I don't care about Tommy Gunn at all and I don't want to see him fight. I'm glad Rocky whooped his ass.
After the dissapointment of Rocky 4, this feels more like a Rocky movie again. Not focused on just the fight in the ring but mostly outside. Some of the Story is a bit too on the nose but this is the Rocky I like.
If the best revenge is living well, then apparently Drago got the last laugh as Rocky V finds Rocky Balboa bankrupt and suffering from permanent brain damage. After going bankrupt Rocky moves back to his old neighborhood in Philly and reopens Mickey’s gym, where he meets a young fighter named Tommy Gunn and becomes his manager. This is undoubtedly the worst of the Rocky films, making a fatal error on the direction to take the series. The film attempts to return Rocky to his roots, which isn’t a bad idea in concept (and worked well in Rocky III). But after Rocky’s triumphant victory over the Russians in Rocky IV, bankrupting and crippling him just serves to alienate the fans. And then there’s Tommy Gunn, the blandest, most uninteresting of all of Rocky’s foils. Rocky V scuttles the series and is one of those few films in a franchise that’s best forgotten, to be wiped out of existence as if it never happened.
It abandons combat and returns to the original dramatic tone.
In some ways, it's comforting that nostalgia-bait/excessive fan service isn't a new phenomenon, as the Rocky series is probably a more egregious offender than even the worst modern examples. However, I'm probably not the best judge, because I watched the first five films in the series over the course of a month, whereas they were released over the course of two and half decades. The passage of time is the key ingredient for nostalgia. Without it, it just feels like an unearned rehash of what we've seen before. In any case, this film was definitely my least favorite of the bunch so far, and a lot of that is due to the overall premise/inciting incident (Rocky losing everything and having to move back to where he started), which feels so manufactured/rushed that it really took me out of things. Add on to that a strange arc for Tommy Gunn and an oddly edited street-fight finale and you're left wondering if the Rocky series should have ended at 3, or even 1.
A lot of scumbags in this movie. Starting with Uncle Paulie, of couse the turncoat Tommy, his manager and the bullies at school.
Then there‘s the good guys, Rocky and his wonderful wife and son.
I enjoyed the previous four installations more, Number 5 is still better than a whole bunch of other movies.
Not particularly better or worse than the original cut of IV, despite its reputation. There’s some good ideas here. Tommy Morrison actually has some charm, and Gunn could’ve been the antagonist with the most depth since Apollo. But they toss that to the side pretty quick. Everything in this movie is too quick. Rocky’s downfall, his neglect of his family, the ending. While the street fight itself is a unique conceit for the series, it’s nothing special, and the movie tries to act as if everything has been resolved and tied up neatly in a way that contrasts the roots it claims to be going back to. There was triumph in the original Rocky, but there was realness too. This tries for both but finds neither.
The first real Rocky that I do not really plan to revisit for fun. The plot tries to be better than the last few, but it takes away the great villain and stakes of the boxing aspect of the movie. It is still a good movie, just notably (and quite easily) the worst Rocky film.
Rating: 2.5/5 - 7/10 - Worth Watching
Promising plot for the 5th film as Rocky becomes a mentor to a promising young boxer after Rocky and Adrian lost everything in a financial scandal after returning home from Russia forcing them to move back into the city. Good story of the struggle with Rocky balancing the relationship between his son and his new prodigy. However the shadow of Rocky's fame causes issues therefore resulting in a bloody ending but not in the ring which makes for a disappointment. Would have been better to finish with #4.
A misstep. And it's flawed by a few production decisions.
The misstep is the decision to take away virtually everything Rocky had gained in his journey so far.
The flaws - the music being majority rap. The flashback to Mickey. The lack of nuance - everything is just so heavy-handed.
One throughpoint of Stallone's career is that he at least understood what people wanted from their films. And he wrote for them rather than the critics...
I can't think what Stallone was trying to do with this and whether it was lost in the edit as Rocky IV seemed to be... Who knows. I don't expect this one to get the later life Director's Cut like IV did.
Once again though we get a mashup of what was going on in Stallone's world versus what was going on with the world at large. Tyson had emerged in the 5 years since IV and the rise/fall of Mike is mirrored somewhat in Tommy Gunn (Little did anyone know what reality had in store for Tommy just a few years later).
And Stallone's own career stall was beginning to weigh on his thinking... A few years later he would recreate his persona and a decade & a half later he would go a long way to rectify this film as being the end of an anthology for the ages.
Worst of the series for sure but Rocky has built up a huge amount of goodwill by this point that all is forgiven.
5.5/10
So, I realize I dont hate the entire movie. Just the stupid street fight at the end.
I'm so glad the "Rocky" series didn't end with the fifth installment. There's really pretty much nothing positive to say. The approach that Rocky is now the trainer and no longer the boxer can definitely work. The "Creed" films proved that. But the implementation in "Rocky V" was abysmal. Sylvester Stallone appeared to have no desire to play this character at all at this point. And Tommy "The Machine" Gunn is probably the weakest antagonist of the entire franchise, and the whole Balboa family drama was just a complete waste of time. Furthermore, there is no cool training montage and only a ridiculously boring final fight. "Rocky V" is the series' definitive low point.
Subpar compared to the previous 4 Rocky movies. Didn't have that same feeling, that same vibe.
Shout by DeletedBlockedParent2021-01-27T10:39:25Z
Of all the Rocky movies I think it is the weakest, but none is bad