Get ready to rumble with ‘Creed’ sequel
One week after “Green Book,” “Creed II,” another American fable of racial healing, arrives, and while not nearly as powerful (or novel) as “Creed” (2015), it’s a decent, if totally predictable, “Rocky”-based boxing picture about fathers and sons.
Robert “Rocky” Balboa, the character Sylvester Stallone created and played in the Academy Award-winning 1976 film, is back as the trainer and coach of surrogate son Adonis Johnson Creed (Michael B. Jordan, “Black Panther”).
Adonis “Donny” is the son of Rocky’s most memorable opponent, Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers). Creed died in the ring (in “Rocky IV”), fighting Soviet mutant Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren). In opening scenes, Adonis is crowned World Heavyweight Champion and proposes to beautiful, hearingimpaired musician girlfriend Bianca (Tessa Thompson). Adonis and Bianca leave Philadelphia and move to L.A., where Adonis’ mother (Phylicia Rashad) lives, leaving Rocky behind in his tiny house with a broken lamp that Stallone works wonders mumbling about.
You have to give it to Stallone, who was nominated for an Oscar for his “Rocky” screenplay and co-wrote “Creed II.” He created a character who captured the hearts and minds of the world, and he’s still playing him credibly at age 72.
Adonis, for his part, faces both Oedipal and paternal crises. Bianca is pregnant, and she and Adonis are not sure they are ready. Back in Ukraine, a defeated and aged Ivan Drago (Lundgren) has trained his 6-foot-4-inch, 245-lb. son Viktor Drago (charismatic Romanian boxer Florian “Big Nasty” Munteanu) to be devastating in the ring, where he is undefeated.
With the encouragement and help of American promoter Buddy Marcelle (Russell Hornsby), Drago issues a challenge to Creed and Rocky. Meet us in the ring for a Creed-Drago revenge match. Sorry, if we also kill the son. Rocky fears fighting a young man “with nothing to lose.” Adonis knows he must accept.
Stallone, meanwhile, is channeling both Rocky, who also visits Adrian’s grave and has a big reunion scene at the end, and his old salty trainer Mickey “Mighty Mick” Goldmill (Burgess Meredith). Leave it to Stallone to write himself the better part.
(“Creed II” contains brutal boxing violence, profanity and a sexually suggestive scene.)