The following contains spoilers for Creed III, now playing in theaters.
One of the most intriguing aspects of Adonis Creed's boxing journey in Creed III is his mistakes as a youth. It ends up driving the movie, revealing he was an angry kid who got into a skirmish outside a convenience store in Los Angeles. Unfortunately, Adonis fled the scene, leaving a friend to take the fall for him.
It resulted in Jonathan Majors' Damian Anderson going to prison for 18 years, which is why he's now out and wanting Adonis' fame and money. That creates an enticing sibling rivalry as Adonis trains with Viktor Drago after coming out of retirement to take his title back from "Diamond Dame" and restore honor to the sport. However, Creed III cut a key scene from the trailers, which sells Adonis' legacy short.
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Creed III Cut the Correctional Home Sequence
In the first trailer for Creed III, there's a sequence showing Adonis, Bianca and their daughter, Amara, in a boys' correctional facility. The kids are chanting for Adonis, inspiring him. The movie would reveal this is the kind of place he and Damian ended up as kids, informing their anger. They'd get abused, which is why Adonis ended up fighting with one of the guys from the facility at the store.
Years later, after Damian sets up the fight with Adonis, the protagonist returns with his family, hoping to erase his rage and the bad memories from that place. However, the movie omits this sequence, despite Adonis talking about it being part of so much darkness. In fact, it's the catalyst for his entire journey, as it would set him up to let Damian take the blame and go on to accept his own fate as Apollo's son. But by cutting the scene, Creed III omits a powerful moment of catharsis.
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Creed III's Cut Scene Spoke to Second Chances
The scene would have helped Adonis and Bianca through a rough patch as he hid all this from her. He didn't want her to think he was a problem child, especially as Amara was also getting violent at school to bullies. Thus, apart from helping Bianca to relate to his story, this sequence would have bridged a generational gap and shown Amara why aggression leads to dire repercussions -- giving him and his kin much-needed direction and emotional stability with their anger.
In addition, it would remind Adonis that Damian suffered in isolation. That's why, when he didn't write his buddy in jail, Damian grew hateful. However, seeing all these boys chanting for Adonis would give him hope, justify his redemption and spark the thought that Damian wasn't the villain -- he was just a sympathetic lost soul. Honestly, it'd have capped Adonis' origin and tied into the arc of impoverished Black youth, systematic racism and how institutions don't offer kids like Damian a second chance. Ultimately, this prison sequence represented closure, and by cutting it, Adonis' beginnings and his moving forward from the past end up missing out on that extra nuance.
To see where the cut seen could have fit in, Creed III is now playing in theaters.
