Creed II

The uber villain from the Rocky franchises returns. Whoever watched the original Rocky movies will not forget Ivan Drago - also known as Dolph Lundgren in real life with an amazing performance that is literally as 1 dimensional as possible and still or rather because of that is in one of the best Rocky movies made. So it makes sense for him to return here and to reprise his iconic role, training his son to take on Creed.

Dumbing down again (evil as evil can be), he brings gravitas to the movie. Which does not quite reach the heights of the first Creed, but still is quite enjoyable. Especially with all the history contained in the movie. This should be a worthy closure to the Rocky saga - but you never know, do you?

I paid half price to see this, and felt I paid for what I saw. For instance, it's predictable. There was quite a few scenes that did nothing for progressing the movie. I wondered why they moved Adrian's grave to a new location. I wondered why they didn't make Drago's ex wife (Bridgette) walk over to Apollo's wife and say good luck like she did before, only this time she could have told her to fk off? I wondered why Rocky was telling D to not fight Drago when Rocky didn't exactly the same thing to avenge Apollo's death? The movie was dry and soulless. The music could have been inspiring in moments to move you along. Father Drago could have been a lot more human and aggressive than just plain angry and silent. They rushed this movie.

This movie is not as good as the first Creed. It felt like a remake of Rocky 3 and was just too formulaic. However what made the movie for me was the final scenes where my appreciation of the movie changed by simply seeing the final round from the perspective of the Dragos and the aftermath of the fight with the Drago's.

Adonis is done for, his story arc is ove and I don't want there to be more for him. He is happy and complete. Rocky's story is now done too. But Ivan and Viktor Drago were the only interesting people in this movie. And I simply want to see what happens to them both now after this ending.

I want to see them pick up the pieces and be successful. They've earned it after the ending which was unheard of in a movie of this type.

Please Sly and Dolph make it happen.

Creed II delivers the punch but doesn't quite land the knockout. While the familiar formula still works as inspiring as ever, it is mainly good ol' Rock that steals the protagonist's spotlight. Without Sly's solid rock performance this movie would have been just another fight movie. And although the Creed saga reaches new hights in storytelling, we must admit that Adonis just isn't as charismatic as Rocky or as his dad, Apollo. This time he can't even step out of his opponent's shadow, who has a far more compelling story to tell than the one Adonis brings. So, this might not be the fight of the century but there is certainly some rumbling in the jungle. Hopefully we haven't seen the last of Rocky Balboa, cause he still knows how to bring magic to the big screen.

Creed 2 (my personal 3 key points):

*A boxing movie with 10 minutes of boxing+training and 2 hours of talking and deciding things.

*Nearly a copy paste of Rocky 4 and if you thought that that fight was unrealistic, wait for this one.

*When Rocky was fighting in his movies even against a Russian I wholeheartedly wanted him to win because he came from nothing, struggled and had spirit. Adonis acts like boxing is his hobby, I just cant feel for him.

I cant say more without spoiling... But very weak overall