![]() ![]() T was meant to be the final punctuation in Rocky Balboa’s story. T’s catchphrase, “I pity the fool” was born. A gruff contrast from suave Apollo Creed and the Greek statue of Ivan Drago, Lang is all swagger and bravado, stumping Rocky in a flurry of words at every turn. T had never acted before, and that rawness on camera translates into a rage and resentment that could plausibly unseat Rocky. He wasn’t afraid to cry at this stage in his career, and this willingness to give Rocky’s vulnerable side just as much screen time as his pecs is what makes Rocky III an endearing swing for the fences, even if it stumbles.Ĭlubber Lang’s larger-than-life persona ensured future rivals would only get bigger and badder. ![]() It’s heavy-handed melodrama, but Stallone’s aw-shucks performance nonetheless sells the moment. T’s Clubber Lang with the actual loss of Mickey. The movie wants to bring Rocky back to underdog status by crippling him with insecurity and compounding his loss to Mr. It ditches reality for Pay-Per-View fantasy, and the franchise becomes a hero’s journey toward winning, not the underdog’s journey where none of that mattered. Rocky III is all about the press conference beef where the poster rivalry is an actual battle between good and evil. He still wants the drama, but it’s no longer the street-level, working-class hardship that made the first two movies so relatable and compelling. The setup poses honest questions about the ramifications of victory as he contends with his own greatness.Īfter two movies, personal victories aren’t enough for Stallone. Rocky’s earned his fame and fortune, but now he has something to lose. ![]() “The worst thing happened to you that could happen to any fighter… you got civilized,” Rocky’s trainer Mickey (Burgess Meredith) tells the heavyweight champ. A hungry challenger sees past the glitz and glam: The Italian Stallion lost his way. Rocky’s first fight in the movie against Hulk Hogan’s Thunderlips is a Looney Tunes cat-and-mouse chase around the ring. In the opening montage, he’s on the cover of magazines, doing commercials for American Express, and appearing on The Muppet Show. Cameras and product endorsements once made him uncomfortable. ![]() Early on, Rocky Balboa is presented with a statue of himself on very the steps he made famous – a surreal victory lap. The sad-sack underdog has become a winning icon. While Rocky III is a step down from its former greatness, it is somehow its own cheesy monument 40 years running, turning what was meant to be the end of the series into a turning point for a franchise still going strong today. It also cemented “Eye of the Tiger” into the series’ iconography. Much of what we know of the franchise formula is crystallized in Rocky III – grudge matches, meatier opponents, sweatier training montages, and a back-to-basics game plan. In retrospect, Rocky Balboa’s third bout is hardly the worst, though it seemed that way at the time. Guess who Stallone fights in Rambo III?) Rocky’s underdog story becomes an action series ‘80s onward, trading the beating heart of the original for ham-fisted melodrama punctuated by a cartoon-y villain. Released the same year as Rambo: First Blood, the two Sylvester Stallone vehicles start to bleed into each other. T, the one with Hulk Hogan, or the one where Rocky Balboa and Apollo Creed become bros on the beach. Rocky III is best remembered as the one with Mr. But Rocky III is the franchise turning point. Rocky is the long-shot character drama that could. ![]()
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