On Memorial Day Weekend of 1982, Rocky Balboa’s latest and greatest challenger entered the cinematic pantheon. On this first episode, join Paul, Javi, and, of course, Producer Brad as they root for the Italian Stallion and his new nemesis, the legendary Clubber Lang, played by the formidable and inimitable 80s icon Mr. T. Can Rocky get back the Eye of the Tiger in time to defend all he has fought for? Come along with us to the multiplex for the answer - because we pity the fool who does not!

TRANSCRIPT

Hi, this is Javier Grillo-Marxuach, and it's just a short note to let you know that Carl Weathers passed away after we recorded this podcast about Rocky III. Obviously, Carl Weathers is an idol of ours, somebody we respected enormously, and we hope that what we have to say here is an appropriate tribute to his talent and to everything that he left behind. And now on to Rocky III. Welcome to the first episode of Multiplex Overthruster, Summer of 82. I am Javier Grillo-Marxuach.

And I'm Paul Alvarado-Dykstra.

Paul and I are really excited to do this and to start this journey, because we're going back in time to the summer of 1982.

It's a huge year.

I think, Paul, I think we can agree that anyone our age agrees it's the greatest year in genre cinema ever, right?

Absolutely. I think that is beyond reproach or debate.

So this year we had just all of these great 80 special effects, box office titans, a couple of duds we're gonna talk about, and films that we're literally still talking about today. So, Paul and I are gonna go back to when we were 12 years old, 11 years old, and we're going to do this podcast as if every episode is a Friday night. It's an opening night. And we're gonna talk about these movies that opened in the summer of 1982, week by week, starting with Memorial Day weekend, and we're gonna keep going Friday by Friday. We're gonna watch 15 movies that came out that summer until we reach Labor Day. And that will be the summer of 82. And Paul, I mean, summer of 82, it's like, right, it's the greatest summer. I mean, we might do 83 after this, if the podcast takes off, but really 82 is the year, right?

I also have my eye on 84. But yeah, who has not wanted a time machine? And I just can't tell you how excited and filled with joy I am to get to jump in the cinematic time machine with you and go revisit these momentous movies, genre milestones of our youth and experience them again with fresh new eyes.

Well, that's what'll be interesting because I think that talking about these movies as we experienced them when we were 12 years old, versus now that we're in our late 30s, I think it'll be an interesting study in contrast. But I gotta tell you, our first movie is one that I'm really excited to talk about. It is not a genre movie. I guess it's a genre movie that is a sports movie, but it's Rocky III, which opened on Friday, May 28th of 1982. And I mean, I might as well, let's just get started. I'll tell you the plot of the movie, ready? Just so that our viewers know what we're doing here. Because maybe you're not as fresh with Rocky III. Maybe you don't know it so well, right? So Rocky III, we start, Rocky has won the championship from Apollo Creed in Rocky II. And he is big, he's popular, he's defended his title several times, but somewhere in the shadows, there lurks a magnificent competitor, Clubber Lang. And he is a tough guy who can really, really beat the crap out of Rocky. And what we find out is that Rocky's faithful trainer and manager, Mickey, has been protecting Rocky from any fight that might actually challenging in order to keep him wealthy and alive and the champ. Rocky takes the fight with Clubber Lang after a horrible public challenge and he loses. And then Rocky has to get together with his greatest adversary, Apollo Creed, to train and to become a new kind of fighter to beat Clubber Lang. I don't know, am I missing anything?

Destiny wears a mohawk.

Yes, Destiny wears a mohawk and a lot of chains too, a lot of gold. Yes. Well, guys, and now for the first time ever, here is...

The Seablacks Overthruster, Summer of 82. Paul.

So we're pretending it's a Friday night. Okay, so hello, dear listener. One of the things you're gonna understand about this podcast is that there is a third person involved here, and that man is Producer Brad. And he will be the font of all factual information. He will dip in here and there. Producer Brad is actually one of my oldest friends. We met when we were 10, and he is who I saw most of these movies with actually. So Producer Brad, can you tell us what weekend we're doing this week?

This would be May 28th, 1982.

And what are the two movies Paul and I have to choose from to go see?

This weekend, in addition to Rocky III, there is Visiting Hours and The Escape Artist.

So The Escape Artist is the O'Neil. It's like JRL. Julia and Ryan O'Neil's kid, right? Something like that? Yes.

It only opened to two screens back in 1982 in this day.

Paul, if you had this choice, would you see Rocky III or would you see Visiting Hours? What's your...

You know, I have to say, I'm feeling really good about our choice with Rocky III. I am not having any second thoughts whatsoever. I feel like this was a choice, a conviction.

We're here. Okay, so Visiting Hours, I just remember the review at the movies, which was sneak previews, was what Siskel and Ebert was called back in 1982, and it was on ClubBS and had on commercials. And I remember, I think there's an actress in that movie who's very well known. It's somebody like Ellen Burston, but I remember like Ebert saying, I can't imagine an actress of this caliber getting, doing this movie. And then Siskel went, I can't imagine an actor of William Shatner's caliber being in this movie. And I don't think they respected William Shatner very much back then, so I have a feeling like that was kind of a slam. What do you think? Does that sound slammy?

You know, I think they just had not yet basked in the majesty of Star Trek II, which was coming the following weekend.

That's right. If they'd only seen Star Trek II, they might have thought better of slamming.

Might have changed their tune.

Yeah. So...

It was Lee Grant, by the way.

Lee Grant?

Hmm.

Well, I don't know how an actress of Lee Grant's caliber got in that movie. It was not a good movie. I actually saw it on the movie channel shortly after it, maybe a year after it came out. It's not a good film. Michael Ironside was the villain, though, whom I worked with on Sequest later. Yeah, so there was that. Yeah, so Paul, you had not seen this film before today?

So here's the thing, among many other things that we will get to in the fullness of time over the span of this podcast. I'm a geek and I grew up loving movies, as did you, as did many of our listeners, presumably. Otherwise, they've made some horrible mistakes in their podcast listening choices. But I had, for whatever reason, not felt the compelling wind of motivation to delve into the Rocky movies in my youth. For whatever reason, that was not a particular genre that resonated with me or my friend circle. So I only had kind of the general pop culture awareness of it. I knew Rocky. Rocky came out when I was kind of too young to see it. So I was sort of kind of playing catch up. So I had just this sort of peripheral pop culture awareness of the Rocky franchise, which then I later in life kind of reconnected with, with the more modern movies and Creed and whatnot. And so it was a long overdue correction in my, in a cultural oversight of mine to have an excuse to revisit, but for the first time for me, Rocky III.

I would call it a lacuna void in your knowledge, Paul. I'm really shocked by this.

Yes.

So I believe this movie was playing at the Fox Village theaters and that strip mall in Ann Arbor. And I believe I saw it with probably my brothers because that was, Paul, my big attachment to Rocky is that I saw Rocky II was one of the first movies I saw in a theater and I saw it with my middle brother. And it's probably one of the biggest moments of fraternal bonding that we had. But I believe I saw this at the Fox Village theater in Ann Arbor, Michigan with my family.

So. Yeah, I think I would have seen it at the twin cinema in McAllen on Nolana, if I'm remembering correctly. That's a theater I would go to. But yeah, at this point, I was already in forced exile out of Michigan because we're both spent quality time in Michigan and was growing up in South Texas. But I think, I mean, you raise an interesting point. I think that if I had been a younger brother instead of an older brother, if I'd had an older brother, I very well would have had that same similar experience of bonding on Rocky movies.

Yeah, I also, I want to point out just so that we all know who we're talking to here. So Paul, you are one of the seminal sci-fi fantasy bloggers in the world and a producer and a writer. I was going to say that we all knew that your favorite genre was of course the musical, but I said you were a sci-fi blogger, so what can I do? You also are one of the founders of Fantastic Fest. So it makes complete sense that this sort of movie might not have been your childhood cup of tea.

No, my attention was elsewhere.

Visiting hours, right?

Well, no, but more geeky than that. Let's just say I did not participate in a whole lot of, let's say sports or athletically driven endeavors, but I later came to have a great appreciation of sports movies, which is a whole other conversation.

Paul, is it safe to say that the weekend before you saw Conan the Barbarian?

Oh, hell yeah.

Okay, so let's say now we've gone to the multiplex, we have bought our tickets, we are sitting there, we've seen the trailers and the movie has begun now because I think we do have to get to the movie.

Yes, we probably should.

So the movie starts, first of all, it starts with the UA logo with the producer.

Before we start, we have to ring the bell.

Okay, here we go.

Do you want to ring the bell?

All right.

One of the best scenes in this movie, isn't it? It's also like the very last scene.

It's glorious. And again, last scene that was heavily foreshadowed. And again, we'll talk about foreshadowing. I'm obsessed with all the foreshadowing in this movie.

What favor? So the movie starts and we have a shot of the belt. You got the title belt. And the glorious Bill Conti music. I mean, it's such an iconic theme. I literally rate that with anything John Williams ever did. But you can debate me on that. I don't know.

In terms certainly of its cultural currency and pervasiveness and potency, it's iconic. And I think that for a film that is strikingly shorter than its two predecessors by a full 20 minutes, this film opens with a lavishly generous opening recap montage that just goes and goes. But you just want to soak it in and bask in it. It's because of that theme.

Yeah, and I thought about that a little bit because first it starts with the last three minutes of Rocky II, and then Eye of the Tiger starts playing, which was interesting to me rewatching it because I always thought that song came in later when Rocky is training, when he's coming back up. But I realized, so yeah, it is a huge montage. It's what I call a Slavko Vorkapic montage. Do you know who Slavko Vorkapic was, Paul? You probably do because you're as big a nerd as I am, right? So audience, so in the 1930s in the musicals, imagine that we're in The Money is Singing and you see this montage of newspapers flying at the screen and big towers of coins and then they fall. Those montages were done primarily by a guy named Slavko Vorkapic, and they were these sort of narrative montages that appeared in a lot of movies. And this one is literally showing you the entire story from when Rocky wins the title to about 10 title defenses in, right? And all of the commercial, the selling out he's doing and all that shit. And then intercut with that is Clubber Lang, played by Mr. T, training. What I realized, and I never knew this, Eye of the Tiger is actually about Mr. T, it's about Clubber Lang.

Yes, yes.

I am shocked and terrified by that.

That is one of the things that really grabbed me and delighted me in the opening of this film, is that it turns the Rocky iconography on its head. Rocky is no longer the underdog. He is Icarus. He has achieved, he's flown to the sun. He's like, I'm looking like it's not going to bode well. But he's achieved everything. He is everything he was challenging before. And their POV shifts to now the new underdog, who is this antithesis of Rocky, but is the ferocious Mr. T. But in terms of narrative montage and the contrast that is built out of the gate and with, you know, having iconic music with this franchise already, to then come in the third movie and say, okay, you know what? Here's Eye of the freaking Tiger that we're going to pull on you. It's incredible. It is absolutely incredible. I would love to know kind of where and how they got that song because it is so potent.

I can tell you. Stallone wanted Another One Bites the Dust by Queen, who refused him.

Really?

This was from Billboard Magazine, yeah. And so they quoted him as asking Survivor to record the song for the movie.

It was a bespoke song for the movie. You know, Paul, it's funny because the montage, long as it is, carries, I mean, because it's the entire song, so it's about three minutes long. It carries a bunch of narrative weight, because you see Rocky sort of selling out. I had a big issue with this, by the way, because Rocky appears in advertisements for both the DeLorean and the Maserati. You think the DeLorean or the Maserati people would have written a non-compete clause in his contract?

So I theorize that maybe this exists in the same parallel universe of where your overly generous bio and praise of me is true, where DeLorean and the Maserati companies merged into some magnificent titan of automotive dominance.

Like a Maserorean or a Maserorean or...

The mind boggles at all those possibilities. Yeah, yeah. Of what kind of world would that be? But yeah, it's disfaceting crescendo and decrescendo in this montage of how all of our associations and affection and investment in Rocky, they are willfully eroding before our eyes by showing him as this sellout, as having, you know, being flying too close to the sun, of being full of himself, of being this arrogant, prideful egoist. While at the same time, this hungry, vicious, terrifying upstart Mr. T is coming. And then we get the first of a feast of foreshadowing. Because who sees Mr. T? Who sees Clubber coming? Mickey. The fear in Burgess Meredith's eyes in that montage, as he is seeing what is coming for Rocky, that's the movie.

I was going to bring that up and I'm thrilled that you did because it really is like, there is actually a great deal of storytelling there. And the way Burgess Meredith, and it's silent, because it's all over the song, but they show Clubber Lang, and he just kills his opponents in the ring. As Mickey says later, he's a wrecking machine. He's not a fighter, he's a wrecking machine. And you see Mickey, and he's in the audience in many of those fights. And absolutely, the acting, just Burgess Meredith, the growing concern on his face, it's really well done. It's kind of amazing. I don't know if Rocky became prideful. I mean, I guess he obviously did, but it's well that he's just kind of like amiably stupid about being rich. I don't know.

Yeah, but it definitely feels like this cautionary tale. This is be careful what you wish for and that this is not going to end well.

Exactly.

Is that what happens when this underdog that we've been rooting for actually achieves and then over achieves and gets everything that he wants? And what is the cost and price of that and the pride?

Yeah, but it's interesting because the song has all of this, the lines like, the last lone survivor stalks his prey in the night, and that ain't Rocky anymore.

It's kind of great. Yeah, I mean, in that moment, coming out of that, Clubber is the protagonist, and Rocky is the antagonist.

Yep, Rocky's kind of the villain in that way.

That's set up in that dynamic, which is remarkable and really gutsy, I think, for a third film.

You're absolutely right, and I hadn't thought about how much daring that is, really, because they're really kind of making Rocky look, if not bad, because you still like him. I mean, he's still a good dude, as we will discuss in a moment about the charity match. But yeah, but he's clearly gone the wrong way, and the movie's not afraid to let you show you how bad that is, right?

Yeah, and it gives us somewhere to go in terms of an arc that, oh, he's going to have to earn this back. From us, first and foremost, the audience. The movie is willing to lose us in terms of our investment in him to some degree in order to then have him need to earn it back.

I think you're absolutely right. So I was going to say, from there, we go to Paulie, who is actually a much bigger character in this movie than I ever remembered. I mean, it's kind of Paulie's movie in a weird way, except that Paulie's entire arc takes place in the next scene.

Yes, the drunken rampage in the arcade where I have to digress because I am so grateful for the unexpected tsunami of sense memory of playing Star Castle in arcades. Because that was like, Star Castle was my jam. And getting to venture into that arcade, and there are a lot of laudable, worthy, more contemporary films that have attempted to recreate period arcades of the era. But to actually go into one in this film, and then have Paulie wreck it in a drunken rampage, at least he spared Star Castle.

Yeah, Paulie has been to his bar, he's drunk, and everybody's saying, hey, say good night to the champ, tell the champ our best. He gets really upset because he feels slighted. He winds up at an arcade and he walks through the machines and then he finds the Rocky machine, the Rocky pinball machine and throws a bottle at it. And then he's in the drunk tank. And then we have a scene where like literally Rocky bails him out and it's kind of Paulie's entire arc in the scene, isn't it? It's like he literally, Paulie doesn't have any more dramatic change in the movie. This is it, right?

Yeah, it's a very curious couple of scenes that feel like, I don't know, just a very strange digression to kind of say, oh, we're just gonna now open this up and make this the Paulie movie for two scenes, right? And, you know, as a Paul, I can't be completely opposed to that, but it's a very interesting choice to kind of basically say like, okay, you go act the hell out of these two scenes. And it's about resentment. It's about having this chip on the shoulder and feeling left behind by Rocky, who he had helped, you know, prop up and build and went off without him and he feels like he's on the ground. But it's completely unfair.

Paulie's a bum. I mean, Paulie's not a good dude by a stretch, but I love how the end of the scene is literally, so they get in a fistfight, you know, and Rocky says, what do you want from me? And Paulie says, I want a job. It's like they're fist fighting and like Paulie belts Rocky a couple times and Paulie just says, can I have a job? And Rocky says, oh, you have to do his ask. And that's it.

Yeah, and it's a classic example of, and I think you've spoken about this very eloquently on your other esteemed podcast, of drama that is rooted in the absence of just a simple conversation that two characters could have had that would have avoided this entire sidebar of misunderstanding and drama. But to get the first of many meta moments of the Rocky pinball machine in the arcade. And that's another thing. And we get hints of this in the montage. But again, the montage, a lot of that is fictional Rocky celebrity and success. In the arcade with the pinball machine, we get what I think is the first of a lot of very overt meta connections with the real world of the Rocky as a franchise and a brand.

Yeah, there's a big thing I want to mention about that later. But we should probably, let's keep this at a fleet pace. So then we have a couple scenes of Rocky at home. He sings to his wife's belly because they're going to have a kid, that kid's going to be Milo Ventimiglia in Rocky Balboa later on. You know, we see his daily life. He's got a nice big mansion. But then we have one of the most fun scenes in the movie, but it's one of the weirdest, which is Rocky goes for a charity match and he's fighting a wrestler named Thunder Lips in an exhibition match for charity. And the wrestler is played by Hulk Hogan, who is approximately 10 feet taller than Sly Stallone, right?

Yes, in his, I believe, feature film debut. I think I knew that he was in this movie, but I had forgotten. And so as I'm watching this movie and Hulk Hogan shows up, it's so bat shit crazy that Hulk Hogan just shows up in this movie as this thinly veiled parody of himself. I'm wondering whose idea was Thunder Lips and how much of a negotiation was that? But what ensues is madness. This scene, it goes insane in terms of this fight.

Because Rocky thinks they're just going to kind of mess around and then Thunder Lips starts like really beating the shit out of him. And then Rocky gets thrown off of the ring. And then he gets Paulie, because Paulie always has a switchblade because Paulie Street cuts Rocky's gloves off. And then Rocky goes bare knuckle on Thunder Lips. It's amazing.

Yes. And meanwhile, Burgess is clutching his heart. This is all taken a toll, you know, for heavy foreshadowing, but also the meta conversation of thinking back to the time as wrestling kind of was becoming popular. And you can just see that Hulk Hogan is taking, seizing the platform of this movie to make the case that pro wrestling is real. And that's basically his entire art here and purpose for being is that he is there representing pro wrestlers in our real world.

As a high performance sport, indeed, yes.

As an actual combat instead of just show, which Rocky to his great pain and detriment woefully believes is just going to be a show. And so it's this other like meta level dimension of the movie that's so crazy.

Also, we start seeing another one of Mickey's great lines, a couple of great lines Mickey has in this movie, but this one I think he refers to Thunder Lips as a hundred pounds of brain damage. And there's also like there's a whole run where Rocky's getting the shit beat out of him and he's like, he says something about Bob Hope doing a lot for charity. And then the payback is after Thunder Lips is kicking the shit out of him. I think it's Paulie, I don't know who says that you better call Bob Hope.

Yeah, something like that. And who doesn't love a dated Bob Hope reference?

Will anybody listening to this under 40 even know who Bob Hope is? I don't think so.

But the collision and the contrast of Rocky with, and you have to also wonder how much of this was fueled from a marketing conversation of how do we keep the Rocky franchise relevant, how do we get it popular, what's hot right now, what's cool, oh, we need Hulk Hogan, we need Mr. T. And it's just unapologetically playing to sort of 80s excess and pop culture and reaching for relevancy.

Every bit as pandering to the 80s aesthetic as Sly's amazing double-breasted suits with huge shoulder pads. I mean, he wears the shit out of those suits. They look amazing. I mean, it's like I'm a big fan of the double-breasted suit, you know, and I got to say, like, Rocky wears it better than anybody. I was going to say, in apropos of your comment about Bob Hope and what it said about No One Under 40, it's interesting to me because Burgess Meredith being in this movie, it's like I realize that our generation is sort of a hinge generation between the classic era of Hollywood and the modern era. You know, like, this movie was in 82, so it's 40 years ago. Producer Brad was telling me earlier that Burgess Meredith was the president of Actors' Equity in the 30s. So you're literally talking about somebody who was there like 15 years after the medium was born. So when we talk about movies of the 80s, you see these people show up in them, and they are actors who literally were there if not at the birth of cinema. And we're like the last generation who got to see people like Gregory Peck and Betty Davis and folks like that being in movies, and you know, it's like when you watch the Muppets show now and the guest stars are people like Bridges Meredith, it's weird because those were the huge celebrities back then. Those were the big movie stars.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's definitely this sort of bridging of eras.

Now the next scene is really interesting because it's Rocky is reading the three little bears to his son, and he's actually paraphrasing it, and he's talking about how Papa Bear whips the sheet off of Goldilocks in the one bed, and the way he says is, uh, thereby exposing her to the public. I just want Rocky to read me fairy tales all night. So anyway, now in terms of the meta of it, so this is one of the huge, hinch-pivitall scenes in the movie. Rocky leaves his son with Paulie, tells Paulie not to feed his kid beer or take the kid to the track, and then the scene ends with Paulie asking the kid about who he should bet on in the seventh.

Yes, and I feel we were robbed by not going down that side story and seeing any of that. I figure for a movie that's 20 minutes shorter than the last two ones, we could have indulged that. I was like, oh, I want to see that.

But you know, it's interesting because there's a lot, it feels like there's a fair bit of filler in this movie, including the whole thunder lips thing.

Oh, a little bit.

But the thing is, the movie is never not, I mean, I think this is one of the most entertaining movies ever made. I love every second of it. But when you break it down, you're like, yeah, the thunder lips thing didn't have to be there because we've already proven that he's gone soft and blah, blah, blah. Maybe like Cobra Kai, they could do like a six-episode Netflix mini-series of Paulie and Rocky Jr. going to the races. Yeah. So then we cut to Rocky is at a dedication of a statue.

The statue.

Paul, can you please tell us what you learned about the statue today? Because I can't imagine us going through this podcast without hearing this.

So just in the weird fortuitousness of how the universe is an unendingly mysterious place. Today, this morning, as we record this in the trades, there is a story about Adele who purchased Rocky's, Rocky's, Sylvester Stallone's mansion in Malibu or wherever, as a condition demanded that she also get the replica Rocky statue that overlooks the pool, that he would otherwise had been planning to take with him as you would think he would. But Adele literally was like, no, that is a deal breaker. With this $45 million mansion or whatever, I'm buying it, but I have to have the Rocky statue has to stay overlooking the pool. So I just take some cosmic comfort in the fact that Adele is swimming in her expansive, beautiful pool at her former Stallone mansion being gazed upon.

Yeah, she's being gazed upon by this.

I mean, if Adele is not our generation's Rocky, I don't know who is.

By the way, like if anything I ever bought came with the option of a 15-foot tall Rocky statue, like you buy a cheeseburger, you can have it with the 15-foot tall Rocky statue or without. I'd be like, I want the Rocky. They shouldn't say you want fries with that. They'd be like, you want Rocky with that? Yeah.

Yeah, I want to know if it came with the Rocky Pinball Machine. I want the Rocky Pinball Machine.

So if you had the choice between the statue and the Pinball Machine, you'd go for the Pinball Machine?

I mean, that's a very hard choice.

Okay, you know what? By the end of this podcast, I expect you to have made up your mind. We'll revisit this.

Let's save this. Let's tease the listeners.

Cliffhanger. So you talked about the reality and the fantasy. So here's what I thought was so interesting about the beginning of the scene with the statue, because this is a really great scene. But it starts with a marching band playing Bill Conti's Rocky Fantasy, which means that that song exists in the world of Rocky. Do you know what it reminded me of? And this is the nerdiest thing ever. No, it's not going to be the nerdiest thing, but it's the first of many in this podcast. Do you remember in Battlestar Galactica, when they made the old Battlestar Galactica theme, the Colonial Anthem, whenever there was a Colonial broadcast? That's what it reminded me of. I was like, oh, that's interesting.

And by the way, kudos to the great and brilliant Bear McCrary for doing that so elegantly. The man is a genius, and I'm grateful to have been able to tell him that to his face.

Kudos to Bear on everything he's done. The guy is amazing. I really love his work. So now this is the scene where the statue is being... Go ahead.

I just want to double down on that point because there's meta and there's meta. And the idea of saying, okay, this iconic Bill Conti Rocky theme that we all know until this moment does not exist in the Rocky universe. Rocky does not know he has a theme. But now we know that he knows and the whole public and the whole world knows that there is a Rocky theme in the world of Rocky, which begs so many questions. Why? Where did this? How did Rocky get a theme, an orchestral theme to his life, in his life? Like, that's just amazing.

No, but it would not be unusual. I mean, like, Frank Sinatra had a signature song. Also, Sprax Arathostra also played before Elvis took the stage.

But those were not written for them. That's the thing. This is a purpose written, like, created theme specifically for Rocky. And I'm going to jump ahead real quick and then come back, because the movie is so marvelously done in this scene with the statue and the unveiling and the marching band. Then they top it in an even more meta way later when he is training in the hotel. And there's a montage of him training in this, like, very plush, like, cushy, make, like, gym that they put together in this hotel ballroom. And you hear the Rocky theme, and then there's a reveal that he has a whole band there in the ballroom with them in this, that's been converted to gym, playing the theme for him while he trains. And I'm like, that is the greatest thing. It's just amazing.

But I think it's part of the sellout. I think it's like he's literally gone so sellout that he even has a song. But it's interesting because, so then, Clubber Lang shows up at the unveiling of the statue, just as Rocky is about to announce that he's retiring. And says that Rocky's retiring because he doesn't want to face Clubber Lang and that Rocky's been ducking. And Rocky knows nothing about this. Because we will reveal later that Mickey has actually been keeping Rocky from fighting Clubber Lang because he doesn't sheltering him. Yeah, it's a really confrontational scene. And like a couple of things like Clubber Lang placed the race card in the scene in a huge way. Yes, he says, you know, they don't want a man like me to be champ. It's a really interesting scene. It works on a lot of levels. What are your thoughts on it?

I mean, it is the dramatic fulcrum of the movie.

Yes, it is.

It is so potent and powerful and dangerous. Yeah. Like you really feel anything can happen in that scene. Like that a fight is going to break out there, that someone's going to get hurt. I mean, I even at that moment held my breath for Burgess Meredith, who again is like, you can see the dial keep being turned on his poor heart.

You can see that heart attack coming.

Yes, yes. But the crowd, the claustrophobia of that scene, how naked and exposed Rocky is in that scene and moment. There's nowhere to hide. And again, this collision of this icon, this Icarus, and then this challenger and kind of the turning the roles upside down, but adding these dimensions of race and class and, you know, so many complexities that are said and unsaid. I mean, it's high drama.

Well, I mean, the scene ends when, you know, the black man tells the white man that he wants to have sex with his wife. And that's when Rocky is used to take the challenge. So, I mean, it is literally like just all there. And the other thing that's really interesting is, you know, you talked about how dangerous Clubber Lang is. And it's interesting to me because, you know, Mr. T, after this, he was in the A team and he was a guest star in an episode of Silver Spoons with Ricky Schroeder, you know. They kind of turned him into like, you know, a big teddy bear. And if you see Mr. T now, like he had his own cereal.

Yeah, he had a cartoon. This was Mr. T before he became his own franchise. I mean, that's the funny thing is that Mr. T in pop culture follows a very similar kind of brand franchise arc that Rocky does in this movie.

We still quote Mr. Balboa like, I pity the fool, blah, blah, blah. And it's funny in this movie, he is terrifying.

Yes. Yeah. And that is one of the most impressive things in this. And thinking back to, again, not having the context of the pop culture Mr. T that would emerge and evolve later, to just see this pure, raw, dangerous, primordial version of Mr. T emerge and present as a real palpable threat to the established order of the universe in the film, but also specifically to Rocky. And that Clubber has Rocky's kryptonite, which is his pride.

Yep.

That's what he hits him on.

Yep.

And that's what convinces him to throw all reason out the window of retirement or whatever and to take the bait. And it's this thing where you're just like, don't do it, don't do it.

You know, and I just remember, I remember the article in Time Magazine about Mr. T and, you know, they talked about how like his mohawk and the feathers that he wore were all part of like his sort of Mandinka tribe heritage and all that. Like this guy was really presented as somebody who had authenticity and whose danger came from both African-American type authenticity. And obviously it was a very sort of imposing guy, but it's almost like that danger was too much for America and they had to like tone it down and turn it into a breakfast cereal.

But yeah, I do think it's that the boldness of him as a performer, as a presence, as an icon of having such intense and deep self-awareness and daring as an embodiment of cultural commentary.

The movie's not afraid of making him smart. The movie's not afraid of making him like, Clubber feels like a real character, even though he feels like Rocky's nightmare or something that came out of his nightmares. He does feel like a guy, like, you know, he talks about how he lives alone and how he trains alone. Character is very manufactured, but they're not afraid of making this villain. Like you said, he gets Rocky's crypt on it. He's got his pride. Like this guy is intelligent. This guy's crafty. This guy is, he's more than he says he is. You know, later in the movie, he says, I don't have to have strategy because Rocky's such a chump. But you know, this guy's like a serious thinker, you know?

And he is a hero. Like he is a protagonist in his own, he has his own arc and story and it's rooted in, you see him and the film shows this, he is working harder than anybody. He wants it more than anyone. And he is making every sacrifice. He's training harder, pushing himself harder. He has the Eye of the Tiger that Rocky doesn't have and that needs to get later to have any chance to stand up to him.

Again, the movie is much more about, like the fact that the song is about Clubber Lang is still blowing my mind, you know?

Yes, but that's one of the things that I think, especially in the context of the time and the period and also knowing the authorship of that, this is again written and directed by Stallone to not just do this caricature villain who also, must be said, happens to be black in America in 1982, but to make him heroic and to give him depth and purpose and reason and really make the audience feel torn in terms of, I'm rooting for him. Like in much of this movie, I'm rooting for him and you should.

In a weird way, like the beginning of this movie is kind of like to Stallone what the prequels were to George Lucas because he's really talking about a fall from grace and he's really talking, Lucas has said many times that he feels he's Anakin Skywalker. He became a billionaire and became this other thing that he can't recognize. And in a weird thing, Stallone, who wrote and directed the movie, is doing the same thing.

Yeah, it's like fighting the Empire and then becoming the Empire.

Apropos of which, so Rocky being the meatball that he is, instead of taking this challenge seriously and trading seriously, rents a hotel ballroom at a Waldorf Astoria, puts up his ring there in his trading gym there. They're selling all sorts of merch and they have Rocky Bop bags. We have the first appearance of Frank Stallone.

Yes, such incredible restraint that we don't see him until this point in the film.

Yeah, it is.

It's laudable.

Because we're going to cover a lot of films from the 80s. A lot of them will have sly in them. We're going to call this the Frank Factor. Whenever Frank comes up, we will hear the Frank Factor sound which producer Brad is going to cue up for us right now.

The Frank Factor.

There you go, so we have a high Frank factor in the scene, which is foreshadowing, not a good sign. And yeah, Rocky said, and Rocky's not really training. He's just taking autographs, like doing autographs, like pretending to train, and Mickey's beside himself.

He basically is training in a Rocky con. Like he's basically turned it into a convention hall.

About himself, yes.

But all about his own franchise, his own self. And it's so, I think, forward thinking, even given as much celebrity excess and culture there was in 1982, I think it's even prescient, because at that point it must have seemed so absurdly extravagant and implausible. And now it really doesn't. Now it actually feels like, oh, of course that's what he did.

I'm not so sure that it was that implausible for the time though, because I mean, we're also talking about the time that gave us the Muhammad Ali versus Superman comic. So, but I think again, you say the movie is daring and gutsy and I agree because Rocky is just cheesing out in this and he's a dunderhead. I mean, we are not seeing Rocky as a serious person at all. And it's painful. Again, they intercut this with Clubber Lang, who is a serious contender who really takes his sport seriously. He's literally training in some hole someplace. I mean, it might as well be the fifth ring of hell, you know? And he's getting tough and he's getting, you know, and like Rocky's being, and you really kind of don't love Rocky very much in these scenes, you know?

No, yeah. I mean, at this point, again, the film dares to make Rocky unsympathetic.

Yeah.

And a bit of a clown. And kind of make you, yeah, a clown and spoiled and privileged and pampered and indulgent and just all these vices that are not appealing.

No, the thing that's interesting is, you know, in Rocky II, there's a sequence where Rocky is trying to sell out, but he's not, you know, he's not as polished as he is now that he's the champ, and he like can't even read the cue cards. And he's trying to make a TV ad and he can't read the cue cards because he's, you know, kind of not the smartest guy. And he fails, you know, and it's like interesting the contrast between that Rocky and this Rocky who is like, you know, he's got the shellacked hair. He looks like, you know, he's got the rings. He's got the tie brace and the double-breasted suits. And, you know, he's kind of like a gangster. He's got kind of gangster polish and he's an idiot, you know?

Yeah, he's a made man. Like, I mean, he's got everything and it's gone to his head. His lumbering meathead.

I mean, the other thing about one of those scenes is there is Leroy Nieman is painting a painting live in this conference room. And if you don't know who Leroy Nieman is, he was an artist who actually, you know, it's funny, like in the 70s and 80s, Nieman was, he was a mainstream artist. He painted sports scenes and stuff like that. He was not considered a high art, but I've seen him in like documentaries and things and there were many times when you would see him with Andy Warhol or people like that, you know? Like whenever they put together the art world stars, even though Leroy Nieman was scoffed at by the art world, but just the presence of Leroy Nieman live doing a painting of Rocky is kind of, it's just so odd.

Yes, it's like how many ways can we underline the scale of celebrity that Rocky is in this world?

Yeah, and the scale of his idiocy.

Yeah, and then having, again, the band there playing, that somebody hired and paid to just be playing during his very kind of, not very challenging training, inspiring sessions.

It would be like if, I don't even know who the champion of the world is right now, but it'd be like if that person had Banksy doing a mural of them while they trained. I mean, it's like, sad level.

Yeah.

Banksy's no Leroy Neiman, but you know.

Imagine how cool that would be. And I guess there are a few people in our culture who do have their own themes from associations that ever get them played at events, and that's pretty cool, but that's rarefied air.

Yes, it is.

To be in.

So then we get to the fight. And the fight starts with a very, very, look, as a fan of Rocky movies, this part of the movie was really difficult for me because there's a little bit of a scuffle before the fight, and Mickey gets thrown against the wall by Clubber Lang.

And it's scary. And also, the things that this movie does at different points to kind of recalibrate who we're rooting for and why and where our sympathies are. And that is a moment where it's like, okay, I am no, Clubber, you've gone too far. Like, you are not, like, that's not cool. Like, but I get dramatically, it needs to be there because he is a man against the world. He's a man against the establishment and nothing is going to stand or stop in his way. He's so single-minded in his purpose.

And I kind of love the character for that. But the thing is, Burgess Meredith was 178 years old when he made this movie. He looks like he's made of toothpakes, you know?

He looks like an insurance risk for the production.

And by the way, producer Brad, how long until after this movie did Burgess Meredith die?

He lived another 15 years.

And he still, and he acted till the very end, right? I mean, he was in those Grumpy Old Men movies, right? Now, was Burgess Meredith just a guy who looked like he was 57 from the time he was 25? Because every time I, you know, he was the Penguin in the original Batman. He did like three episodes of the classic Twilight Zone. And he kind of always looked the same.

He always looked like an old guy.

Yeah, lucky him because that's how you get a long career in Hollywood, you know? So now we hate Clubber. Now we've been, I've been on Clubber's side up until now. He is politically conscious. He's not unhappy to throw out a bunch of things he don't throw out in polite conversation. He's driven. He's not an idiot. He did this himself, all by himself. But then he grabs Mickey. And then he fucking throws Mickey across the, and Mickey doesn't make it to the fight.

No, no. And that's heavy.

That's heavy.

And again, it's the thing that compromises. I mean, Rocky didn't have a chance anyway. He was not prepared. But then to have that rug pulled out from under him and have that distraction, you know he's completely screwed. This is not going to be pretty. And up until this point, there's part of, at least for me, to a point I'm like, I think Rocky kind of needs to have his ass handed to him. Like, he needs a reality check. He needs to be taken down a notch. But this goes way past that, into a terrifying place.

I would love, now that we talk about it, and because we both seem to have a very real fondness for Clubber Lang as a character, if I were doing, if I were an IP guy, if I were, you know, because they're doing the Rocky version, now they've got all the Creed movies. They're going to do a bunch of other movies and stuff like that. I would do this movie from the point of view of Clubber Lang. That's a movie I want to see. Because I honestly think today, as you have pointed out, Clubber Lang is the hero, you know?

And where did his story go? Where, like, there's all, like, yeah, exactly. I am now all about wanting to know what happened to Clubber, his legacy, like everything, I think, and Mr. T, you know?

Well, who I found out from Time magazine as well that his real name is Lawrence Tarrow, a fact I have retained in my mind for like 50 years. I don't know why. Now, Mickey is not dead, even though we've seen him clutching his heart many times during the movie. And also, by the way, one of the other things that I missed actually is after all of this, Rocky and Mickey have a scene where Mickey tells Rocky that I picked fighters who were past their prime. All the contenders you fought, I was there to take care of you and keep you healthy and help you make money and help you survive. So Rocky's going into this knowing that his prior 10 title defenses were not really legit, right?

It's a huge reveal.

It's a huge reveal. Yeah, and I'm sorry that I didn't talk about it because it's huge. And it's a great scene too, the way they play it.

Yeah, no, it is devastating. And in a way, it is more devastating than the loss in the fight. Yeah, because it basically is Mickey dismantling Rocky's carefully constructed reality. And that it is built on lies, but that it has been done from this place of love and of care, misplaced as it is, but that Mickey has been trying to protect him and his family and shield him. But again, it is now Mickey's hubris that we're gonna be paying the price for, in addition to Rocky's, that Mickey thought this was a good idea, but now it has come home to roost, because it's been a deception.

No, but I think Mickey loves Rocky so much that, I mean, he was never gonna say no to Rocky. He was gonna train him for the fight, but I think Mickey knew that this was not a, and it actually makes Rocky even worse for throwing the Rocky con because you know the stakes, and he has been, but he still acts like a moron. So here we are, Rocky goes up on the ring and Clubber Lang beats the shit out of him in two rounds and knocks him out in two rounds. Yeah, and it's brutal. I mean, honestly, like watching that scene, to me, that scene is as powerful as when the Reliant first fires on the Enterprise in Star Trek II and like knocks out the engineering section. When I saw that, I was like, this can't be happening, like this can't be happening to the Enterprise. And it's the same thing with Rocky, like even though there's been all this foreshadowing, it hurts, you know?

Yeah, it is taken to such a degree of viciousness and ruthlessness that it is shocking. And it is, even though you kind of expect, oh, he's through it, and we also know kind of where we are in the running time of the movie, that like, yeah, the movie's not over, he's gonna have to lose so that he can then have the third act, you know, come back. Like, we know that rationally, but it is, I mean, you feel it as a punch in the gut. It is visceral.

The other thing you see in the scene that I think is really interesting, though, is that, and I don't know a lot about boxing, other than what I've learned from these movies and other sports movies, because I dislike sports in real life, but I like sports movies, some of them, the way that you do. I also used to get the sense that Clubber Lang is technically a far better fighter than Rocky ever was. Like, Rocky's whole thing was he could take a beating and he could kind of outlast anybody, but Clubber Lang is fast on his feet. He's got like, his punch combinations are like much more choreographed. I mean, Clubber, like, technically is a much better fighter.

He is the T-1000. He's the advanced model that has taken things to another level.

And he deserved to win.

Yes, he did. He completely deserved to win. There's no argument in the context of the film for that. But yeah, it's the fall from grace that Rocky needed, but it is so harsh.

Followed by the hardest and most painful scene in the movie, which is Mickey is in the dressing room. They've laid him out on like the massage table that they use for the fighters and he's dying. And Rocky looks like crap. His face is like just, I mean, he literally has like a raccoon mask of bruises, fat lip bleeding everywhere. And he goes to Mickey's side and Mickey asks how the fight went. And Rocky says, it was a knockout. And Mickey never finds out how badly Rocky lost the fight and then Mickey dies. Oh my God. I can't even talk about the scene, I'm crying already.

It's so perfectly constructed as a scene and as a payoff to all the setups that lead to it. And it is just devastatingly heartbreaking. It is operatic, it's so unapologetic in its melodrama, but it's still, it comes down to these two actors and that relationship that we followed and knowing that, oh God, there are real stakes here and they're actually doing this.

The thing that's really interesting to me on a meta level about this conversation too, is that it's such a parable for Stallone's own career because Stallone is a really gifted writer. He's a really gifted director. I mean, he has given from the period, he's from the seventies and the eighties, there's a lot of cheese in Stallone. And you see his career having this tension between wanting to do sort of work that is quote, serious unquote and then like Rocky II and Rocky, which were slice of life movies about a chump. And then the next movie is Rocky IV, which is another 10 minutes shorter than this one. The three sequences of it are music video montage. And then, and it also has a flashback. So that's from another movie. So literally the next movie is even shorter and it's not really a great movie.

It's more cartoony.

Rocky was an independent movie. You know, it was made for no money, it was shot in Philadelphia, it was a lot of it handheld. It's an indie movie. And then suddenly it's turning into this.

A franchise.

And seems like with Paulie, you're seeing kind of the end of that indie thing and going into your music video. So there's also a parable here about Stallone, you know?

Yeah, absolutely. It's an incredible scene.

Then you get the biggest surprise in this film, the biggest twist, which is that Mickey was Jewish all along. Okay, so they're in the mausoleum and there's a rabbi giving the ceremony, right? And Rocky is singing the prayer, right? And his name is Mickey Goldmill, but like he's Mickey and he's a boxing training from Philly. How is he not Irish? Am I just racially profiling boxing trainers? Mickey, his name's Mickey.

I don't know. That may be God's private little mystery. I don't know. I will say I was not expecting that whole, I mean, I knew they're gonna have to be like some memorializing, some, we're gonna have to take that beat and we're gonna have to do that. But in terms of the choices it made, yeah, that's very unexpected and thoughtful and moving. And it also kind of feels a little bit in terms of like we're breaking out of Rocky out of his world in different ways. And so I kind of took it in that respect and that's something that otherwise Rocky would never have probably stepped within or experienced. And in a way for me, and I think as slightly dismaying or disorienting as a turn that it is.

It's just weird because it was never mentioned before. And like, again, because the character was sort of so heavily coded as sort of East Coast Anglo-Saxon immigrant. You know, so.

But from this point, like we really then see, get this whole arc of PTSD that Rocky has. From the one-two punch of The Greater Loss of Mickey, I was really surprised by, oh, this is now a movie about Rocky having PTSD.

And it's great because as you said, like the environment of that funeral service, Rocky is saying a prayer in a foreign language, Rocky's in a place that doesn't look like the, none of the rich people places that he's at look like he belongs there anyway, because he's kind of lumbering and big and he's got that big head and all that stuff. But you're right, this feels like a real threshold moment into another world because when the scene ends, Rocky goes back to the old gym where Mickey trained him and he's there dining on ashes and there follows the greatest, just a great fucking scene. I love this scene where Rocky's there dining on ashes and then suddenly you see this figure appearing in the door, a little bit backlit, long shadow, overcoat, and it's Apollo Creed, the champion. And he's there to-

In all his majesty.

Oh my God. Can I digress for a second?

Please.

In this show that I did, The Middleman, one of the directors says to me, hey, my friend is getting into directing and he really wants to kind of shadow me on the set. So I said, okay, if my friend comes to watch me direct, I'm like, yeah, of course. So the next day I go to Video Village and I sit down on my chair and I turn around and there's Apollo Creed. Like literally, I just actually was like, oh my God, it's Apollo Creed. And then I go back to the director, I'm like, Michael, you didn't tell me your friend was Carl Weathers, holy crap. I was like, Apollo Creed is such an icon as a character. You forget, you see Carl Weathers playing this guy and you know, in a fair world, Carl Weathers should be just lionized. He's such star power.

Completely agree.

Yeah, look, he's done well. I mean, he's fine and also, by the way, his directing career, he's directing Mandalorian. He's doing great.

Yeah.

But my God, I would have loved to have seen him have, you know, like a career like the one that Stallone had or the one that Schwarzenegger had.

I think we were all, we were all wrong.

Absolutely.

You know, and we get glimpses like him in Predator, you know, and here and there, this being this tower of awesomeness.

Yeah.

But to have this twist, this turn, where he comes in and he is now Jedi Master.

Yes.

Apollo Creed.

It's the best.

It's so badass, but it's also moving to then see as how their relationship has evolved, that they are now in this different place and that he is the one person that Rocky needs. There's no one else in the world who can help him and guide him of where he needs to go.

I read a book about ex-presidents and like, you know, you see people get upset with Michelle Obama and Barack Obama for hanging out with George W. Bush, you know, which I'm not a fan of either, but this is the only person who understands anything about what they've been through, you know? Like, who's going to empathize with the ex-president? Same with heavyweight champion of the world. They defeated one, no less. And I love the speech that Apollo gives about, you know, being a fighter and having to retire and, you know, sort of losing your fight. And the line, Eye of the Tiger comes from Apollo. And he basically lays out here that Rocky lost his street. He lost his fight. He lost his war and he's gonna get it back. But that's not gonna work out so well for Rocky, is it?

No, it's not gonna be that easy. But yeah, I mean, revisiting that gym, because the other thing too that's so great is the misdirect, the twist. Because you're thinking, okay, now we're gonna get Rocky back to basics. We're gonna go back to that gym. We know that gym. If we're coming back here, the presumption is, oh, we're gonna stay here. But it's like-

The presumption is cue the montage.

Yes, yes, like we know this. We've seen this movie before. Like we know what's gonna happen. But Apollo has said, uh-uh, now we're doing it my way.

Exactly. And it's interesting because Rocky basically has to learn to fight like Sugar Ray Leonard. He has to learn how to be fast on his feet. There's a scene later where Apollo has him swimming and Apollo says, he's gotta use muscles he doesn't know where he's got. So it's really like about, as I said, with Clubber being a much better fighter technically than Rocky, it's about kind of bringing Rocky to the 20th century in terms of fighting.

Yes.

But the interesting, you said this movie is about PTSD and I hadn't really put that together. So again, you're just much wiser than I am.

I have, as I tell people, I have intermittent spasms of lucidity.

That should be the title of this podcast. Javi and Paul's Intermittent Spasms of Lucidity. In Rocky II, a very similar thing happens. Rocky does not train particularly well for the big fight at the beginning because Adrian gets sick and he doesn't, and he can't put it together.

Distracted.

Yeah, you get a good 15 minutes in this movie where the obstacle in the plot continues to be Rocky's, well, as much of a mind as he's got, because he's so far in his head about getting beaten and Mickey dying that he can't train. He's having real issues. And there's that great line where Rocky says, we'll do it tomorrow. And he shouts, there he is, no tomorrow. And it echoes into the next scene. But the other thing is, Apollo makes Rocky move to a shithole hotel in downtown LA.

Yes.

And Adrian and Paulie move in with him and they're living in this flea bag and Rocky's really upset because he lives in a flea bag. And Adrian's like, I used to live in a flea bag, I don't care.

And really for no other reason other than they just need to be in the movie. It's just so kind of amusing that Paulie and Adrian are dragged across the country. They leave Rocky Jr. behind.

To move into the shithole, yeah.

And they go to this like horrible flea bag hotel in East LA and it's so great. It's just so, it's so great. And then there's the gym and it's like, this is how we're doing it. And it's like, oh, we're in Apollo's world now. Getting back, not to Rocky's roots, getting back to Apollo's roots.

Yep, yep. Because a lot of this is about Apollo, Apollo sees in Rocky kind of the defeat that he has. And this is his own turn to kind of rewrite history in a weird way. Yes. And the other great thing that happens in this, in the sequence is we meet a character who is the great unsung hero of the Rocky movies. And that is Duke. Yes. Duke is Apollo's trainer. And he stays in these movies all the way through Rocky Balboa. That's right. He trains Rocky and Rocky Balboa is the sixth movie in the series. And it's the one where Rocky at the age of 56 decides to get back in the ring. And weirdly, a wonderful movie.

Yeah, it is.

So, and there's a really, you know, and again, look, we're two white men. Well, no, we're two Latinx men who primarily are perceived as white in the universe. So for us to talk about race politics and all that, it's always gonna be awkward and weird, but please nobody take anything negatively from any of that part of our conversation, please, because we're keenly aware of our ignorance. But I think there's a really interesting, look, the fact that Apollo is black, Clubber is black, Rocky is white, there's a huge sort of river of racial politics in this movie. And it kind of comes to a head during this montage because Apollo is playing a lot of like funk music for Rocky to kind of fight dance with so he can learn to be light on his feet and all that. And Paulie up and says a line, I don't think you'd hear in a modern movie. He says, you can't teach him to fight like a colored fighter.

Yeah, he makes us, I believe, a similarly racist statement about the music.

The jungle music you mean? Yes.

Yeah, the jungle music. Paulie is sort of unapologetically racist. But yeah, it is striking in this film with both of these characters who also could not be more different. Clubber Lang and Apollo could not be more different. And when we finally get them face to face later, but that's also one of the best moments in the movie. Not to get ahead, but to shift the bearings of the movie and the franchise. Yep. And to instead center a black experience and perspective and say, you know what, you've had your time in the sun. You've gotten to do it that way. Now you're in my house. Now we're going to like do it my way in my world and to validate it to the degree that this film does. I found that to be a surprising and a very beautiful and moving thing.

Well, you know, it's also a movie about a white guy who has to learn that he has to work twice as hard, which is, you know, one of the things you hear a lot of people who are in minority communities. I mean, you certainly hear in the Latinx community is that, you know, in order to just get the job, you have to work twice as hard. And Rocky now has to learn to work twice as hard as he ever did, even more so, because even when he wins the title, even though he was hungry and all of that, he's still not a good fighter. He's just, he's a guy who can just take a lot of punches. And now he has to learn to actually work at this. And it's kind of amazing.

Yeah. And the other thing the film has done at this point, it is has shown us clearly that Clubber Lang has worked twice, if not 10 times as hard, that he is this relentless force.

Clubber deserved to win that first fight, straight up no chaser.

Exactly. And that has been, there was such an imbalance. And this is about how to reset that balance. And I don't know if we're ready to move on from the gym yet, because the gym, I think is incredible, an incredible setting and environment. And in terms of seeing that, but the thing that I love is when they get on the beach.

I want to say one thing before they get on the beach, because the beach is phenomenal. And it's kind of the, it's the rest, it's the fulcrum for the rest of the movie, really. Cause you cue the montage after that scene. There's a scene in this movie that I love and it's Apollo and Duke while Rocky is in bed with Adrienne, you know, going, you know, Duke and Apollo are watching movies of Clubber Lang fighting. And they're breaking it down. And even in 1982, the idea of a scene where there's two black men who are good at their jobs, who are competent and intelligent, talking over their strategy.

Yes.

That's not a scene you saw a lot in the 19, in the 1980s either, in a lot of mainstream movies. I just wanted to point that out cause it's kind of a really cool scene and it makes me respect those two guys.

I'm really glad you did because it is this passing of the torch and it's like shifting who we're centering, who we're platforming and who we are putting the reins in their hands. And it's about validating them as being as exceptional, as expert, as anybody else and really as the only people who can deal with this challenge with the situation.

Exactly.

And the fact that it is these black men, I just think is magnificent.

Something you'll learn about talking about movies with me is there's not a lot of things I care about, but like competence porn, people being good at their jobs is more important to me than almost anything else in a movie. So I was just delighted and it's a short scene, but then we get to the beach. What happens at the beach ball?

We get to beach therapy.

Beach therapy.

And I'm just like, what do you need when you have PTSD? You need beach therapy with Apollo Creed. And this is, I think, should be enshrined in the highest halls of cinema as just this pure unadulterated joy of brotherhood, of fellowship, of a little homoeroticism at the end when we do full-on beach training montage that ends in full bloom beach frolicking.

Yeah, beach hugging, beach frolicking, beach high-fiving.

Oh my God.

You wanna say just kiss already, yeah. But before we get that, because remember the beach is bifurcated by, there's the first scene at the beach where Rocky is supposed to just outrun Apollo.

I just get accented by the beach, yes, I know. There's a whole arc to the beach, but oh.

But then, so Apollo gets pissed off at Rocky because Rocky is just not cutting it. And then we have the obligatory Rocky movie, Adrian's Speech, which is the highlight of, I mean, you have to have one. And this is the one where Rocky basically says that he's afraid and that he is terrified of Clubber Lang and that he's terrified of having that to lose everything and that he's terrified for his manhood and that he feels like he's nothing because he's been defeated.

Yeah, and again, I gave short trip to that because that was under my umbrella of beach therapy. And that's really the central theme of the beach therapy is that he basically goes to therapy with Adrian on the beach and has this most self, like startlingly self-aware moment and expression of self-examination that is sort of unexpected, but it's like, oh, it's taken all of this trauma, all this dislocation from his world to reckon with and then to have the one person he can express that to.

And ultimately look, Rocky was no one. I mean, he was a complete bum in the beginning of Rocky. And the truth of the matter is that although he put his nose to the grindstone and trained, this is kind of the first time where he actually has to change as a person. And it's the third movie, which is interesting. You know, it's because of Adrian that he gets there. It's kind of a movie about, you know, not just putting in the work, but like humbling yourself and accepting that this new training, this new way of fighting, this new way of being is the way to the future. And also Talia Shire, she can be very theatrical in her performances, dare I say, but it works so well here. Like just the way she shouts at him, it's great.

It's a really great scene. And another thing too that I've missed here, and this kind of weaves in and out at different points, once Apollo re-enters the ring with Rocky and kind of takes on this role, is the favor. That we establish that Apollo is going to ask Rocky for a favor.

For a favor. He's not gonna take any money for the fight. Well, he kind of says he will because Apollo is gonna get paid, but he says he wants a favor, yes. Every time he brings up the favor, Rocky goes, what favor?

Yes, and they are not subtle in beating that drum of foreshadowing.

No, it is repeatedly.

Which builds into like, oh, then this is probably, what is that gonna be? But I just wanna make sure we don't miss that that is also happening as we are getting through beach therapy. And then yeah, then the whole arc of the beach training. It's its own movie of him not doing what he needs to do and Apollo giving him hell for it and then ultimately finding the Eye of the Tiger.

Exactly, so Rocky trains in a montage, intercut with the montage is Rocky running around the beach with Apollo in varying degrees of slow motion. And the montage, the training montage ends with Rocky finally beating Apollo on the beach sprint. They run into the beach and they're both wearing these sort of tank tops and they are frolicking in the water. And look, you said somewhat homoerotic, I think this rival's top gun. Literally is like just kiss already for God's sake. But you know what? I like how even though, you know, not even though, I like the idea that it is so earnest, it is so real. Yes. And it actually postulates that, hey, guess what? Homoerotic isn't such a bad thing. It's fine. They're hugging. It's okay. Men can hug. It's good. You know?

And the arc of that relationship, these two bitter rivals who come together and find such deep fellowship and affection for each other. It's just an unabashedly beautiful thing. And I'm glad that the movie just fully embraces that. And it's like, oh yeah, they're now.

Yeah, they're brothers now. Yeah. So now we get to the big fight. There's one point where Clubber's being interviewed and he says the line, I'm gonna torture him. I'm gonna crucify him real bad.

Yeah.

And I'm thinking, torture and crucify sounds real bad. I don't know if he needed to add real bad, but I like his flair.

Just in case.

Yeah.

He didn't quite get it.

And for your foreshadowing, Mr. Paul Alvarado foreshadowing, this is the one where Clubber Lang says, I don't need a strategy because I pity Rocky. He's such a chump and I don't need him because he's a lumbering fool and I see him coming a mile away. And you start seeing Clubber's arrogance beginning to be his downfall, which is something the movie never hinted at before. But once Clubber becomes champion in his own way, he starts having some of the same issues that Rocky was having, which is sort of interesting.

He is now possessed by hubris. It is this virus that has infected Rocky. And now Rocky has to get cured of from Apollo and from being beaten and Mickey. But now this virus is taking hold on Clubber. And it's this cautionary tale of pride.

Yep. So the fight is, I mean, look, there are nights when I just get stoned and watch the Rocky movie fight scenes one after the other. And that's like the best 45 minutes of my life. But I mean, the fight in this movie is, it's a great fight. It's such a great set piece. I mean, the great thing about it, it's that like basically Rocky movie, like Rocky movie fights all, they have very predictable beats. You know, it's like the fight starts, Rocky, you know, then the opponent gets the better of him. And then the opponent is like, he's beating Rocky. But then Rocky comes back. And I don't think any Rocky movie could ever beat the end of Rocky II, which is both Apollo and Rocky fall to the canvas. And it's about who's gonna like climb up the ropes first to get the title. But it starts with Rocky very aggressively going after Club. He literally crosses the ring and starts like punching a Clubber Lang in a-

He's broken free of his fear.

And he's also broken free of like, what did Clubber Lang say? He's lumbering, you know? And Rocky does not lumber. He's in his float like a butterfly, sting like a bee stays down. He's learned how to fight like Sugar Ray Leonard. And he's going in and he's going after Clubber. And you get the sense that Clubber Lang sort of surprised by this, which is pretty cool.

Yeah, and there's also in the, there's a pre-fight moment that I don't want to skip, which is when the two sides are facing off and you see Apollo facing Clubber Lang. I mean, that's a whole movie in and of itself. Finally, those two and the contrast between the two of them and then how visceral it is that Apollo is offended.

Yeah, by Clubber.

Like that Clubber's whole demeanor, his whole attitude, his whole style, his whole approach, his whole reframing of what it is to be a fighter and a boxer, it fundamentally offends Apollo to the core of his sensibility. And then he goes and tells Rocky that he has to beat him.

Well, here's how it goes. Cause I love how Carl Weathers plays the scene. So Carl Weathers and Rocky, they're about to get in the center. Yeah. Rocky and Clubber are about to get in the center to do the pre-fight fist bump. And you're like, I want a clean fight, whatever. And Clubber starts, so before that Clubber starts shouting, cause Clubber has called Apollo Creed a bunch of names before this.

Yes.

And then Clubber like starts looking at, pointing at Apollo Creed and going, you're next, I'm gonna come after you. And like Apollo Creed, he code switches and he looses his shit. And now you've got Apollo sort of going back to being much more sort of street and kind of stereotypically black. He pulls a code switch. And then, you know, Apollo has been telling Rocky to be cool before the fight, right? And then when finally Clubber and Apollo get torn us away from each other, Rocky turns to Apollo and says, I thought you said be cool. And Apollo goes, that was cool.

Yes. Yes. It's incredible. The other thing too, that I can't believe we missed, but it's such a magnificent and meaningfully symbolic moment is that before Rocky goes in for this fight, Apollo bestows his trunks on Rocky. And Rocky takes that mantle up and he goes into the ring representing and wearing, basically, deferring himself, bowing to Apollo.

Because Rocky has had to become Apollo in order to win this fight, yeah, totally.

And that is like, and I just geek out for symbolism like this, but that is such a mythically powerful moment and meaningful gesture in both directions. And to then see him enter that ring wearing Apollo Creed's colors and trunks, like, oh, wow, like, and then literally it's that the manifestation that in that ring, Clubber is fighting Rocky and Apollo.

There's two things about that scene. First of all, like, this movie is pretty great in that it's showing this friendship as a possibility between a white man and a black man.

And it is former bitter rivals.

Yep. And they are and they are they're not equals. Apollo is by far the superior and Apollo has to bring Rocky up.

Yeah.

The other thing is it reminds me of the end of Highlander Endgame, where Adrian Paul has to decapitate Christophe Lambert and take over all of the Highlanders that Christophe Lambert has in order to defeat. You know, the anyway.

No, give me a start. But there are no other movies. There can only be one.

There can be only one. We have now like we literally have this hybrid of rock. Rocky is wearing Apollo's signature American flag trunks. Literally, races have come together under the mantle of America. And Rocky has this fight with Clubber Lang. And there's two things in this fight that are just I mean, there's so many stand up into your moments.

But in the scene with the other thing, too, the other thing, too, and you touch on this and I'm so sorry, but I would feel like we'd be painfully remiss if we didn't mention it. I thought you were going to this was going to be your punchline earlier. We get Mr. T saying, I pity the fool.

I pity the fool. Yep.

And the world was forever changed.

Yes, indeed it was.

When he said that.

Yep.

And when that moment comes in that movie and I'm like, oh, this is this is the moment this was said and was never could never be unsaid like that.

Like, yeah, no, it's kind of like May the Force be with you. It's like that phrase did not exist in our in our mainstream popular culture.

Yeah.

And then Mr. T says it in Rocky III and suddenly we all pity the fool.

Yeah.

Yeah.

There was before I pity the fool and after I pity the fool.

So there was there was BIPTF and AIPTF., right?

Yeah. Yeah. But that's it's just striking that the accumulation of iconic moments, that this third movie in this trilogy. From I the Tiger to I pity the fool. They're like Hulk Hogan popping up and Mr. T like it is this treasure trove.

And you've got Burt Young acting like he's in a Cassavetes movie. I mean, it is a bridge between many, many different eras of Hollywood.

Yeah.

So one of the things about these fight scenes that I love and actually, I was watching the movie Searching for Bobby Fischer and I realized that the chess match at the end of this movie is exactly the same as the fight in Rocky III because it's all about Rocky starts fighting like Apollo, right? Then he has to fight like Rocky and then he fights like both of them because yes, the scene with Duke and Apollo, Apollo says, even if I get Rocky to where I need him to be, he's not going to last more than eight rounds against this guy. Yeah. So Rocky starts fighting like Apollo Creed. He's doing it. He's doing it. And then of course you have the turn. And because these scenes are musical numbers, they're scenes. They have a dramatic progression. Clubber does one of those slow-mo punches where they just have his roar like, Raaargh! You know, and then of course that's the beginning of a downfall for Rocky. He kind of pissed the shit out of Rocky a little bit. And then Rocky goes back to fight and Apollo's like, he's getting beaten. And Paulie goes, he's not getting beaten. He's getting mad! So now you've got Rocky has fought like Apollo, then he has his setback and then he starts fighting like Rocky again, which is take the beating. And then in the last rounds of it, when Rocky's fighting like Rocky, but he's also like teasing Mr. T and he's like literally touching his mohawk, you know? He has that scene where he literally...

He's toying with him.

And then he puts his glove on Mr. T's mohawk and he's like, you're not so bad, you're not so bad, you're not so bad. I'm sorry, I've just literally turned into a 13-year-old boy because that is so like awesome, you know?

It is pretty great. And you're right, like it is so well thoughtfully constructed. Yes. And designed in terms of the beats that needs a hit and the fact the only way for him to win is, again, he has to win with Apollo. Like it has to be Rocky and Apollo. It takes both of them to beat Clubber Lang.

And just look, the ending of Searching for Bobby Fischer, first he plays like Mr. Pandolfini, his coach, then he plays like Larry Fishburne from the park, the speed chess guy, and then he plays like himself. And it's literally the same dramatic progression here. Like when you get that fusion of all of the things he's learned, that's when he wins.

Yeah, and he becomes the new Rocky.

He becomes the champion of democracy from Rocky IV.

I will say, I will say, and we have been wonderfully aligned in our affection and admiration for this film. And it gives me great joy that I love this movie so much, that I don't disappoint you as your friend. But I will say, to me, the fight felt short.

Oh, interesting. How so? Tell me more.

I feel the fight could have and would have benefited from breathing and from taking more of its time. It felt a little rushed to get to the finish and the victory. I wanted it to be a more arduous struggle, a steeper, longer climb to get there.

So what you're saying is, for the fight, you would have liked for Stallone to give up the reins to Bellatar. No? Is anyone going to get that joke?

I'm not saying it's going to, that's good. I'm not saying it needed to go nine rounds. But I really felt like this movie is really tight, it's moved, we've covered a lot of ground, Rocky has gone on quite a journey, and I was ready to sit back and soak in, like, okay, let's really go. And let's just have a feast of a fight. And I felt a little disappointed, a little cheated, and again, it's admirable in terms of its efficiency, but in terms of drama and impact, I felt like after all the buildup and everything to it, I wanted there to be more to relish and bask in.

Look, that's an interesting point, and I don't have an argument against it. It's how you saw the movie and whether you got what you needed from the movie. You can't disappoint me as a friend for not liking something. I'm way past that. We should talk about that.

I liked it. I just wanted more. I wanted a fuller meal and maybe one also that contrasted more in terms of duration and length than the other that we'd seen. The flip side of that is that it's great to get to the coda, the epilogue.

Then we get to the payoff to all of this planting. Paul, please take it away.

There was a favor that Apollo said as part of this deal.

It's a favor.

Instead of a deal with the devil, Rocky made a deal with the angel that is Apollo Creed. In exchange, Apollo was going to call in a favor after the fight.

What favor?

Exactly. What could it possibly be? It has been built up. Finally, Rocky is victorious. Rocky and Apollo are victorious. They have conquered. He has reclaimed the mantle, but he has reclaimed it righteously. He is now a champion, not because he has been coddled and protected, or because he can take a beating, but because of skill and effort and worth. He is worthy. In a way that we have not seen Rocky be worthy before. And it's because of Apollo. And we go back to the gym.

And they both walk in, and they're both wearing these weird cod pieces. What is that about? And you find out that the reason is... Why are they walking in the gym?

It's a personal choice.

Apollo wants to start a line of fashion cod pieces, and he needs Rocky to bankroll the effort.

And that's... No. Who doesn't need a Rocky cod piece? I think it should be a whole new fashion trend. But no, Apollo wants a rematch.

Yeah.

He wants to go back in the ring and have a rematch. But not for show. Not for pride, for adulation, for money, for fame, for anything. Just for them.

And the great thing about that is that now that Apollo has trained Rocky, you never got the sense in the Rocky movies that Rocky was as great a fighter as Apollo Creed. Again, it was all about Rocky and his persistence. And now Rocky says, do you want to ring the bell? And Apollo goes, ding, ding. And then they get close to each other in the ring. You see the first punch go. And then you have a freeze frame and it goes to a Leroy Neiman painting of the freeze frame.

Ah!

It's perfect.

I am a big believer that movies, there are exceptions to every role. For me, a movie is only as great as its ending. What makes a movie great and last is, what does it leave you with in terms of how it makes you feel? And yes, the foreshadowing was overdone. And it's kind of silly. But it's so beautifully pure as a bookend. And of course, we don't know, we'll never know. But we do know. Because they are now peers. They're equals. And so, yeah, it's the perfect ending. And that they're joined in this love of this sport. And that they now have full, complete respect and admiration for each other.

Which I love because it is heavily hinted at in one of the Creed movies that Apollo won the rematch.

Yes.

I'm not sure if they say definitively, but it is certainly hinted at. And yeah, no, I think you're absolutely right. Look, it's literally a movie about how Rocky gets made into a better man. And as you said, the movie is so pure. I think this movie is so entertaining to me because there's a lot of stuff in Rocky IV and moving forward in Stallone's career that feels very phony. Like he's gone Hollywood, like he's turned into the Rocky of the RockyCon, you know? But out of all of his movies, this is one where I feel like between this one and First Blood are sort of the movies where you saw kind of that, you know, who Stallone was when he wrote Rocky, you know? And you see the best fusion of the mainstream entertainer, and the guy who wrote that little indie film. And again, Apollo Creed, man. I hear they're making a TV series about Apollo. Because like I said, MGM wants to build out the Creedverse or the Rockyverse or whatever they're going to call it. So there you go.

But yeah, I think the one of the things I admire most about the film and by extension admire about Stallone in crafting this is just how intentionally self-aware this film is. In terms of the franchise, in terms of celebrity, in terms of its place in pop culture, in terms of it being the third movie. And yeah, that it strikes that balance between being true to its roots and earnest in its spirit but also embracing and commenting on a very meta level about so many things that it can't exist outside of that vacuum that it is tied up in. Anyway, this was a huge treat.

As Siskel and Ebert would have said in sneak previews, two thumbs up, right?

Two fists up.

Next week.

Next week.

What's our choice for next week?

Next week is June 4, 1982, and there are four movies opening.

Oh, wow.

We have Poltergeist.

Oh.

Star Trek II.

What? I got to choose between Poltergeist and Star Trek II?

Well, hold on, two more. It gets more complicated.

Uh-oh.

Panky Panky, Gene Wilder and Gilda Radner. And then Disney re-releases Bambi.

Wow.

I know what you're picking. Come on, just say it.

Bambi. Okay, Paul. Now, here's the thing, Paul. You and I, I mean, look, you and I are kind of OG geeks at this point. I mean, you're literally like on the ground floor of modern geekdom.

I feel tempted to sway you in that delusion. Don't be falsely humble. But I will let you continue to believe that.

The real question here is, has the world heard enough of guys like you and me talking about Star Trek 2, or can we have something new to say about Star Trek 2?

You know, this is the existential dilemma of our time. Given these choices, I mean, obviously we have to choose Hanky Panky.

Clearly.

No, I have never seen that movie. I only have vague awareness of its existence. Bambi, by the way, I believe a remake has been announced, a live action adaptation that Sarah Polly, I believe, is attached to do a quote unquote live action Bambi. I will see anything Sarah Polly does. So I'm as excited for that as I am of Greta Gerwig Barbie, which is boundlessly. But, you know, Star Trek 2 is like the Bible. I mean, it's like it's a metaphysical imperative. There's no choice other than that. That said, Poltergeist is a great, great, great film, deep in significance and complicated on many levels in its making and place in 80s genre cinema. Also, I think maybe share this with you, recently reconnected it through the amazing ILM documentary on Disney Plus that has some really cool stuff about Poltergeist. So at the risk of straining producer Brad's indulgence...

Are you going to suggest a double feature?

I feel something stirring in my psyche.

Paul, growing up, did your parents let you see two movies on a Friday?

I could have gotten away with that at this point.

The way we would have done it, Brad, is we would have taken the university bus downtown. We would have seen one at the state theater, and then we would have seen the other one at Briarwood that night. So I think we can... It might be two separate podcasts, but members of our audience, stay tuned. Will Paul and Javi see a double feature?

Thank you.

So, there's a very important question that is left unanswered from our very first episode.

Yeah, we have been woefully remiss.

Yes, so I need to know, if you had to choose between having the Rocky Pinball Machine or the Rocky Statue in your home, which would you get?

So, I have given this considerable depth of thought, and-

I'd expect nothing less.

Thank you. I have to go with the Pinball Machine. As tempting as the Statue would be for various seasonal decor, themed cosplay, all sorts of utilitarian functions that one could imagine it could serve, just the sheer, I don't know where I would put it. And the Pinball Machine, though, I think is just, I mean, it's pinball and it's a Rocky Pinball Machine, and the whole aesthetic and sense memories of playing pinball. And I'm just thinking I would get far more persistent enjoyment from that artifact as opposed to the statue. And frankly, I just don't know if I could handle the grandeur of-

It's your virility, in fact.

I know, that would just be a lot. That would be a lot to live with.

Well, I'll tell you this. My answer to that question is straight up no chase of the statue, I've never wavered. I didn't have to think about it. And I'll tell you where it goes. It goes right next to my front door. Like literally, you're coming up to my house, a little path leading up to the front door, you know, from the front patio, and right smack there where the ferns are right now. Boom, Rocky Balboa. So he can cast a shade over my living room. Yep.

I'm honestly so happy that we're not fighting over-

I know, I know. But also, I should hope that you would applaud my moral clarity here, but whatevs.

I do, and I look forward to visiting your statue and paying tribute to it.

In the home where I live without my wife, who has divorced me for putting a Rocky statue in front of the door.

Ding ding!