By Frankie Dulatre
I cannot stress enough on how much the Fast and Furious franchise has to stop making movies. I watched the new Fast and Furious movie and yes, I entered the movie theater with low expectations, but I left with tears; not because it was a sad movie, but because I wanted a refund. As the franchise continues to make more movies, they also continue to run out of ideas to add into them. It was starting to become obvious the franchise was running out of ideas when the writers thought it was a good idea to send Roman (Tyrese Gibson) and Tej (Ludacris) into space.
The franchise has been around for more than two decades, and has been making great and memorable movies…until Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson joined the franchise. I said this once and I will say it again, Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson” is the Lin Manuel Miranda of Hollywood. Every single movie Johnson is in, he tries to make himself the main character and have the whole movie revolve around him. For example with Black Adam, an anonymous executive stated: “Dwayne tries to sell himself as bigger than the movie” and “He’s one of the few people who always thinks he’s the most important person in any situation or room”. Considering these comments there is no doubt in my mind that Johnson has tried the same in the Fast and Furious franchise.
Also, one thing that infuriates me is when Dom (Vin Diesel) either gets out of a dangerous situation or lives very catastrophically from an action that should literally kill him by ‘the power of family’. It is too overused and too corny to the point where I think a low budget movie made in 2013 is better than the Fast X movie. Going back to the movie itself, it felt like this movie had 80 percent deep discussions about family and the other 20 percent cars and action. This did not make it feel like an action movie, but more of a coming of age movie for sappy, angsty teenagers.
With the movie, the action scenes made me think one particular thing: ‘This is a nice action scene, but where is this certain character?’ With all of these action shots, this makes me think that no one in the writing team knew where to add him in the scene and possibly the plot. Apparently, after all these action shots, the character pops up again as if nothing happened. Not only does this make me laugh, but it makes me feel like I am a better writer than the entire Fast X writing team.
As previously mentioned, the franchise also has a thing for adding in new characters when they can’t think of a new plot for the movie. With the add-ins, they add in popular actors who have starred in popular action movies or tv shows: Jason Statham, Dwayne Johnson, Luke Evans, Nathalie Emmanuel, and even WWE wrestler Ronda Rousey. Including the recent movie, the franchise has had 10 new add-ins, and the recent movie probably had the most useless ones yet. Dante (Jason Mamoa) is out to kill Dom, because Dom apparently killed his father years ago. The second new add in is Tess (Brie Larson) who is Mr. Nobody’s daughter, and she plays that stereotypical girl who always try to prove herself because her dad is this cool, famous dude. This makes me think, why would Dante suddenly go after him now, why would Tess now make an appearance in this movie and why did they not appear during a previous movie(s). Ever since Fast and Furious 7, the plot of each movie does not make sense, it is almost like the movie tells you what is happening without explanation. This further proves my point in Fast and Furious 9 when Han was revealed to be alive, which I find very useless and it is only seen as a stunt for people to watch Fast and Furious movies again.
Overall, the franchise has been a nostalgic thing for everyone, including myself. Watching the new movies makes me wish for the old movies’ writing and vibe back. Considering the new movies that came out, I do not think that is happening any time soon.
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