Its taken me a couple of days (and, admittedly, nights) to fully grasp the realization that Stallone is going to make another Rocky movie. There's so many things wrong with this movie, I don't even know where to start. Wait, no I do. The opponent is named Mason "The Line" Dixon. You're kidding me. What happened to inspired names like Apollo Creed, Thunderlips, Clubber Lang, or even Spider Rico? Mason the line Dixon? Wow. And the big rumor is Roy Jones is in the running for the part. Great. Even Carl Weathers in his "Chubbs" costume complete with wood arm couldn't rescue that part with such a ridiculous name. But its just a name, I suppose, so is there anything else I don't like about this movie? Hmm, come to think of it, there is...
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When my buddy Dick sent me an email with a link to the story in the Hollywood Reporter, he made this comment:
"I think there is a typo in the article as well. It says this would be Rocky 6, but I think they mean Rocky 5. I don't remember anything else coming after the 4th one, do you?"
Come to think of it, yeah, why are they calling it the sixth Rocky movie? Did I miss something? Was there a TV movie or a reunion or something, that they named "Rocky 5" so they can't use it now? What's the deal?
Apparently, the writers were confused as well, as the new movie is tentatively named "Rocky Balboa". Why not continue with the numerically sequential naming? What about "Rocky V"? That has a nice ring to it, doesn't it? How could you miss with a movie named Rocky V? I mean, even with the worst script EVER, and the usual bad acting from Stallone, I'm pretty sure you'd have a classic movie with a name like Rocky V. That V at the end just makes it bad ass by default, wouldn't it? I mean, lets say you made the greivous error of casting someone like, oh, Tommy Morrison in the movie. Even with that, it would still rock. So why skip the numeral to go right to VI? Seems fishy to me.
There has to be a reason. Did NBC make a TV movie of the week, picking up with Rocky as Heavyweight Champion after disposing of Ivan Drago, only they couldn't afford Sly with a MOW budget so they cast some cheaper Sly-wannabe like, say, Steven Seagal as Rocky? Or maybe an even worse actor? How did I miss this?
I mean, I consider myself pretty knowledgeable on many pop culture things, and I just can't for the life of me remember anything anywhere being released after Rocky IV. Furthermore, with this being the case, there is no reason for the new movie to skip ahead to Rocky VI, unless its some futuristic sequel, showing you things to happen maybe five years down the road, and then in a coy marketing ploy, they'll release Rocky V as a prequel to this new movie.
Maybe that's it. Because, and I could be wrong, there was never a Rocky V, right? Tell me I'm right.
You know what it probably is? Just a simple typographical error, somebody accidentally typing a "6'" instead of a "5". The keys are right next to each other, its simple to do. I've done it myself. It probably just slipped through the proofreaders. So I'm probably getting all lathered up for nothing. They're not skipping "V", its just a typo.
You bet.
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