Why You're Stupid: A Tale of Two Rockys

1 Shitty Self-Serious Rocky (Rocky, Rocky V, first half of Rocky II)

First there are the self-serious, pseudo cinema verite, shitty Rocky films. These are the Rockys in which events have consequences. The Rockys in which Rocky loses. In which Rocky is poor. These are the Rocky films that actually acknowledge the fact that, in all likelihood, Rocky Balboa is mentally retarded.

The universally despised fifth installment was this sort of Rocky and so was the overrated original. Yeah, we know that you "film buffs" claim to like the first one the best. "It encounters human suffering in a way that is brave and unwavering," you say.

Well, how about I stand over your cubicle and try to blow myself for 90 straight minutes? That would be brave and unwavering, but it wouldn't be fun to watch, would it? If Rocky VI is the Shitty Self-Serious Rocky it will play out something like this:

Synopsis of Shitty Self Serious Rocky VI:

Before the film starts, Adrian dies in a car crash, or of ovarian cancer or in a car crash caused by ovarian cancer. At the funeral, Rocky's son comes out of the closet, forcing the aging boxer to confront his out-dated aversion to homosexuals. At some point, Rocky gets into a boxing match that he either wins while at the same time losing in life, or loses while at the same time winning in life. You, the audience, go home and beat your spouse.

These are the Rockys of Clubber Lang and Ivan Drago. These are the Rockys in which his opponents murder Rocky's loved ones and appear to be happy they've done so. These are movies in which Rocky Balboa single-handedly ends the Cold War.

The transition from Shitty Self-Serious Rocky to Fucking Sweet Rocky happened halfway through Rocky II as Balboa prays at his wife's bedside. She is in a coma due to complications caused by childbirth. Up to this point, the Rocky films have been gritty and realistic looks at a mentally challenged boxer.

And then everything changes. Adrian wakes up from her coma and inexplicably demands that Rocky win. She has been in a coma for weeks and the first thought on her mind is that she wants her husband to beat another man within inches of his life. Does this make sense? No, and that's the first sign that we've entered Fucking Sweet Rocky Zone.

From here to the end of Rocky IV, we don't look back. Balboa is throwing murder-avenging upper cuts and driving motorcycles and Italian sports cars. Half of his time is spent in musical montages, sprinting away from the KGB and punching pro wrestlers and Mr. T. It doesn't make sense and it doesn't give a fuck that it doesn't make sense.

If there is a God, He will let Rocky VI be this sort of Rocky. He will let Rocky's opponent be a murderous caricature of ethnic stereotypes. He will let Rocky fight evil to the strains of rock and roll power ballads. He will let Rocky VI play out something like this:

Synopsis of Fucking Sweet Rocky VI:

Adrian is walking down the street when an Iranian suicide bomber vaporizes her and a bus full of school children. Cut to Rocky watching TV as the Iranian Boxing Champion Osama 'Jihad' Van Laden (a bearded, turban wearing Jean-Claude Van Damme) looks into the camera and says: "I ordered the attack on Rocky's wife. Jihad on America!"

Rocky decides to avenge Adrian's death and fight Van Laden. Unfortunately, the American government won't sanction the bout because they think Rocky is too old and will lose.

Luckily, Rocky's neighbor is Lou Gossett Jr., an ex-Naval aviator who teaches him to steal and fly a Stealth Bomber.

Rocky flies to Iran, organizes a sanctioned boxing match and trains by bench pressing camels and running through the desert, all to the strains of The Darkness.

In the boxing match, Rocky gets brutally beaten for fourteen rounds and then tears Van Laden's adam's apple out of his neck in the fifteenth round. After the fight, Rocky gives a rambling victory speech that ends global hunger and gives everyone who hears it an erection.

THE END