Film Illiterate, wherein the proprietor records movies seen, and sporadic progress through assorted lists of the "best". Originally started after regretfully renting something forgettable for the third time. I've forgotten what, but never again! A tedious endeavour since 2005. Hello. 🙂
Even more of a shameless retread than Creed (i.e. Rocky VII), Creed II (Rocky VIII) brings back Rocky IV's Ivan Drago (Dolph Lundgren), whose son Viktor (Florian Munteanu) becomes the new contender.
It's like we're back in 1985; the only thing missing is the hammer and sickle shorts. Co-writers Sylvestor Stallone and Juel Taylor really drop the ball here by repeating the good vs evil nonsense of the last Russian installment. Ivan and Viktor are ridiculous cardboard cutouts. Hints that life has been hard for them after Ivan's defeat are not enough to engender any sympathy, so we're left with an unlosable fight against an uninteresting robot.
Oh, there are some stirrings of excitement when the Rocky theme starts to play during the final bout, but it's a tired, Pavlovian response to a paint-by-numbers effort. Any hope that there was life left in this franchise is dead. It's only moving because they keep kicking it.