The Fast and Furious Franchise

I have reviewed part 1 and 3 on this site already, so I wont spend to much time on them, but I will present my reviews in order of how they were made – technically Tokyo Drift takes place AFTER all the others (even after the upcoming Fast Six).


The Fast and the Furious.


First film in the series and it’s the best. Introduced all the characters, Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Michelle Rodriquez and Jordana Brewster. Good story and good characters with a cool ending.


4/5.


2 Fast 2 Furious.


Only Paul Walker returns, this time teaming up with Eve Mendes, Ludacris and Tyrese. This one is really fun and has a lot of car chases – probably the most in the series.


After the events of part 1, Paul Walker is now a criminal, but the government knows that they need him to take down the villain (who Eva has been working undercover for a year). Walker needs help in the form of Tyrese – an old buddy of his who is currently under house arrest.


They team up and its all car crashes and stunt driving.


I have to say I thought this would be a letdown, but I ended up really liking it. Paul Walker is cool and Tyrese may be my favorite character of the series!


Really fun movie!


3.5/5.


The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift.


This one is directed by Justin Lin (who stays on as director for the remainder of the series) and some people think it’s the weakest. It may be the weakest (slightly) but that doesn’t mean it’s a bad movie!


It doesn’t have Paul Walker, or Vin Diesel (although Vin makes a cameo appearance in the very very end), but it introduces Han (Sung Kang) who remains part of the cast for the rest of the series and he is a cool character!


I liked this one, but I am a mark for anything Japanese, so the location and scenery had something to do with it. Also the drifting is really really cool, and Lil Bow-wow has an Incredible Hulk car – so what more do you want?


PS – this one takes place after all the others – in Fast Five Han is asked “Don’t you want to go to Tokyo?” and he responds “Eventually.” – meaning that there will be a few more movies before the storyline of Tokyo Drift takes place.


3/5.


Fast and Furious


This is part 4 but instead of calling it that, they simply removed the “the’s” and now we have Fast and Furious.


This one marked the beginning of a new genre for the series – action.


I mean all of the films were action flicks, but the others focused on car culture and street racing – this one is a revenge flick.


Everyone returns – Vin, Michelle, Walker (who is now an agent again), Jordana and even Han makes an appearance.


Spoilers –


Michelle is killed off in this one and Vin wants to take revenge. It just so happens that the killer is someone that Walker is after – so they team up again and Walker falls back in love with Jordana.


This was a great action film I must say. It’s almost equal to the first – Vin is really intense in this one and he just kicks ass! It was also nice to have all the cast return, so I have to say I am very happy with this fourth film – they haven’t lost steam yet and changing the genre helped too – there was only so much street racing they could do.


4/5.


Fast Five.


This may be the best one yet!


This time around EVERYONE returns. Walker, Jordana, Vin, Han, Tyrese, Ludacris, the girl from part 4, and they are now joined by the Rock (Dwayne Johnson).


Ok - the Rock is the best character ever in this! He is so cool, and so no-nonsense! He is after these guys with a vengeance! This one has amazing action sequences and has the best stunts I have seen involving cars!


I mean I was blown away with the action – the story – good too! This has to be the coolest movie of all time!


But the only problem – you have to have seen all the others. If not, then it’s just an Ocean’s 11 rip off. See in Ocean’s 11 you don’t really know all the characters, this film was better because they brought back guys from other movies you have seen – so you already know them all and we can get right to action instead of spending time learning who they are.


The story is similar to Ocean’s 11, Vin and Walker need to gather a team of guys together (hence everyone returning) to steal money from this Brazilian drug lord (btw – the location here is a amazing – Brazil is beautiful!) and the Rock is out to get them.


The Rock in this movie is very smart, the villain is very smart and Vin and his crew is smart, so the tension is really jam packed in this one.


I cant wait till Fast Six – this is shaping up to be one hell of a great action series!


4/5.


J-Man.