Pun Salad

I fell off the Rocky series by missing Rocky V 26 years ago (!) and Rocky Balboa 10 years ago. I am as cynical as the next guy about Hollywood filmmakers resurrecting beloved characters in slapdash efforts to vacuum money out of the suckers' pockets.

But I heard that Creed was pretty good. Sylvester Stallone was Oscar-nominated for his performance. And, yeah, it was pretty good.

The idea: Apollo Creed had an illegitimate son, Adonis. Fortunately called "Donnie" here, mostly. As the movie opens, Adonis is in some sort of juvie, and parentless. (We knew about Apollo, but his mom also passed away.) He's an angry young man, who likes to punch other kids.

Fortunately, Apollo's widow, Mary Anne (Phylicia Rashad, woo!), becomes aware of young Adonis and takes him away from his orphan life. He gets a good education, a good job in finance, and… well, he still has the urge to hit people, fighting in Mexican venues. That's his true calling.

Mom's not happy about that, but Adonis takes off to Philly, tracks down Rocky, and inveigles him into becoming his trainer. You can probably plot out the narrative arc from there, right?

Sylvester Stallone fits into the Rocky role like a glove. A boxing glove, sure, but still. The movie is heavy on sentiment and nostalgia for past movies, but you know what? It all worked for me.