Creed 3 Review: Michael B. Jordan’s Rocky sequel is a knockout

Creed III faces the unique challenge of getting the Rocky series out of Sylvester Stallone’s shadow. The ninth installment of the franchise that started in 1976 Rocky is the first not to feature Stallone either on screen or in a creative capacity. This time, direction has been turned to Michael B. Jordan, who plays Rocky’s protégé Adonis in the Creed films. In his directorial debut Jordan, a self-confessed anime and manga fanbrings a cinematic flavor to the spinoff/Threequel the series has never seen before and remarkably expands on the imagery of the Hollywood boxing movie.

Jordan’s approach at times contradicts the previously grounded nature of the saga, however Creed III has enough visual flair to plaster its occasional narrative inelegance. But its strongest point is its creators’ desire to weave a character-centric story that, by the way, doesn’t repeat the beats of the Rocky movies Believe And Creed II Follow the broad structure of Rocky And Rocky IV. At the same time, the new film doesn’t mimic the emotional arcs of previous Creed parts. Written by Keenan Coogler and Zach Baylin (from a story they co-wrote with Ryan Coogler, Keenan’s brother and director of Believe and the Black Panther films), it continues the trilogy’s ongoing theme of people grappling with the past, but it’s the first Creed film where the emotional weight doesn’t stem from the original Rocky films.

Believe deals with Adonis dealing with the legacy of his father, the boxer Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers), and Creed II sees him confronting Viktor Drago (Florian Munteanu), the son of Rocky IV Villain Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren). Creed III draws on the story of Adonis as a child rescued by a family with funds from foster care and juvenile detention centers. (Apollo dies in Rocky IV; Phylicia Rashad plays his widow, Mary-Anne, in all three Creed films.) The story confronts Adonis with his privilege as a black man whose family name brought him both instant fame and instant escape from violence and poverty. This specter takes the form of Adonis’ old, forgotten friend Damian “Dame” Anderson (current Marvel Cinematic Universe star Jonathan Majors), who was released from prison after nearly 20 years. When he enlists Adonis’ help to break into the boxing world, the former champion reluctantly agrees.

After a prologue that hints at Adonis’ tense history with Damian, the film revisits familiar faces from earlier in the series to tie up loose ends. Three years after Adonis’ retirement, he and former trainer Tony “Little Duke” Evers (Wood Harris) are now shaping the next generation of boxing greats at their gym, drawing on their fathers’ long history together. Adonis lives in a huge mansion where his wife Bianca (Tessa Thompson) produces music in her private studio and similarly nurtures aspiring people rather than performing on stage herself, although her career choices were not entirely in her control. (Bianca’s hearing loss, noted in Believe and the sequel has deteriorated.)

Their little daughter Amara (Mila Davis-Kent) is a happy firecracker. (Davis-Kent is deaf, as is her character — a significant portion of the film’s dialogue is in American Sign Language.) They all share happy existences on the surface, but historically Adonis wasn’t the type to open up with could his feelings and Creed III takes full and brutal advantage of this limitation.

The cracks in his family life widen as Damian enters the picture, bringing long-buried memories of the violence they faced as children and a guilt seething just beneath the surface of their polite interactions. At least Adonis made it, while Damian ended up behind bars for something that might have been Adonis’ fault. Both men refuse to confront these grudges directly or honestly – Adonis doesn’t have the emotional means while Damian uses friendship to hide ulterior motives. Their meetings teem with gripping emotional tension as the possibility of sudden conflict pervades every conversation.

We’re barely two months into 2023 and it’s already the year of the majors, between his imposing majesty as a villain Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumaniahis deep insecurities as the obsessive bodybuilder in the Sundance film Magazine Dreamsand its explosive twist Creed III. As the new Adonis antagonist, his quiet intrigue – leading to an inevitable top 10 anime betrayal – bears the operatic hallmarks of a mustache-twirling villain, and his frequent outbursts in the ring as he trains with Adonis’ charges are of seething rage. And yet, through the way he behaves, with his “don’t fuck with me” physique and shoulders hunched over decades of isolation, he creates one of the most compelling and nuanced characters in the Rocky series. His eyes are tired, but his gaze is unwavering and rarely strays from his path up the ladder of the boxing world, where he sees Adonis at the top.

Meanwhile, Jordan focuses his lens on Adonis’ emotional vulnerabilities, which the character is desperate to hide. Whenever Adonis is forced to open up, he retreats further into emotional isolation. For most of the film’s 116-minute runtime, this is the ring he fights in. Unable to use physical fights as an outlet, he builds anger that eventually boils over in unhealthy ways — most often in Bianca’s direction, though she manages to hold onto her own.

But what is particularly moving and challenging? Creed III is the way his simmering anger colors even his seemingly gentlest and most caring moments as Amara’s father. The Creed series began by asking what Adonis inherited from his father — and what those films inherited from the Rocky franchise. But three films later, the focus has shifted to what Adonis himself will pass on and what the Creed films stand for outside of Rocky’s shadow. The story deals with violence as a language that stifles honest expression and reconciliation, and as a character trait Adonis must watch out for when training his daughter in self-defense.

Jordan’s performance isn’t just talking about majors. Both characters are shaped by their past and the loneliness they grew up with. Again and again Adonis withdraws into his snail shell Believe And Creed IIbut in Creed III, Jordan eventually forces him to overcome his reserved instincts, even if it means wreaking havoc in front of loved ones. Unfortunately, there are several missed opportunities for dramatic scenes between Adonis and Mary-Anne, whose subplot makes sense on paper but whizzes by far too quickly and mechanically in execution to leave a lasting impression.

As grounded drama Creed III struggles to overcome its inherent contradictions: it’s a film about leaving violence behind, but its third act – with the inevitable boxing match between Damian and Adonis – is framed as an extension of that idea, rather than contradicting it. A key line of dialogue even seems to shift a character’s entire ethos from general anti-violence to specific violence in favor of Adonis-on-Damian.

But while that may seem odd at first, it’s an integral part of a film that not only frames fighting as its characters’ standard lingua franca, but does so in the specific manner of a shonen manga or anime, where the action premise is so intertwined with the character drama is that they are virtually inseparable. (Another recent Hollywood production using this approach is the Netflix series Cobra Kai, where all personal and interpersonal conflicts are resolved through karate). This paradox becomes a necessary stylistic departure for the film, as Jordan flexes his directorial muscles in in-ring bouts.

Moments in the film’s early stages offer clues to the approach that finally blossom in the third act. He and cameraman Kramer Morgenthau isolate body parts from fighters to emphasize the confrontation. (There are plenty of anime-style scowling close-up shots.) They distort the fabric of action scenes around the characters, shaking the frame and blurring focus during intense movement to mimic the action lines of stylized anime combat.

This naked inspiration is a far cry from the realism of most Rocky fight scenes. But Jordan leans in all the way, folding his seemingly unstable narrative approach – the violence of the ring as an arena for catharsis that could end violence – into dreamlike vistas that foreground the characters’ suppressed conflict with stunning formalistic flair. Attempting to balance the franchise’s American sports-drama roots with sports-anime inspiration comes with narrative bumps, but the emotion holds it all together.

Jordan’s takeover from Stallone as director feels like a real-life Rocky trajectory for the series, but at the same time, Jordan is working to part ways Creed III from the Rocky franchise. Rocky Balboa deserves only a brief mention here, but most importantly, this film’s story of fame and money, dealing with retirement, pent-up emotions and confronting open wounds is completely different from the trail Rocky‘s sequels approached similar stories. Creed III instead, these issues are rooted in the peculiarities of Black Americans and their experiences in unforgiving systems. It examines the conflicting perspectives on black wealth and celebrity as signs of individual success and as acts of assimilation, even betrayal, to the black community.

Throughout the original series, Rocky’s greatest villain has been the passage of time and the unpredictable shape of his future. Adonis’ villain always has the past and the way it captivates him in the present as well. The way Jordan addresses those points Creed III makes it as pivotal a chapter as the character’s first appearance. If Jordan continues to work behind the camera, another pit stop or two with these characters and their story would be more than welcome.

Creed III hits theaters on March 3rd.