Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw

Imagine it's the year 2001 and you've just seen the fantastic Point Break rip off The Fast and The Furious.  Now imagine someone says the movie will spawn 7 sequels plus a spin off starring The Rock and that British dude from Snatch.

I guess sometimes truth really is stranger than fiction.

Allow me to speak my truth:  I loved The Fast and The Furious.  Cars, Vin, Paul Walker doing his best Keanu impersonation...it all just worked.  That's, of course, why it became so popular in the summer of '01 and only grew in popularity as it went on to take advantage of the then peaking DVD release patterns of the early 2000's.

It became apparent a sequel was not just inevitable, but wanted.  So we got a John Singleton Fast & Furious movie.  Hello to Tyrese - welcome addition to the fold.  Goodbye (for now) to Vin - unwelcome departure.

To sum up the rest of the journey:  Tokyo Drift - I thought it was the nail in the coffin of the franchise, as did everyone.  Huge surprise in 2009 - they brought back the original cast!  That movie (Fast & Furious, no "the") was average at best.  It led to Fast 5 - which is arguably the franchise high point.  Fast 6 wasn't as good.  Furious 7 was sad (a very poignant good bye to Paul Walker that holds up).  Fate of the Furious was just awful.  The worst one in my opinion.  Over the top action needs to be fun or it's worthless.  This one is just worthless.

So now we get Hobbs and Shaw.  It's about what you would expect.  I mean, I fell asleep during a couple of parts, so I missed a few things, but it has some entertaining moments.  The Rock is an entertaining guy - but his shtick is about 3 movies past it's prime for me.  Statham is cool and doesn't seem to age much - so that's neat.

Seriously though, it's a big, showy summer movie made to be loud and proud and to look good on the biggest screen available.  Sometimes that's enough for a fun evening (or afternoon matinee).

I think this franchise is at it's best when it's focusing on the family of friends, and not necessarily in saving the world mode (which is still hilarious to think).  I mean, they were hoodlums that were stealing electronics in the first movie - now they save the world?  How did we get here?

It's best not to think about it.  If you want to see Hobbs & Shaw, that's awesome.  I sure did.  And I'll line up for Fast 9.  But I'm really hoping they start to turn this ship around with a slightly more down to earth take - wouldn't that be a breath of fresh air?!