The ‘Rocky’ movies ranked, from best to ‘Rocky V’

There are some things we can all agree upon when it comes to the Rocky movies. That Rocky is a (mostly) unassailable gem, an irresistibly charming, gut-punching, seat-of-your-pants-cheering tale of a fictional hoagie-mouthed palooka who beats the odds, wins his true love’s heart, and goes the distance with the heavyweight champ. And that Paulie’s relationship with that robot in Rocky IV is just downright creepy.

No one can disagree that in the real world, our plodding pugilistic hero could probably never flatten his menacing rivals. Not the fast-fisted Apollo Creed. Not the “Ultimate Male” Thunderlips. Not the brutal Clubber Lang. Not the merciless Ivan Drago. Not even the utterly forgettable and horribly named Mason “The Line” Dixon. (OK, I’ll give him Tommy Gunn in a street fight.)

But we love Rocky still. The pure fire that fuels the heart of Rocky and its five sequels (the excellent Creed movies are their own franchise to rank) has bled into the fabric of Philly’s underdog identity. In his all-or-nothing way, the Italian Stallion brawled his way into Philly’s soul. In 2015, when Pope Francis visited Philadelphia, we greeted His Holiness not with “Hallelujah” but the triumphant trumpets of the Rocky theme song.

Rocky is us.

So why rank the Rockys? Why not let them stand on their own saccharine, South Philly-style, Capra-esque charms, for better or worse? Because the world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows, that’s why. And I didn’t hear no bell, so let’s go one more round with the Rock.

We don’t have to go to the scorecards on this one. There’s a reason Sylvester Stallone all but disowned the fifth installment of his massively popular franchise. It’s a very, very bad movie.

It starts out with such a promising premise: Brain-damaged and bankrupt (Paulie accidentally signed away the Balboa fortune), Rocky and Adrian wind up back in the old South Philly rowhouse. Then the film, which has Talia Shire’s last appearance in a Rocky film, spirals. Literally breaking out his old fedora and black rubber ball, Rocky reopens Mickey’s gym and trains his roughneck protégé, Tommy Gunn (played by the late boxer Tommy Morrison), while forgetting all about his son, Robert Jr., played by Stallone’s late son, Sage.

It all builds lifelessly to a five-minute-plus street fight between Rocky and Tommy Gunn that is saved by the fact that it’s filmed entirely by the local news. A Rocky montage plays over the final credits, but luckily this wasn’t goodbye.

Written and directed by Stallone 15 years after the embarrassing Rocky V, the last installment of the original Rocky movies is pure nostalgia, and a nearly note-for-note tribute to the first movie.

The plot is predictably silly: A 60-year-old Rocky runs a South Philly restaurant, while mourning Adrian, who died from “woman cancer,” as he puts it (we never said these movies were progressive). When a chance comes up for Rocky to fight an exhibition match against the current heavyweight champ, Mason Dixon, played by real life boxer Antonio Tarver, everyone is against it. Especially Rocky’s son, Robert Jr., played by Milo Ventimiglia.

» READ MORE: Test your knowledge of Philly-based movies by guessing the locations they were shot in

The movie inexplicably ignores the brain damage from the previous film. The nostalgia hits the heartstrings — hey, there’s Spider Rico! Philly has a shine never seen in a Rocky movie, and it’s fun to see old Rocky shuffle through the changed city. But it doesn’t really add up to anything.

The movie falls flat emotionally, especially the big fight, or exhibition, the only one in all the films not meticulously choreographed — and it shows. Adrian’s absence is keenly felt. All in all, this trip down memory lane doesn’t take us much of anywhere new. And Rocky deserved a better swan song. (Thankfully, he got it in Creed.)

The highest-grossing Rocky movie, Rocky IV is in a class of its own. It’s less a classic Rocky movie, and more a Cold War action fantasy with some sick training montages of a bearded Rocky running through a tundra, chopping down trees, hurling rocks, and pulling Paulie on a sled at a Siberia-like training camp. The fight with Drago is punishing even for a Rocky movie (an errant punch landed Stallone in the hospital for nine days after his heart started to swell).

In short, Rocky defeats communism with his fists.

» READ MORE: ‘Rocky’, and the 49 other best Philly movies

And then, in his garbled way, informs Mikhail Gorbachev and a rapt audience of unblinking Soviets that geopolitical conflict is better solved through boxing than nuclear war. (He’s not wrong.) Avenging Apollo Creed, Rocky defeats the towering Ivan Drago, played by a silent, stalking Dolph Lundgren, on Christmas Eve. (Take that, godless Soviets!) But all this is almost irreparably marred by the robot, as the gang from South Fellini points out in a hilarious nearly two-hour podcast on the hour-and-a-half movie.

Rocky inexplicably comes into the possession of a humanoid robot, and even more inexplicably, gives it to boorish, drunken Paulie, who more or less marries the thing. Unforgivably, the robot is then assigned to babysitting duty for 9-year-old Rocky Jr. and his friends, while Rocky and Paulie and Adrian go off to save the free world. Outside a Rocky movie, the implications here could power a horror flick. Fortunately, Stallone left most of this out in the 2021 director’s cut of the film.

In all fairness, Rocky IV also includes one of Paulie’s finest moments: his teary prefight speech to Rock. The emotional pep talk is a reminder of just how much the late Burt Young brought to the character of Paulie.

The sequel that birthed all the other sequels. With the potential franchise’s future riding on it, this movie had to be good — and in the first act, it’s a knockout!

The irresistible, scruffy appeal of Rocky and Adrian’s romance is on full display as Rocky spends his winnings. “My husband’s an expert on bricks,” Adrian proudly tells a real estate agent, as the couple tours a new home. And there’s Rocky’s proposal to Adrian at the snowy zoo: “I was wonderin’ if, uh, you wouldn’t mind marryin’ me very much.”

But then, after giving birth to Rocky Jr., Adrian slips into what feels like a very very very long coma, and the movie never fully recovers. Even Mickey, in a clip which has seemingly been played at every Flyers home game since, can’t wait to get back to the action. While it’s fun watching Rocky chase chickens for Mickey, his ultimate victory in the rematch with Apollo feels too Hollywood (and honestly, Rocky would never beat Apollo).

Rocky III was the big surprise of my recent rewatch of all six films. There’s so much to like here. There’s Paulie’s very dark and very jealous takedown of a Rocky pinball machine and Rocky’s hilarious exhibition with the giant wrestler Thunderlips, portrayed by Hulk Hogan (“The Ultimate Male vs. the Ultimate Meatball,” the wrestler intones). Mickey’s dying goodbye to Rocky ( “I love ya kid, I love ya”) is an immediate tearjerker, and a pivotal moment in the franchise. Clubber Lang, played by Mr. T, who Stallone spotted on a televised tough guy bouncer competition, is criminally underwritten. As it is, he’s a raging quote machine. When the announcer asks for his prefight prediction, Lang simply scowls, “Pain.” The movie even gave the mohawked actor his catchphrase: “I don’t hate Balboa, but I pity the fool.” The movie’s training sojourn to Apollo’s old gym gives us the longest look into the former champ’s backstory until the Creed movies. The Balboa vs. Lang rematch is one of the best fights of any Rocky movie, and not just because it’s a quick one.

The quintessential Philadelphia film, and it’s not even a close contest. From the opening minutes, we’re taken by Rocky’s sweet lunkhead charm and the gritty reality of his place in the world. This movie has a sense of place that sets the stage for all that’s to come: from the flaming trash cans where the street singers sing to the sweat-soaked Mighty Mick’s Gym, to the grungy Art Museum steps before the film made them famous.

It’s classic, simple storytelling about a guy grasping to rise above his station for even a moment and find love — who just happens to be a boxer. Stallone wrote the basis of the script in three and a half days, and it’s pitch-perfect. He then famously rewrote some of the movie’s most memorable scenes on the fly during filming. Like Rocky and Adrian’s date at the ice rink and his antsy late night visit to the arena the night before the big fight.

Carl Weathers is so good as Apollo Creed it’s almost hard not to root for him. Weathers, a former NFL linebacker who died earlier this year, is wholly believable as the heavyweight champ. His Muhammad Ali knockoff plays as the perfect foil for Rocky.

And then there’s Adrian, who Shire slowly brings out of her shell. The performance earned Shire her first best actress nod — you can’t not root for Adrian and Rocky. (One caveat: the infamous first kiss scene has not aged well.) When the film debuted in 1976, people rose from their seats cheering. It’s hard not to do that even today.