Creed III (2023) – 2/5

They surely did not knock it out of the park

„Creed III“ is a pretty new movie from the United States that is almost exclusively in the English language, but here and there you also find some Spanish and American Sign Language. If the inclusion of the latter is attributed at least partially to the success of the film „CODA“, I do not want to be a judge on, but as this film is in no department really a creative achievement in its own right, but instead a recycled movie, sometimes in an alright way, on other occasions not so much, I would not be surprised. One of the most interesting aspects here is that this is the very first directing credit for lead actor Michael B. Jordan. I honestly feel a bit bad for him because this is a screenplay that is so generic and stereotypical at times while trying to ooze greatness, yet being miles away from that, that as a consequence not even far more experienced directors could have made it work. I am still a bit curious how his career will continue now, if he will become one of the actors who will focus on directing too or maybe if he will in the long run even switch completely to directing. A career like Ben Affleck’s he can only dream of of course at this point, but we will see. Sorry, I just thought about Ben because he made a magnificent film this year about the man who is probably the reason why Jordan carries the first letter of his middle name in every credit sequence you come across him. Another Steve McQueen-like coincidence, but let’s not get any further into detail about that. Just caught my attention as a linguist and I am a bit surprised that I never recognized this before. Anyway, Jordan’s movie here runs for almost two hours and is of course the newest chapter of the Creed saga or you could maybe even say Rocky saga, even if Stallone is out of the films now of course after almost winning an acting Oscar a few years ago. But the name Creed will always bring the connection between Apollo and Adonis. Honestly, Adonis for a protagonist is already a bit on the cringeworthy side already, but oh well.

It is not one of the key issues I had with this film. One big issue there is simply the lack of realism. I got the same problem with the first Rocky film admittedly, but even if it is entertaining here and there, it is just too much to stomach. What do we have? A guy who was a successful junior/amateur boxer ends up in jail for almost 20 years, gets out and immediately manages to defeat the reigning world champion. Okay. I think this is self-explanatory. I mean they actually knew themselves that this is really nonsense and thus made it look that the champion was in control before the challenger used some dirty tricks and turned the tables in his favor then. I could not take it seriously though and the problem is this is not a comedy, but wants to be taken seriously. Actually, there is hardly a comedic moment in here at all and even with dramas, this is something you do not see too often. What also did not feel particularly realistic then, is that the retired champion agrees to return to the ring as a consequence to set things straight again. Maybe still more realistic than the actual victory, but I suppose they hoped that after this nonsense we would also believe everything else too. And there it was exactly the other way around. All of a sudden, the bad guy then started strong, but eventually could not keep it this way. I mean we knew the outcome of course and that Jordan’s character would always win, but with this especially, with zero element of suspense there, they totally would have needed to deliver in other departments. But they just didn’t. On the contrary: They simply threw other unrealistic stuff at us. Take the way how the hand injury for the Eastern European guy happens. I wonder if this was planned and ordered by the bad guy even, but there’s no indicator there I think. Or at least I did not see any. Take the actual decision that the bad guy then gets the chance to fight the champ. In reality, they would have picked somebody else, they even mention two contenders, or they would have just postponed the fight until the other guy can fight again.

The look into the protagonist’s family life was also nothing that felt particularly deep. All for the sake of it. The deaf daughter shows us that the family has been through quite a bit and the scene with her punching the other girl, of course after the other girl is the bully aggressor, was about as uninspired as daddy defending her in a way or the caring mother acting more reasonable. With Tessa Thompson I was struggling especially hard here. The inclusions of her own struggles because she could no longer perform were almost cringeworthy to watch. Of course, she instantly became a top-notch producer. Of course, she is still trying to work her way through so much from her past. Of course, she needs her man to open up to her fully. Of course, she found a „mother“ in her man’s mother and she can talk to her about everything etc. These inclusions with writing talent and attention to detail could have actually been turned into good quality and a smart and touching script I am sure, but here it was no such thing. On the contrary. The film just wanted to be so much in so many areas and then did not succeed in a single area almost. The scene with Rashad’s character playfully bullying hers on and teaming up with her daughter-in-law was also almost painful to watch early on. I also almost felt a bit bad for Rashad. I remember her from her sitcom with Bill Cosby and I admire her for staying loyal to him throughout all the shenanigans going on around him lately, but we need to make sure to understand and spread the message that he is a free man and declared innocent. This is another story though. The reason why I felt bad for Rashad’s character is the way how she got killed off here. She has another stroke and after a few quick words at her deathbed to her son she dies. This was a moment that could have been really emotional, but it felt so rushed and for the sake of it that I honestly think it was a travesty. Even moments later almost nobody talks about it anymore, not even the main character who just lost his mom for Christ’s sake.

What is wrong with these screen writers? They cannot be serious. And these people are the Cooglers and especially Ryan is considered one of the big Black names in the industry now because of Black Panther. But what he did here was atrocious. Maybe his brother dragged him down I don’t know. Perhaps it was Ryan’s attempt to save Keenan’s career after the new Space Jam film went so terribly wrong, but it rather looks as if Keenan dragged down Ryan instead too. Zach Baylin you can add as well as he recently switched from the art department to writing and with quite some success. Not that writing isn’t art, but you know what I mean. Well, the writing for this film here surely isn’t art. But the acting also wasn’t too great. Some were weak, everybody else was forgettable. I would say Jonathan Majors was the exception. He made for a good antagonist and I would not mind him getting some awards recognition for his turn here and I am also curious what he will be up to in the next years. He has solid recognition value, range and charisma I would say from what I saw here. And he showed all that against the premise of how his character was also not written great exactly. The worst moment for him was maybe the reunion then towards the end after the fight when the two are, all of a sudden, buddies again and that made no sense either, no matter how exhausted they were or glad for it to be over. The way he acted before I would have expected his desire for a quick second fight against Creed, but no such thing. Maybe a good thing honestly if this means there will be no fourth Creed film. Or will there. The inclusion of the daughter developing an interest in her father’s career and boxing herself made me think that she could be a focus in another film, but the character is probably still too young and they won’t come up with a fourth film in 2033 or so with the short gaps between the other three films. So unless they use massive aging make-up and cast another older actress for the daughter, this will not be the central story. We will just have to wait and see. Or I surely won’t wait as I would have zero interest in another sequel unless critics and general viewers praise it to the moon.

By the way, I am writing this review as somebody who has not seen the previous two Creed films, but at least the first one I will be going for at some point I guess. I hope those are superior to this pretty messy gimmicky film we got here. I also did not really have plans to see this one, but it was shown one last time today and the tickets were cheap, so I went for it because I knew the reception wasn’t totally terrible. Not my brightest moment. This is pretty much it then. I wish I could find some more positive aspects about the outcome here or stuff that I liked, but I just can’t. The music was also forgettable. This film is exactly why nobody really takes MTV seriously anymore if they give out nominations to something like this. No offense to Jordan. I do believe he is a decent actor at times, but he probably acted better in almost everything else he was in. Which again of course has to do with the script here. The story also feels painfully similar to his turn in the highly-overrated first Black Panther movie with the conflict between the two male protagonists there, only that he was on the other end of the good vs. Evil scale over there. Definitely no coincidence that Coogler was part of this too. So no matter how you look at it, you will not find anything new or creative in this film. Which could only be forgiven for if the outcome here was huge fun, but it is not even close. All you see in here has been done already and most of the time it has been done in a considerably superior manner. That is why I give „Creed III“ a thumbs-down. It is not at all worth seeing.