Creed II (2018) review

Part two of the Creed series has heavyweight champion Adonis (Michael B. Jordan) challenged by Viktor Drago (Florian Munteanu) - son of Ivan (Dolph Lundgren) - which he accepts against the wishes of his trainer Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone, who co-wrote the script), they fight, he "loses" and lands in the hospital ... and then needs his old mentor back to prepare for a rematch in Moscow.  It's easy to predict where this is going from the start - and "revisits" the events that took place in 1985's Rocky IV where Ivan killed Adonis' father Apollo - which makes it a little bit of a chore to get through (and the pleas for sympathy are groan-worthy), but the cast is likeable and worth cheering for, including Adonis' singer girlfriend Bianca (Tessa Thompson), who's pregnant with their first child.  Also, who knew that pounding dirt with a sledgehammer in New Mexico was the "key" to pulverizing a significantly larger Ukrainian man in the ring?