by Heath Lynch, Contributing Writer
In this day and age, it is nearly impossible to not have some kind of pre-formed opinion regarding the Fast & Furious franchise. What started as a simple Point Break knock off has spawned into a media empire that has grossed over $7 billion — that’s billion with a B — at the box office over the course of more than 20 years, and now, with this entry, 11 movies. At this point, you know what you’re getting into. Odds are you either really enjoy these movies, or really… don’t. There’s very little middle ground on these films it seems.
Me? I’ve been following the series since its early days going back to 2001’s The Fast and the Furious. I ironically love the original three movies for how campy and absurd they are. I genuinely love Fast Five, widely considered the best film in this IP, due to its ability to finally reach the right gear, and to understand its tone, action, and large ensemble cast. But since then it has been a downhill slide. In fact, I absolutely despise what this franchise has become, and hate many of the recent outings, especially the most recent F9: The Fast Saga.
These days, I find myself watching these more out of a sense of completionist obligation and morbid curiosity than I do out of a sense of wanting some fun entertainment. So that leads us to this newest entry: Fast X. Is this the movie that brings lapsed fans back into the fold? Can we reach back up to the high water mark of Fast Five, or is this more of a downhill slide? Well, it’s a bit of both. While this is better than several of the recent films in this series, that’s a low bar to clear. As such, Fast X is a flick that is only watchable due to its new franchise antagonist, as it otherwise falls back on its eye-rolling old tropes.
As is second nature for the Fast & Furious movies, this movie opens with yet another retconning of previous events from a past film. You can almost sense the desperation in the movie (the recent films have been sliding in the box office) to try and latch onto nostalgia and a movie that people actually enjoy with this tying into the epic vault heist scene at the end of Fast Five. I will admit that even me, myself, and I were a little tickled by this, as it instantly made me more invested in this new adventure, as well as this new character, Dante Reyes (played deliciously by Jason Momoa). Our new villain is undeniably the best part of this movie. He is completely unhinged, delivering a sociopathic performance that is a much needed, and welcomed, gasp of fresh air for this franchise. He’s eccentric, bombastic, and over-the-top in a deliriously entertaining way, and I loved it. From his physical mannerisms, to his androgynous representation, I loved it. He’s everything I didn’t know I needed in this series. My one knock on him would be that he sometimes comes off like a diluted version of the Joker, especially when he’s talking to corpses in the same vein that Jack Nicholson once did, but he’s still a blast to watch.
The opening act of this movie, which serves as an introduction to Reyes, his maniacal ways, and delivers us an insane action sequence in which a giant neutron bomb, is rolling through the streets of Rome (that is very not subtly evoking the same kind of action of the lauded, previously mentioned/shown on screen, safe heist sequence from a superior movie) is the best chunk of this movie.
I got the sense the film was attempting to take the series back to its roots, at least a little bit: no more superhuman powers, no secret agent mission where cars drop from the atmosphere, no high-powered magnetrons that defy physics and common sense, no technological MacGuffins that will destroy the world with the press of a button, and no cars going to space! Just a bunch of people racing down the streets trying to stop a bomb before it explodes. For the briefest of moments I, dare I say it, actually smiled while watching this movie, which is the first time one of these movies have made me do that in years.
But then, the wheels fall off…
Any amount of enjoyment I was having goes out the window. My suspension of disbelief is not bent, but completely severed. Obliterated to a point of no return. I am reminded of why so many fans, like myself, have grown to loathe this franchise, and I’m almost even more offended than normal because, for the briefest of moments, this movie reminded me that it could still be good. Then it ripped that hope out of my hands.
The inevitable, and predictable, second and third act has this movie making an epic heel turn in which we return to form in the worst way. It’s nothing but an orgy of horrible dialogue, poor acting, laughable CGI, relentless and inconsequential cameos of other established characters from this world that don’t amount to anything, unbelievable technology, atrocious green screens, and physics-defying bullcrap that will make your head spin. You have John Cena not even attempting to play Jakob Toretto anymore; he’s just playing John Cena. One movie later and his character is already irrelevant. I found myself getting more and more annoyed at Tyrese Gibson and Ludacris’ banter, the same as it has been for five movies now. I still, to this day, don’t know how these two went from being a badass racer who beat up Paul Walker, and a garage mechanic who hustled car and jet ski races, to a complete clown who’s the butt of every joke and an elite computer hacker, but I digress. Vin Diesel is overly self-serious, killing the mood of his own movie once again. I don’t get it.
I could feel the excitement draining from my body as the minutes wore on. Because, as per usual, this movie decides to throw stakes and consequences out of the window. It is completed with deaths that are clearly being used to emotionally manipulate the audience into thinking important characters are no more, while also not showing those people die so they can be brought back in a later film. Hell, even if someone did conclusively die, this series has a history of making up some hogwash and saying that didn’t actually happen either, and once again this movie does that as well with an impossible (and frustratingly not explained whatsoever) resurrection.
There’s one simple, universal rule with storytelling: Things should matter. The choices that our characters face should have consequences, good or bad, that impact our characters. Choices that make them grow and evolve. But when everyone in your massive action franchise has insane plot armor, and no one can ever truly die, because even if they die they just come back, then nothing matters. Fast X is one of the worst offenders of this in the history of this series. Whether it’s people jumping between cars that are going 100 miles per hour down a highway, a car towing multiple helicopters by cable, or even driving vertically down the side of a dam as if this was the video game Rocket League, this flick is a mess that will make you throw up your hands as you surrender to your frustrations.
Now, I will say, if you’re a massive fan of the recent Fast & Furious movies, if you love The Fate of the Furious, Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw, or F9, then you will likely enjoy this movie. By the second and third acts, it is in keeping with those films, their tone, and their insanity. Nothing here will really make you not enjoy this if you were already on board with taking a plane into space. Conversely, there’s absolutely nothing here that will keep you from despising this movie if you already hated those other three. There’s nothing redeeming here. You can just enjoy Momoa hamming it up, and that’s about it.
So, consolation prize for those who like how this series has changed? Yay? But this sucks for me and everyone else who wants narrative before spectacle.
The last big slap in the face that Fast X offers you though, that really puts the nail in the coffin, is the fact that it isn’t a complete movie. This is our first incomplete story in the history of this franchise, but it doesn’t even have the courtesy to warn us ahead of time to call this a Part One, and it doesn’t say, “To be continued…” at the end. I mean, it ends with a literal cliffhanger, with a couple people looking out over a cliff at a completely unbelievable scene. Even more frustrating is the fact that the film doesn’t even pick a natural point in which to split the story! A plane crashes and a dam explodes and… we don’t see what happens. Are people dead? Probably not, honestly, given this series, but what the hell? This would be like Star Wars ending right as Luke Skywalker dives into the Death Star trench but before he shoots his Proton Torpedoes. Sure, we could probably make an assumption as to what happens, Luke blows up the Death Star, but we wouldn’t know that it’s Vader who almost kills him, but he can’t because Han Solo saves the day. I just can’t express how brain dead of a decision it is to kill the movie in the middle of an action scene. Unreal…
What started out so promising flickered and died right in front of my eyes. I had genuine hope that this series could be fun again, and within the same movie, this series smashed my dreams. Thank God for Momoa for adding some zest and life to this otherwise vapid experience. He truly made the film almost watchable entirely on his own. I wouldn’t blame anyone for seeing the movie just for him. Because, otherwise, Fast X is a truly terrible film and not worth your time.
Score: 3/10
Fast X is currently playing in theaters
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