Car enthusiasts and action film lovers alike have been drawn to the Fast & Furious movies for decades. With high-octane thrills and insane cars, the all-star cast has given us countless adventures with a bit of grit, a little humor and a lot of nitrous. Unfortunately, some fans have noticed a decline in the series’ quality despite numerous sequels and even more A-list actors on the roster. This begs the question: why?
When you take a deeper look at the movies, it’s not hard to see why they aren’t as popular as they used to be. The films aren’t what they used to be, and the series embodies the concept of ‘too much of a good thing’. If you’re struggling to put your finger on why the movies just don’t hold up anymore, here’s our take on what’s hurting the Fast & Furious franchise.
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There Are Just Too Many Movies
Via: Universal Pictures
The franchise includes nine films as of 2021, with more slated for production over the next few years. At this point, the franchise doesn’t have enough substance to warrant more sequels. The idea of fast cars, illegal street races and detailed scenes of automotive work is appealing, but the magic started deteriorating as time went on. Simply put, the films peaked around the era of The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift.
The movies were about family bonds and fast cars, and street racing was the backbone of the series. They were over the top, but there was a lot of heart and ‘cool factor’ in the earlier films. As time passed and the focus shifted from the underground racing world to murder-vengeance stories, government operations and cyber-terrorism, the movies began to lose the charm of their roots. Some plotlines feel a bit repetitive, and even the big-budget action sequences can’t make up for a lack of substance.
The Characters Are Hard to Keep Track of
Speaking of too many movies, there are too many characters to keep track of anymore. The original cast featured favorites like Dominic and Mia Toretto, Letty Ortiz and Tej Parker; each new installment seems to bring in more characters, each immediately marked as detrimental to the series. While this isn’t always a bad thing, the movies lose emotional weight by forcing the audience to divide their attention between the entire cast. This is especially true for a cast composed of A-list actors—from Vin Diesel, Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham to John Cena and Charlize Theron, it’s hard for any character to stand out.
Another issue is the apparent deaths and revivals of some characters. Dom’s girlfriend, Letty, allegedly died in the fourth film, but returned in Fast Five after surviving a murder attempt. Team member Han Lue is supposedly killed in a collision in Tokyo Drift but appeared in both Fast & Furious and Fast Five afterward. After discovering that these two films were prequels, we see Han killed for the second time in Fast & Furious 6, only to be alive later in F9. When characters can die and be revived seemingly at will, their deaths and sacrifices lose a lot of meaning.
The Thrills Have Gotten Out of Control
When the movies first debuted, they delivered high-octane thrills and over-the-top action that pushed the envelope while still being fun to watch. Most of the action came from intense street races and an occasional fistfight, giving us the ‘underground race’ aesthetic fans know and love. Sure, the Fast franchise has always taken suspension of disbelief to its limits, but the thrills have gradually spiraled out of control.
Now, the movies make a point to show characters jumping across cars at Interstate speeds, driving tanks on the open road, piloting submarines through the ice and handling nuclear arms races. What started as a diverse crew of car enthusiasts living for the road has evolved into a huge group of gear heads, government agents and spies being called upon to save the entire planet. The ideas don’t mesh together very well, and the films have all but abandoned their origins.
Not Everything Needs Multiple Spinoffs
Via: Dreamworks Animation Television
Spinoffs can be amazing when executed well—they’re perfect for giving different characters a chance to share their stories and allowing fans to dwell in their favorite fictional universes just a little longer. Unfortunately, the Fast series has put out more spinoff content than fans can keep up with, and not all of it benefits the franchise as a whole. The Hobbs & Shaw spinoff is set to get a sequel, there are rumors of an all-women spinoff in the works and two short films were released in the mid-2000s. The Fast & Furious Spy Racers animated show introduced a cast of children recruited by the government to take down entire criminal organizations.
All these new characters and new pieces of lore have made the whole series difficult to follow. Understandably, the Fast creators want to branch out and target new audiences, but the spinoffs suffer from the same issue the extensive main film series does: lack of substance. You can only tell so many stories about the underground race scene. The movies took a hard turn into espionage and criminal empires to justify big action scenes and larger-than-life vehicles, but this isn’t enough to make up for lackluster stories and reused tropes.
Most of the Movies Don’t Make Sense
Tying into the issue with spin-offs, the films don’t always make sense. From the automotive side, some cars featured in the movies use fake engines, strange NOS physics and more hidden switches than you can count. It seems like the creators were aiming to make the cars seem cool and futuristic, but any experienced car enthusiast can tell that they aren’t true to life. Famously, the massive engine in Dom’s 1970 Charger uses a false supercharger just for the aesthetic!
In terms of the story, it doesn’t make sense for Dom’s team to be so heavily involved with the government. The original movies made it clear that the crew illegally jacked cars and had extensive racing and mechanic experience, but to hire them to dismantle criminal syndicates and stop cyber-terrorists and dangerous mercenaries? It seems out of place, especially when the crew is infamous for their crimes.
