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Plot Summary: Dom Toretto and his family are targeted by the vengeful son of drug kingpin Hernan Reyes.

Director: Louis Leterrier

Writers: Dan Maze and Justin Lin

Runtime: 2 hour 21 mins

• Vin Diesel as Dominic Toretto
• Michelle Rodriguez as Letty
• Jason Statham as Shaw
• Jordana Brewster as Mia
• Tyrese Gibson as Roman
• Ludacris as Tej
• Nathalie Emmanuel as Ramsey
• Charlize Theron as Cipher
• John Cena as Jakob
• Sung Kang as Han
• Helen Mirren as Queenie
• Brie Larson as Tess
• Jason Momoa as Dante

Review by: Samuel

In 2020, it was announced that the finale of the Fast and Furious franchise would be a two-parter. Shortly before its release Vin Diesel then spoiled the possibility that it might actually conclude as a trilogy. I was unaware of both pieces of information before I saw Fast X. Had I known, I would not have watched this film because I have no interest in two more of these films just to complete a mediocre story.

It should be known that I do NOT like the Fast and Furious. I have not liked it since 2 Fast 2 Furious, I have not found it watchable since Tokyo Drift, and when I saw the safe driving stunt through Rio in Fast 5- I was done. Now I have kept up with the series via friends, YouTube Clips, and other movie reviewers.  I did appreciate the touching send-off to Paul Walker in Fast 7 (where this franchise should have ended), but overall, everything has gotten more and more ridiculous. I think the franchise jumped the shark long before they went to space in the last film. That stunt, I was happy to hear earned ire even form the most die-hard fans of the franchise.

So, I was hopeful when I came to this screening. Hopeful that 1) they learned just doing the MOST ridiculous things won’t make for a good movie and 2) that since it’s the last one, it would feel like there were some stakes. I was wrong on both counts- this movie is EXACTLY what you’d think it would be.

What I Liked

For the first two acts, this felt like the least Fast and Furious type film since Tokyo Drift. It was still ridiculous with these common car thieves somehow bare-fist fighting soldiers IN FULL BODY ARMOR and winning. We had characters we’ve never seen fight suddenly become John Wick and take out rooms of 10 people. There is a massive scene in Rome that involves a giant bomb barreling through the city while on fire and them somehow stopping It with cars; oh and not to mention the fact that they are all full-fledged secret agents now who regularly run “missions” for the most cliché sounding clandestine organization- The Agency. BUT, despite all that, I found myself just shrugging it off- we didn’t hit the levels of absurdity in Fast 6 during the never-ending runway scene, or Fast 7 when they jumped from one building to another inside a car and somehow didn’t land in-between floors of the building they eventually landed on, or even driving on ice to outrun a submarine in Fast 8.

So, if fast driving through a dense city and impossible feats of combat brilliance was the level of impossible Fast X had to offer…meh. I could live with it and just turn my brain off. I enjoyed the comedy from Tyrese’s Roman for once. I also enjoyed the fact that cars and just driving fast were a major focus for a large part of the first two acts. That’s right, we get more actual fast driving here than in any of the films in recent history. It was quite enjoyable…and then the third act happened. But we’ll get to that later.  Something else, I want to note is that the team is separated for almost the entire film, and that also really helped. I liked how we got to see each character shine and get more lines since the screen was shared by smaller group in any given scene. This really helped a character like Ramsey who has honestly been an afterthought since her introduction.

But, by far the best part of the film is the villain portrayed by Jason Momoa. He had A LOT of fun with this role, and you can tell. He is as close to embodying The Joker as we’ve seen since Heath Ledger. He is PSYCHOTIC- and he plays it perfectly. He acts in the most ridiculous ways while doing some truly heinous things. His cheerful attitude while blowing up people or having them gunned down just brings a smile to your face. He has a funny line for every situation, he’ll make his squeak on purpose while threatening to kill your family, has spa days with corpses, and was literally dancing during sniper fire- he’s insane and I couldn’t help but love it. He is actually more memorable than every character outside of Dom.

What I Didn’t Like

This could be a whole lot so I will try to keep it contained. First, the third act. It was a CGI mess like all of the DC Comics films and a lot of the Marvel films. It went full on Fast and Furious with the most impossible stuff that my brain actually turned itself back on just sigh and throw up my arms in disbelief. The movie had been doing well as pure action until then, but of course they had to go off the rails – and I mean that literally. If you’ve seen the trailer, you know there’s a point when Dom crashes two helicopters together with his car. TRUST ME when I say the third act gets so much more ridiculous that you might involuntarily scream “oh c’mon!” Any thoughts you had about there being stakes or danger just disappear as the bad CGI takes over. No one ever really dies, no one is ever really in danger, no one is stronger than family. I should have known, but still allowed myself to get tricked. This is all emphasized by the final shot before the credits roll, with a cliffhanger ending that had many in my theater scream “what!” and the scream (along with some expletives). It was a scene that made no sense and I’m really upset that another one of these is going to be made just because of it.

Also, the new characters introduced were meaningless. I don’t know why Brie Larson, Alan Ritchson and Daniela Melchoir shouldn’t have even been on the poster. They were more useless than Dom’s sister. And that’s not a knock on their acting ability- it’s a knock on this script that didn’t need to add to the runtime by including worthless characters.

Speaking of, John Cena has an entire arc in the film with Dom’s son that was utterly boring. You know it’s bad when I want to get back to the gravity defying nonsense instead of watching this uncle/nephew duo on their trek- a trek that ultimately made no difference in the long-run.

Outside of that, the usual problems from past movies persist- bad dialogue, cringe worthy “emotional scenes,” impossible leaps in thinking that somehow manage to be correct, stunts that would make your physics teacher throw-up, and decisions made that make no sense based on everything we’ve learned about characters. It Fast and Furious in its fullest.