The Wilderness. Almost as soon as Moses and the Hebrews make a break for it, the Israelites start whining. They complain about not having any food and, when God sends some, they complain about how tiresome it was. (No surprise that God found his chosen people pretty tiresome Himself.) They spend 40 years wandering out in the hot, dry, sandy, barren wilderness—chasing after the promise of a better place. But man, it can be hard to focus on that future promised land when the present is so terrible.
Adonis’ own wilderness—his training center in Creed II—plays the part of a Middle East desert reasonably well. It’s hot, dry and barren, and Adonis, like the Israelites, seems in almost constant misery (though he doesn’t whine about it nearly as much). Rocky tells him bluntly that, to get to where he wants to go, he’s going to have to suffer, and suffer a lot. So Adonis suffers—getting pummeled in the ribs by sparring partners, getting thwacked in the gut by Rocky’s medicine ball, throwing up in the middle of training, passing out while running down a road to nowhere.
Getting Stronger. But all that suffering serves a purpose. In the Bible, wandering in the desert was both a chastening and humbling experience—necessary steps in forging a new land on the eastern edge of the Mediterranean. Wandering through the wilderness strengthened the people, too. Most everyone who left Egypt died on the way to the Promised Land, leaving a bevy of youngsters—literally born and bred to the harshness of the desert—as a force that terrified that land’s current inhabitants. When the Israelites came to take possession of the land they felt God had given them, little could stand in their way.
In Adonis’ own personal wilderness, he strips away all the luxuries that he became accustomed to. He’s humbled in that desert. He’s chastened. He grows in his own strength, and just as importantly his own understanding of who he is and what he’s fighting for.
As literal as Adonis’ wilderness feels, his personal Promised Land is more ephemeral. While he’s interested in retaining his crown and creating his own kingdom (that is, his own legacy), he’s fighting for more than that: He’s fighting for his wife, his child, and his own understanding of what it means to be a good father, husband and man. And none of that necessarily requires a knockout to get.
No, for Adonis, perhaps the fight’s Promised Land is secondary. It’s the Wilderness, Rocky’s “hell” he had to go through to see that Promised Land, that makes him who he is.
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