The Fate of the Furious (2017)

[Gaith]

(Yes, thanks to Stark-level gadgetry, this series is sci-fi now. Deal with it. )

So... Fast & Furious inspired a 17-post thread. Fast Five, 30 posts; Fast & Furious 6, 46; Furious 7, a whopping 168 (RIP Paul Walker). But now, in its third week of release, the billion-dollar grossing eighth installment has yet to get its own thread... until now.

The Fate of the Furious

My take:
The Fate of the Furious is more of the same. One of the great pleasures of the franchise's early installments is how they improvisationally bounced around from being an urban gang drama to a goofy quasi-buddy cop movie to an unrelated side story to a grim revenge thriller to a heist movie to, finally, a cyber-techno superhero saga in F6. Well, it seems they've found their formula and are sticking to it (and, with these returns, who could blame them?), because F7 and F8 are very much tonal and narrative matches to that sixth movie. Although just about everyone agrees that Fast Five is the series' peak, with our protagonists on the run from the law on one side and battling a drug lord on the other, making them government-friendly automotive avengers opens the most globetrotting scales, and allows for the biggest action set pieces, so it looks as though this mode is here to stay. And I for one am good with that.

F8 is tons of fun. Though it has far more comic relief/beats than F4, the previous darkest hour for our heroes, this one gets darker still, showing us a side of Dom we haven't seen before. Perhaps this heaviness was inspired by the loss of Paul Walker, or maybe not. (F8 gives us a new token white guy in Scott Eastwood, the assistant to Kurt Russell's Mr. Nobody, and though he doesn't have Walker's charisma or looks, I liked him a good deal.) And there is one character/plot point that has proven damned divisive, with some saying it irreparably breaks the saga's narrative integrity. And sure, it's a bit awkward, but I went with it. After all, the downside to abandoning the drug lord baddies of the 2-5 years is that the new Big Bads are all techno-terrorists, but, because the risk of offending anyone anywhere in the world means lost dollars, it's never been clear, from 6 on, just what these techno-terrorists want. (Of course, one could say the same for Spectre's Blofeld.) And just how virtuous are our heroes, anyway? They started out as highwaymen thieves, and pulled guns on and threatened (lawman Hobbs included) military members doing their proper job at the end of 6 for purely personal gain, so it's not as though morality has ever been a pressing concern. A spoilsport could credibly call the team's ethics Trumpian, but I am not a spoilsport, at least not here. The aforementioned twist results in more fun than not twist-ing would have, so I allowed it. If the MCU pulled something similar, I'd indeed be pissed - but this ain't the MCU.

Spoiler: F8 Spoilers

In fact, I enjoyed this movie so much, absurd redemption of Statham's Shaw and all, that I was genuinely excited when Luke Evans' Owen Shaw showed up for about two minutes of screen time and as many lines, despite not being a fan of the actor's, and 6 being my least favorite of the non-TD series so far. (Still haven't seen TD, and at this point, despite owning it on blu, don't much care to.) And I expect that, especially if he keeps showing up, I'll enjoy re-watches of 6 more than I did the first time around. Meanwhile, I look forward to seeing Theron return and drive and fight. (Where does she refuel and maintenance her plane?! When they bring her back, we'll need some answers!)

But, I for one haven't forgotten Monica Fuentes. Bring back Eva Mendes, I say!

Grade: B+

Series Ranking
1. Fast Five
2. Furious 7
3. Tie: 2 Fast 2 Furious, Fast & Furious, The Fate of the Furious
6. The Fast and the Furious
7. Fast and Furious 6

There are some awesome series infographics/data here, courtesy of Bloomberg News. And, because it will never, ever get old:

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[Enterprise1701]

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This opening montage never gets old to me.

 

[LJones41]

I thought the melodramatic aspects of the movie made it better than the last film.

 

[Kemaiku]

Guys, a moment of silence.

The Sin Counter finally met it's match.

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[Gaith]

Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw (2019)

Longtime series writer Chris Morgan. Deadpool 2 director David Leitch. And, of course the riveting pairing of Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham. The question, then: what went wrong?!

I regret to report that, in spite of one great low-key hallway fight sequence, and some fun banter here and there, Hobbs & Shaw is a total dud - as in, don't even bother with a rental. The biggest problem is perhaps location: the story's three acts each get one, and the first two are London (already the boring primary setting for the post-Fast Five franchise low point Furious 6) and a dull, soulless factory/warehouse in the former USSR. Granted, the third act location is a major step up, but by that point in this 135-minute slog, it's too slate; the patient's dead.

Another drag is the complete invulnerability of our main stars. This has been a factor in recent Furious movies also, but those flicks have had the sense to bring its huge cast of FAMBLY along for the ride, so we get secondary characters whose almost entire purpose is to wail, panic, complain, and briefly act macho before doing all the aforementioned things. Hobbs and Shaw may come from different worlds, but their fast-paced snark just doesn't make for much of a contrast. They're funny together, but they were already funny together in Fate of the Furious, and because their goals are aligned just about the whole movie, they only get chances to be funny by grinding the story to a halt. There are some great quasi-superheroic action beats, but suprisingly, Leitch doesn't go far or cartoony enough. I actually found myself wishing I was watching a superhero movie, so there'd be more variety of powers and abilities than endless punching, driving, and a bit of shooting.

As for Idris Elba, he's a boring villain who answers to an unseen boss, so, despite the script sweating to convince us otherwise, there isn't even much tension between him and our heroes. He's just a thug doing a job, for generic and boring transhumanist reasons. Finally, there's the truly odd detail that, in a franchise and movie in which FAMBLY is the dominant theme, Furious 6 baddie Owen Shaw (Luke Evans), last seen in Fate, is only directly mentioned once, and so briefly that I missed it.

Yes, Hobbs was a blast of fresh air as an antagonist in Fast Five, but he was a dull ally in Furious 6, spent most of 7 in a hospital, and was then against Dom in Fate. Maybe an almost certain Hobbs & Shaw sequel can give the character him a great starring role, but, bearing in mind I haven't seen Tokyo Drift, this is my least favorite Furious yet, by a long shot.

C-

 

[Gaith]

Mild spoilers follow...

F9 (2021)

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10 years after the breakout hit Fast Five, and a whole 20 years after the original film, F9 is finally here.

2017's The Fate of the Furious was the first Fast film developed after Paul Walker's death, and his absence allowed The Rock's ensemble player Luke Hobbs to be promoted to co-lead of that film. F9, however, is the first Fast flick developed since Dwayne Johnson was diverted to his own spinoff franchise, allowing Vin Diesel and returning director Justin Lin (coming off the horrible Star Trek Beyond) to re-center Dominic Toretto as the undisputed center of the saga. This time around, the second lead part goes to John Cena's Jakob Toretto, Dom's previously unmentioned brother (genetic half-brother? it's unclear), who is nicely established in numerous flashbacks to the death of their father in 1989. Cena is a far more satisfying antagonist than Cipher (Charlize Theron) was in Fate, but in this series, does anyone seriously expect a character like him, played by an actor like that, to stay bad?

In terms of the saga at large, F9 feels a lot like Age of Ultron, which gets referenced (plagiarized?) in an early scene of the Torettos working on a tractor in a verdant, off-the-grid farm. (Subsequent scenes are heavily reminiscent of Civil War's climax and Steve's punching bag scene in The Avengers.) With Cipher spending most of the movie sidelined, and Diesel and Cena doing their thing, the rest of the FAMBLY is largely tasked with bringing Han (Sung Kan) and Sean Boswell (Tokyo Drift's Lucas Black) back into the fold. Han's much-balleyhooed return is... fine, I guess. As a longtime Fast fan, I was never too concerned with the #JusticeForHan meme, and the list of dead characters keeps getting smaller - surely the next flick will introduce Gisele's (Gal Gadot's) previously unmentioned identical twin?

The action and set pieces are pretty good this time; Justin Lin stages the vehicular mayhem well, and the fisticuffs have some cool moves, but the latter are cut much too quickly. As for the ridiculousness quotient, anyone who, like me, enjoyed the submarine battle at the end of Fate will likely find much to grin over here.

At nearly two and a half hours, Fate is a long flick, but it mostly moves well. Now that the FAMBLY has been fully re-assembled, I look forward to the upcoming two-part conclusion, not least because we're being promised they will be the conclusion to the saga, ongoing spinoffs notwithstanding, of course. It's been a great ride, and it deserves an epic conclusion, but Diesel's instincts are correct in deciding the time has come to wrap things up, albeit in a typically over-the-top fashion. For a wheel-spinning, table-setting entry, F9 is pretty good fun.

Grade: B