Creed III

Last weekend, Creed III, the newest installment in the Rocky/Creed franchise and the directorial debut of Michael B. Jordan, was released in theaters. Creed III follows Adonis Creed in the ending years of his career as the world heavyweight champion. When a person from Adonis's past comes back into his life, Adonis must return back to the ring one last time to settle this final score. I really like the entire Rocky franchise and was really interested in where they were going to take this next chapter of Creed's story.

To cut right to the point, this was a very good movie. I thought where Adonis is in this story is a very natural place for his character to be after the events of the last films and allows for circumstance to tell a very compelling story. While the last couple of films focus on Creed's career and his father's legacy, this film takes a deeper dive into his family life and his role as a husband and father. We get to see a lot of sweet interactions between Creed and his daughter and really get to see the growth in his marriage. I also thought the handling of Stallone's absence was done very well. The way the story is told, there is no Rocky-shaped hole in the story. Without Rocky, the movie can really become its own legacy without coasting on the fumes of Rocky. Just like in the new Ant-Man film, Jonathan Majors gives a standout performance. Dame is such a different character than Kang in Ant-Man and it is really cool to see Majors pull off both roles and show how good of an actor he really is. His character in this movie is someone the audience can understand his motivation and why he has his conflict with Adonis. But at the same time, you also get some moments where you feel bad for him and want him to succeed. Finally, all of the fights in the film were very exciting and really well done. They do a great job of getting you invested in what is going on and keep you on the edge of your seat.

However, there are a few moments that bring the film down slightly. The first thing is the whole daughter subplot with her issues at school. It is introduced at the beginning of the film and explored a bit but just kind of gets forgotten about and isn't really addressed at the end. It felt like they had this good idea with the daughter but didn't quite know how to fit it in with the rest of the story so it was just dropped. The other issue is the pacing and character focus were a bit off at times. The first hour or so was a bit slow while the last hour is super intense. It also seems like they kind of forgot about Dame's character in the middle of the movie with there being about 30 minutes where he just doesn't show up.

Overall, this is a very good and solid addition to the Rocky/Creed franchise. It was a lot of fun to watch and gave us a compelling next chapter in the Creed story. Aside from the smaller issues discussed, this is a solid directorial debut by Michael B. Jordan.

Score:8/10 Grade: B+ Recommendation: Must watch for sports movie or Rocky fans