In 2015, an unlikely Chicago Cubs team made a playoff run that ended in the national league championship series. With an offseason coaching change and young ball club, preseason predictions at best placed them battling for third in the central division with 16-1 odds of winning the World Series. Still, regardless of Vegas spreads and talent acquisition, 2015 was a pop culture prophetic year.
If Marty Mcfly had landed on 2015 in Back to the Future, he would’ve seen the Cubs win the series. It’s the prophecy that had been etched in every Cubs fans mind as a glimmer of hope, since the film was released in 1989. But, ultimately hope faded and the film remained as it always had been–science fiction.
The saga of Rocky Balboa is one of the most commonly used analogies to link coincidence of real life professional boxing to fictional film. The polarizing character aspects both hero and villain possess create easy reflections of actual fighters. It’s most recent imitation is not Klitschkos resemblance to the chiseled Soviet Ivan Drago or Rocky’s return to the ring one too many times in Balboa just to get beat on like James Toney. This time the similarity to the chronicle is a projection of the crazed mandatory Clubber Lang. Only now the confident adversary is not from the black inner city streets of America. No, Tyson Fury is a white chaos from Great Britain.
The spectacles that Fury has made of the moments leading to his heavyweight championship bout with Wladimir Klitschko have been Clubber style. Portrayed by Mr. T in the third installment, Lang was the number 1 contender that annihilated the now well received champion Rocky Balboa with public disrespect. From the initial press conference that had Fury strolling into the well dressed event decked in blue jeans and an Abercrombie style polo, giving parting remarks in accepted European vulgarity towards Klitschko. Tyson has continued to command the air in an open defiance of the champ.
Only would Clubber Lang show up at a ceremonial statue unveiling for the well respected champion, yelling obscenities and condemnation at Rocky and his family. So goes Tyson Fury in a batman costume knocking Klitschkos’ rightfully accumulated titles to the floor, only to leave the room and return in business attire for another demeaning verbal outburst at the champion. Really, if you have not seen any of the press conferences or subsequent interviews look them up on YouTube. It’s golden. The character envisioned by Stallone in Rocky 3 is there.
The ability to liken real life events to a fictional work is a curious joy in film. That through visual entertainment we are familiar with life’s unknown outcomes. However at some point, the mirror reflection returns to pure imagination. The 2015 season for the Chicago Cubs has come and gone. And the north-siders are still without crown. The same thing will happen for Tyson Fury as well. The reflection of life and fiction will soon fade. If Fury is correct in his Clubber assertions of his dominance over Klitschko and becomes champion. It won’t matter if Apollo Creed himself trained Klitschko for the rematch. Those titles are staying with Fury.
Opinion was derived from watching interviews of Tyson Fury with Michelle Phelps of Behind the Gloves and Sham Ayum of BeRealTV. Press conferences were presented by Skysports. Thank you.
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Edited by Nat Wilkins of Brooklyn Fights
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