Creed II

**Creed II** is a 2018 film starring Michael B. Jordan, Sylvester Stallone, Tessa Thompson, Wood Harris, Phylicia Rashad, Florian Munteanu and Dolph Lundgren, directed by Steven Caple Jr., written by Juel Taylor and Stallone and produced by William Chartoff, Stallone, Kevin King Templeton, Charles Winkler, David Winkler and Irwin Winkler.

The film was a financial success as it generated a profit of $7 million.

## Plot

In 2018, three years after his loss to "Pretty" Ricky Conlan, Adonis "Donnie" Creed, with his trainer Rocky Balboa by his side, has won six straight bouts, culminating in a victory over Danny "Stuntman" Wheeler to win the WBC World Heavyweight Championship, as well as win back his 1967 Ford Mustang that he lost to Wheeler in a bet prior. Now a worldwide star, Donnie proposes to his girlfriend, Bianca Taylor, who agrees to marry him. Bianca suggests starting a new life together in Los Angeles, but Donnie is reluctant to leave Philadelphia, and by extension, Rocky.

In Ukraine, Ivan Drago, the former Soviet boxer who killed Donnie's father Apollo Creed during a bout in 1985, has been living destitute since losing to Rocky that same year, and seeks an opportunity to regain glory. Assisted by promoter Buddy Marcelle, Ivan pits his son, Viktor, against Donnie. When Rocky refuses to support Donnie's acceptance of Viktor's challenge, Donnie leaves for Los Angeles.
Donnie and Bianca settle down in a luxurious apartment in Los Angeles close to Donnie's adoptive mother and Apollo's widow, Mary Anne. As they adjust to their new life and prepare for the upcoming match, Bianca learns that she is pregnant. Donnie recruits Tony "Little Duke" Evers, son of his father's trainer and later Rocky's trainer, to start training him. Overwhelmed by his life's recent developments, the underprepared Donnie rushes into the match and is badly injured. Viktor is disqualified for hitting Donnie while he is down, allowing Donnie to retain the World Heavyweight Championship. Despite his loss, Viktor becomes extremely popular in Russia and wins a series of fights with top billing.

His body and ego shattered, Donnie becomes increasingly disconnected from Bianca. Mary Anne reaches out to Rocky, who reconciles with Donnie and agrees to train him for a rematch against Viktor, who is suffering torturous physical tests at Ivan's hands. Bianca gives birth to a daughter, Amara, and Rocky is named her godfather; however, Amara is born deaf, inheriting it from her mother's progressive hearing disorder.
While Viktor taunts Donnie publicly, he faces constant pressure from his father behind the scenes, who enjoys the attentions of the media and various Russian delegates. At a state dinner, he and Ivan encounter Ludmilla, his mother and Ivan's ex-wife, for the first time in several years after she abandoned them following Ivan's loss to Rocky. Enraged at the sight of her, Viktor storms out of the dinner and chastises Ivan for seeking approval from those who cast them out. Meanwhile, Rocky and Little Duke retrain Donnie in a decrepit location in the California desert, focusing on fighting from within and training Donnie's body to absorb the heavy impact he will receive from Viktor in the ring.

In Moscow, the rematch is more balanced as a more controlled and focused Donnie exchanges equal blows with Viktor. Viktor is used to winning by knockout as his bouts have never lasted past four rounds; Donnie uses this to his advantage and willingly endures a heavy beating from Viktor, even after his ribs are broken. In the tenth round, Donnie unleashes sequence after sequence of effective blows and knocks Viktor down twice. Ludmilla departs after the second knockdown, upsetting Viktor, and Ivan sees the truth of his son's earlier words. An exhausted Viktor is cornered and receives multiple strikes without defending himself, but is unwilling to go down. Realizing that his son's safety means more to him than acceptance from Russia's elite, Ivan throws in the towel, forfeiting the fight to protect his son. He assures the distraught Viktor it is okay that he lost, and embraces him. As Bianca enters the ring to celebrate with Donnie and Little Duke, Rocky recuses himself and takes a seat to watch them from outside the ring.

Following the match, Viktor and Ivan later train together back in Ukraine. Rocky travels to Vancouver to make peace with his own estranged son, Robert Jr., and meets his grandson Logan for the first time. Donnie and Bianca visit Apollo's grave, where Donnie makes peace with his deceased father and the burden of carrying on his legacy, as he and Bianca introduce Amara, who now has a new set of hearing aids.