Not pitiable... though not far off from it, either

Rating: 6/10 (26 December 2016)

Our protagonist(Sly, charmingly everyman as ever, in spite of greater fame and wealth than before) is challenged by the up-and-comer, Clubber Lang(Mr. T, his tough image not yet tempered with a fear of flying. He's fortunate assault laws clearly don't exist for those who take the ring in this). Will he return to his underdog status? Mickey's(still intense Meredith) health is failing. Might he return to the great big cold continent in the sky? And Adrian(Shire, sweet, smart and shy) is still here. They just don't know what to do with her this time. It's too bad, the love between the two is one of the elements that work best, especially for those of us who don't care about the macho crap. What? I recognize the original as amazing, and the first five were on sale. Well, they have her support him, because that's what they default her to. Paulie's(Young, still gritty) racism comes to the forefront, as Creed(Weathers, less showy) and Duke(Burton, determined) become unlikely allies.
It was a matter of time before they'd cast at least one actual fighter, not an actor and/or former football player. And here we get two. Wrong sport, of course, but at least it's the right direction. A little in the fights does legitimately play out as wrestling. At the time of writing this, I've only watched up to this point in the franchise. This didn't change my mind on what I thought watching the second installment: there never shoulda been more than one movie here. And apparently I still have the worst ahead of me. Part of the point of 1 was that he couldn't possibly keep doing this, it was his last chance! The problem with a series in this genre is that we know it has to have a climactic showdown. Action flicks, thrillers, dramas... it doesn't have to be public, planned, the consequences can be purely personal. Meanwhile, here... one way or another, it needs to be set up and have emotional, not only physical, stakes. We know where it's going, and are seeing the signs. Anything that happens that isn't related to that, we know it won't prevent that from happening. You can also only go so far, intending to top what came before, without getting unrealistic: "that wouldn't be allowed, it's against the rules". And this does get into that territory. This runs 92 and a half minutes without credits, and 95 and a half with.
There is a lot of brutal boxing and some strong language in this. I recommend it to completionists. 6/10