara, who has led the hosuehold to learn ASL. Fast-forward again to present day, and Adonis runs a gym, along with Tony "Little Duke" Evers Jr. (or is it "Little Duke" Burton? IMDb and Wiki give me two different names. Anyway, he's played by Wood Harris). In his spare time, Adonis promotes world champion Felix "El Guerrero" Chavez (Jose Benavidez) in a match against Viktor Drago (spoiler alert, they're buddies now).

Eventually, Damian (Jonathan "In Major Trouble" Majors) comes back into Donnie's (that's Adonis, not me) life after getting out of jail, and he taps Donnie to help him try to complete his ultimate dream of becoming a heavyweight champion. Donnie agrees to give him an underdog shot against Felix, but along the journey lays the fine line of friendship and selfishness, and, well, lets' just say the remainder of the movie is quite predictable. BUT, predictability aside, it IS kind of easy to say that perhaps most sports movies are. What's important about the movie is the execution of the story, and that's where the developing backstory comes into play quite nicely.

One thing I have to admit to is that I did not go back to watch the previous two as a refresher before going into this. So there were a few moments and characters here and there that I had forgotten about, and had to come back to research just who they were to jog my memory. That said, I think if one knows the bare basics of the last two plots, one can still get plenty from this stand-alone story. I did appreciate how well it blended these films' passion for boxing with a more dramatic side of Donnie's past that didn't have to do with his father, Apollo. Although I will also say that much like the 'Rocky' films, they might work best in some kind of epic marathon.

One big takeaway from this is the progress of Michael B. Jordan's career, as this is the man's directorial debut - and he did a fantastic job! It's great to see how far he's come since the first time I saw him in 2012's 'Chronicle', and it's safe to say that he definitely has an eye for direction. This is one of those all-emotion movies that'll make you laugh, cry, cheer, etc., and its themes of friendship and loyalty are pretty spot-on, if, as I mentioned, a touch predictable. But once again, the execution was great. In fact, as it stands, the 'Creed' trilogy is one of the most solid that I've ever seen, and I'm definitely going to be doing some kind of re-review of this, along with the other 'Creed' and probably 'Rocky' movies in the future.

​But now for some exposure... I almost shamefully admit that I didn't actually get into the 'Rocky' films, but have always had a soft spot for the original. Thus, the boxing series that became the one for me ended up being the 'Creed' series. However, a lot of this made me want to go back to actually watch and enjoy all of the 'Rocky' movies. I can definitely imagine that the story will be the same for a lot of noobs like yours truly, and in my own way, I hope it is. The 'Rocky' films may not have been something I quite got into, but I do view them as a classic series in their own right, and they do deserve the time of day. After all, the 'Creed' trilogy is already an instant classic as it is.

​4/5

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