Rocky Balboa is up there with Superman as one of the greatest fictional characters of the 20th century, the original Rocky is generally considered one of the greatest American movies ever made. It spawned a franchise with an inspiring but uneven legacy. Watching Rocky IV, the character, though still written and portrayed by Sylvester Stallone, is unrecognizable compared to who he was in the first couple of films. Rocky V was an attempt to correct that, but was deeply flawed and very poorly received. To this day, when most people think of Rocky, they think of the utter ridiculous that was Rocky IV. Even if Rocky V was a much better film, I still do not believe it would have been embraced at the time of its release due to audience expectations of what a Rocky film should be. The franchise was all but dead (as the character would have been if Stallone went with his initial idea to have Rocky die at the end of the fifth film). Fortunately the failure of Rocky V paved the way for the sublime Rocky Balboa in 2006. No one, myself included, expected the film to be much of anything. Stallone wisely used that perception to his advantage, crafting the most fitting companion piece to the original film and giving the character a most deserved and well-earned send-off. But just as Rocky’s story comes full circle, the story of Adonis Creed begins.
Legacy Storytelling – A Review of Creed
in Film, Reviews, Randall Lotowycz
