New Life to the Cinematic Universe

Rating: 9/10 (21 February 2016)

Creed is the Rocky of this generation. It is sensational with great performances and amazing direction and cinematography. Seeing some of the original Rocky movies will give you good context for this film, though not the entire series is great.
Creed, on the other hand, is a compelling continuation of the Balboa universe with new energy. A conflicted Adonis who would fight in his youth before realizing his father was the famous Apollo Creed seems a wreck when he becomes an adult, traveling to Mexico repeatedly in order to make extra money fighting every now and then. He becomes arrogant and angry when people from Apollo's gym will not train him and learns a lesson that being a great fighter comes more from nurture than nature.
Even though Adonis is privileged to be living with his late father's wife, he makes the decision to abandon that life which lacks excitement to find Rocky Balboa in Philadelphia. He figures he can receive training from Rocky since he was Apollo's friend, and with a little effort he's right.
What's great about this film is the conflicted Adonis played the up and coming Michael B Jordan, from great stuff like The Wire and Fruitvale Station. He plays the son of Creed, but he is more than that. This very notion is what makes him such a conflicted character - throughout the film he is struggling over his need to become his father as well as his need to create his own legacy simultaneously. He has too much pride to take up his father's name in the ring specifically because it will make the public have high expectations for him.
In the film, Adonis' relationship with Rocky proves to be a great cinematic relationship not just within the Balboa universe, but a great relationship in cinema in general. The two of them redefine what it means to be family and this relationship is made that more convincing due to the great strength of both of these actors (Jordan and Stallone). Jordan got snubbed of an Oscar nomination.
The most brilliant scene in the movie is when Adonis fights his 16th fight. Pay attention because the entire scene is done in one amazing long take with such complex camera movement and direction, and man, does it feel perfect.
The biggest flaw of the film is that it seems to steal plot points from Rocky. It is not an identical film, but the main beats are very similar. But looking at 2015 as a whole, this is definitely one of the better films.
3.5/4.0