Creed: Adonis Creed (ISFP)

Creed is a series consisting of three movies, as of the writing of this article. It’s a follow-up, or perhaps, a spin-off of the Rocky series, only it follows the son of Apollo Creed. Previously, we analyzed the characters from the Rocky series, which you can check out here: The MBTI Personality Types in Rocky. For the Creed series, we will only be analyzing Adonis Creed, who appears to be an ISFP. The other characters get so little focus, that we’re not comfortable taking a definite stance. Adonis Creed is the generally accepted as an ISFP, and we saw no reason to contest that when watching the series ourselves. Below, you can check out the evidence we found to support Adonis Creed being an ISFP.

Fi:

“If we didn’t do what we loved, we wouldn’t exist.”

“Look, this career just ain’t for me.”

“…I did it, but I didn’t do it for you, or because of them. I did it because it was my fight.”

Adonis Creed values staying true to himself and his feelings. The first movie starts out with him walking away from a stable job, in spite of just receiving a promotion, so he can follow his dream to box. He doesn’t try to hold onto the job as a security blanket, but instead completely commits without getting any guarantees from a trainer first. To him, it’s worse to not try to do what he loves.

Adonis struggles to change his name to Creed, in spite of the fact that it’ll allow him the chance at professional boxing that he so badly wants. He doesn’t see himself as a Creed, and wants to build his own legacy and make his own name. He doesn’t want people to see him differently once he’s officially connected to his father, and he doesn’t want to be deemed a fraud, or a fake Creed. Being referred to as “Baby Creed” or a fake Creed is the quickest way to get his blood boiling. The first two movies essentially deal with him learning to accept his identity as a Creed.

Adonis is an extremely private individual. He keeps his emotions to himself, which is a source of conflict between him and Bianca. Whenever he deals with trauma, Adonis emotionally locks down and sits in his emotions, isolating himself from everyone around him. Bianca will try to push him to open up, but he usually struggles to do so because he prefers to keep everything inside.

Se:

“I can’t think like that… I don’t wanna go there.”

“There’s nothing to talk about! I don’t wanna talk about anything! I’ve been trying to forget it! It’s dead! Leave it! Leave it! Let it lie!”

“Yeah, but when he went down, I didn’t reach out. I never called. I didn’t write. After a while, it felt easier to pretend like I forgot. You know, just act like it never happened.”

Adonis outlets his emotions through his fists. Because he’s Fi first and Se second, Adonis comes across as controlled and reserved, right up until he’s emotionally triggered. This weakness of his is made apparent almost immediately in the movies. He gets in fights constantly as a kid, and even into adulthood. Whenever he gets upset, Adonis’ first impulse is to fight. As is typical for high Se users, he defaults to being physical, rather than using words.

Adonis prefers to live in the moment, when his Fi isn’t getting in the way. He has a tendency to move on quickly from the past and try to avoid it. This tendency plays a major role in the third movie’s plot. He has completely buried the past, and with it, the brother-like relationship he had with Dame. In addition, when faced with potential future issues, Adonis shows signs of avoiding thinking about those in advance as well, unless he has no choice. For instance, he fixates on the issue with whether to accept the name of Creed, because he’s being forced into a decision. However, when faced with the possibility of his daughter being deaf, Adonis doesn’t want to entertain the idea at all. When Rocky prompts him to consider it, Adonis just says, “I can’t think like that… I don’t wanna go there.” He’d rather wait until it happens before thinking about it.

Ni:

“Most people think it’s about violence, but it’s not. It’s timing and focus and [control].”

“I was afraid. Of this. Expectations. Being the champ. I was scared I couldn’t do what he couldn’t. It’s weird. I used to feel like he was a part of me. Now I can’t hear him, or that thing, that thing that tells me to get in the ring. Move my feet, keep my hands up. Hit anything that gets in my way. I can’t hear it anymore.”

Tertiary Ni can a hard function to prove, considering its silent nature. However, there are a few clues that Adonis has this function. When teaching his daughter, Adonis explains that boxing is not about violence, which is what it appears to be. Instead, he tells her that it’s about timing, focus, and control. By this movie, Adonis has generally become a more controlled individual, and he’s shown taking a more strategic approach to his final match. (The match gets likened to a game of chess.)

In the second movie, Adonis falls into a Fi-Ni loop. After losing to Drago, he mentally withdraws from everyone around him. There is a deadline for when he has to fight again, to defend his title, but he avoids boxing altogether. Adonis gets caught in his internal struggle, seeing himself as a failure, unable to pull himself out of it and move forward. He loses touch with his fighting instincts (Se), which he explains in the quote at the top of this section.

Te:

“I was afraid I couldn’t live up to his expectations.”

“I’m afraid of taking on the name and losing. They’ll call me a fraud. Fake creed.”

Inferior Te often surfaces as a fear of being ineffective or unsuccessful in the real world. In Adonis, this shows up as a fear of not meeting expectations. Adonis spends a large portion of the series suffering from imposter syndrome. For instance, he struggles to take on the name of Creed, partially because he fears the expectations that come with it. Even in the second movie, he’s still struggling with the implications of his namesake, worried that he would fail in the same way that his father did. This fear along with the antagonizing of the fight coordinator causes him to overreact. Adonis tells Rocky that his reason for accepting the fight is to not let them “disrespect me like that”. In reality, it was spurred by his own insecurity and fears of being perceived as a fake, failure, or coward.