What’s it about?

Dom Toretto and the Fast Family are doing whatever it is they do between movies when they’re confronted with a dastardly new villain out for revenge.

What’d we think?

Pete Linning says: Are we reviewing this as a movie, or as the twelfth* entry in the Fast Franchise? As a movie it’s a bull in a china shop, lumbering under the weight of its own convoluted lore while wildly (and loudly) thrashing about. If you’re not a fan of the franchise this isn’t going to change your mind, and if for some reason you’ve not seen any of the preceding movies, this is possibly the worst to use as an entry point. But as the latest entry in the Fast Saga it’s an absolute delight, unquestionably one of the best in the series, and sure to be a fan favourite. You’ve got your barbecues, you’ve got Vin Diesel saying “family” about thirty times, and you’ve got everyone being hyper-competent martial artists for some reason. The ludicrous action setpieces that the series is known for come thick and fast, but there’s an actual street race in this one that serves as a nice homage to the style of the earlier movies. All the tropes of the series are turned up to 11 and doused in petrol and energy drinks, and it’s just wonderful.

Plot? Plots are for movies. Fast X is not so much a movie as it is a 2-hour compilation of post-credit scenes, all you need to know is that Jason Momoa is the villain this time around – everything else is just details. Momoa is the best part of the movie, clearly having a blast playing the flamboyant Dante, but what makes his villain so much fun is that the character is just so genuinely gleeful in his villainy. Dante is hell-bent on revenge against the Fast Family, he looks fabulous doing it, and he is having the absolute time of his life. He’s the best villain the series has ever had, and one of my favourite movie antagonists in a long while.

Some movies are just big dumb fun, and this is the biggest, dumbest fun you could ask for.

*I’m including Hobbes & Shaw and Better Luck Tomorrow, and I’ll fight anyone who wants to argue the latter’s inclusion.

7/10

Sam Donaldson says: The Fast and Furious franchise has been a bizarre thing to watch over the last two decades. From the humble beginnings of a movie about DVD-player thieves to globe-trotting special agents, each film has been gleefully tongue-in-cheek while slowly morphing into a ridiculous cartoon franchise. Fast X is the first of the finale trilogy (until they inevitably announce a second wave of spinoffs) where Jason Momoa seeks revenge after his father was killed in Fast Five. The movie is exactly what you think: the concept of family is threatened, the laws of physics are thrown out the window, characters who were seemingly dead or evil in a previous movie are alive and part of the family now, and Vin Diesel’s baritone reaches a level that even the surround sound speakers have difficulty registering. Jason Momoa is delightfully over the top, flamboyantly bouncing around and cackling as the Fast and Furious version of Joker.

Where the previous movies were at their best when all the characters were grouped together, riffing off of each other and planning heists, the ever-expanding roster of recurring characters forces the movie to split everyone up, getting bogged down in trying to keep track of everyone’s separate hijinks and making the movie bigger and more convoluted than it really needs to be. The editing and direction aren’t as slick as Justin Lin’s previous films and most of the humour goes over like a lead balloon, but you’ll be laughing at the ridiculousness all the same. It’s good fun, but not the series’ best.

But if you’ve made it this far with the Fast and Furious movies, why stop now?

6/10