The Fate of the Furious

It’s amazing to me that I’m alive to even write this review today! Now I know that I have said this essentially every year I have been alive on this Earth but after my latest trip to Los Angeles, it really is true this time. And no I’m not saying it simply because I just celebrated my 87 th birthday; I’m saying it because I’m a black man (who happened to be wearing all black at the time) who was walking down the streets of East L.A. at 2 in the morning with an open container and a stoned 24 year old white girl. Both cholos and the L.A.P.D. passed us with regularity and neither of them batted an eye. Was it the fact that they couldn’t see me due to my natural camouflage or was it due to the fact that the cops didn’t want any more bad press after the recent revival of the O.J. Simpson story?

For some reason, the girl couldn’t understand why I was so nervous. Had she never seen the movie Colors before? Did she know that O.J. Simpson was actually an acquitted murderer and not the name of a different flavored codeine drink? Well either way, two things popped in my mind after we spent 20 minutes talking about the upcoming release of Boss Baby and how awesome it was going to be: 1. Why am I not married to this girl? And 2. If I survived this experience, why would I not go out and pursue my dream? I mean, if car racing truck jackers from the hood can now take on Russian mercenaries and secret government agencies that have military grade weapons, why can’t I be a successful screenwriter in Hollywood?

And speaking of The Fate of My Lost Money, I can’t believe that this franchise has blown up the way that it has. There’s no way in hell that you can tell me that after you saw that first trailer of Vin Diesel spewing off such terrible lines like "I live my life one quarter mile at a time" that you said to yourself, "Now that’s a billion dollar franchise!" The first Fast and the Furious looked like the prequel to Grand Theft Auto. They had to have blown their entire budget on casting Vin Diesel and renting out his expensive muscle car. But now these films get as much attention as the new season of Game of Thrones does. And to make matters worse, I am 100% certain that 70% of the actors in these films wouldn’t even be able to find work today if it weren’t for dummies like me supporting these films. Oh and by the way, 25% of that working 30 is made up of Game of Thrones actors who were just looking for something to do in the offseason. So once that series goes away, there’s going to be a lot of out of work actors in La La Land.

I must admit that there was a time that I got pumped up to see these films. I even spent an hour in a bar one night debating with a complete stranger over which movie was better; F&F 5 or Tokyo Drift. Oh, and the answer is clearly Drift by the way. When you somehow get a 5’1" Texas scrub to take on and defeat the entire Yakuza with a street race; there’s simply no topping that.

But anyway, in Fate, Vin Diesel is somehow convinced by the nefarious Charlize Theron to turn his back on his family and to help her steal a giant EMP and codes to nuclear warheads. Now, no one in his posse believes what they are seeing, so they team together to bring him back alive to not only stop him from completing his evil mission but to also get to the bottom of his unfathomable betrayal. And along the way, they are forced to once again team up with the covert government operative Kurt Russell, the gung-ho bounty hunter of sorts in The Rock, and most surprisingly, the guy who spent his entire time trying to kill them in all of F&F 6, Jason Statham. Now what’s really shocking about that last part is, this is the same guy who killed their dear friend Han at the end of F&F 5; and no one even says a word about it throughout this entire film. They complained for about 15 seconds and then collectively shrugged their shoulders and said "F it!" How in the world is this possible?!?! Are they upset because Han got to bang the ultra hot Gal Gadot and they didn’t? And is the fact that they no longer mention her character a clear sign of jealousy that she’s now the new Wonder Woman and they’re stuck with an aging Ludacris? Speaking of, when did Luda become so uncool? I used to love his Word of Mouf and Chicken-n-Beer albums but now he’s just a sad, short scrub who spits out terrible one liners and computer jargon that he has absolutely no clue is real or not.

This film is unbelievably stupid in almost every way; and while my idiot friend did bring up the fact that they have all been super cheesy, this one unfortunately no longer tows the line between being fun and being hammy. Now I will admit that there are some pretty badass action set pieces which include remote controlled cars falling from the sky and of course Lamborghinis on ice fighting submarines but overall, this was just way too much. The film was basically XXX 3 with a bigger budget. Now do I suggest that you go see it? Hell yes you should see this film! But just know going in that it’s not any good and it’s because of this simple fact that it gets a rating of pretty WEAK. Oh, and just know, If I’m gonna clown a billion dollar franchise ima make it look seeeexy! That’s for all you Kendrick fans out there. I’m out!