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I don't understand The Fast the Furious franchise's popularity

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neoemonk

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This is all started by listening to the Bombcast. They always talk about this movie franchise, and I had always dismissed it based on the trailers. They made three movies, and then that seemed to be that, and then one day a fourth one came out...then a fifth...and when I found out that six and seven were in the works I thought that perhaps I had been too hasty to dismiss it, and that maybe there really was something there under the surface, some substance that I had originally missed. The only other film franchise I can think of that had this many sequels other than the Friday the 13ths and Nightmare on Elm Streets of my childhood was Saw, and although I don't appreciate those movies, I can understand that people have a sick fascination with the scenarios that they lay out in those movies.

But this...this is just cars and guns, right? Certainly not enough to make a HUGE seven film franchise out of, or at least I thought. Clearly I was wrong.

I decided one weekend to head down to my local library and see what they had in, and sure enough, they had the first five movies all on DVD so I checked them all out and committed to sitting down and watching them all.

I put the first one in and got through it. It was mildly interesting, and I guess Vin Diesel's character was ok, and at the end he's down in Mexico or whatever, but the ending just reminded me of Eastbound and Down.

Undaunted, I moved on to the second movie. I understand that some times it takes a sequel to really give a franchise legs. I popped in 2 Fast 2 Furious, and I only made it about 30 minutes into it before I just got tired of it. It was just Paul Walker and Ludacris and none of the other characters that I had even grown somewhat attached to from the first movie. Why wasn't Paul Walker's character in jail? How was he still a free man after the shit he pulled in the first movie? I just couldn't get into it, and I turned it off, and returned all of the movies.

But yet I still find myself wondering how and why these movies are so popular and make so much money. I can't help but feel that I'm missing out somehow, and I don't know why. Please explain to me what the deal is with these movies, and whether or not I should give this franchise another chance.
 
1-3 was on a downhill trajectory. 4 was essentially a reboot that injected life into the franchise (and brought people back)
 
Just watch Fast 5. They made a transition into these crazy over the top heist movies in part 5 that are awesome.
 
I've never watched one before, so the popularity of the most recent one caught me completely off guard. I never really thought that they were "bad" per se, but my impression was always that there were a generic, middling action series that focused on fast cars and shit. But then this 7th one comes out and the world loses its collective mind over it. So maybe there's more to it than I thought. I'll have to check it out sometime.
 
neoemonk said:
This is all started by listening to the Bombcast. They always talk about this movie franchise, and I had always dismissed it based on the trailers. They made three movies, and then that seemed to be that, and then one day a fourth one came out...then a fifth...and when I found out that six and seven were in the works I thought that perhaps I had been too hasty to dismiss it, and that maybe there really was something there under the surface, some substance that I had originally missed. The only other film franchise I can think of that had this many sequels other than the Friday the 13ths and Nightmare on Elm Streets of my childhood was Saw, and although I don't appreciate those movies, I can understand that people have a sick fascination with the scenarios that they lay out in those movies.

But this...this is just cars and guns, right? Certainly not enough to make a HUGE seven film franchise out of, or at least I thought. Clearly I was wrong.

I decided one weekend to head down to my local library and see what they had in, and sure enough, they had the first five movies all on DVD so I checked them all out and committed to sitting down and watching them all.

I put the first one in and got through it. It was mildly interesting, and I guess Vin Diesel's character was ok, and at the end he's down in Mexico or whatever, but the ending just reminded me of Eastbound and Down.

Undaunted, I moved on to the second movie. I understand that some times it takes a sequel to really give a franchise legs. I popped in 2 Fast 2 Furious, and I only made it about 30 minutes into it before I just got tired of it. It was just Paul Walker and Ludacris and none of the other characters that I had even grown somewhat attached to from the first movie. Why wasn't Paul Walker's character in jail? How was he still a free man after the shit he pulled in the first movie? I just couldn't get into it, and I turned it off, and returned all of the movies.

But yet I still find myself wondering how and why these movies are so popular and make so much money. I can't help but feel that I'm missing out somehow, and I don't know why. Please explain to me what the deal is with these movies, and whether or not I should give this franchise another chance.
Click to expand...

It didnt become a MEGA franchise till the 5th movie, which moves it more towards an Avengers-style ensemble superhero action movie. Skip to that one to understand why the series is huge today.
 
What's not to understand? It's a fun action series with likable characters, cool cars, and crazy stunts. They're mindless but fun. I think it makes perfect sense why it's popular.
 
It is the same poorly thought out action and set pieces with uninteresting characters as Transformers. You did yourself a favor by not watching them.
 
I'm with the OP. I don't get this franchise either. Cars aren't enough to draw me in and I'm easy to entertain. Mindless action movies entertain me but this series just seems eh. Even the cast doesn't stand out to me.
 
It is more of a heist series than a racing series.

Has a diverse cast, dumb fun that knows it is dumb, not very expensive for hollywood standards.... why not ?
 
You either like it or you don't..different people have different tastes and if the movies didn't grab you, us explaining won't change anything.

Really, in the end, it's about family. It's ok if you're not apart of it.
 
I honestly can't blame anyone who wanted to catch-up but lost interest at 2.

Hell, I fucking started fast-forward skimming through the film after 30 minutes of watching it.

You guys are still missing out on Fast Five though.
 
For millennia, there have been alpha men who either liked their entertainment fast or furious. The genius, like the invention of the Reese's peanut butter cup, was in combining the two.
 
The originals were catered towards teenage car enthusiasts, lot of kids I grew up with tinkered with Honda's in their backyards. The newer ones are ensemble action flicks, and not particularly terrible ones at that. I liked the FF films more than the Expendables.
 
Sulik2 said:
Just watch Fast 5. They made a transition into these crazy over the top heist movies in part 5 that are awesome.
Click to expand...

Fast 5 is the only one I've seen start-to-finish, and it was a pretty fantastic action movie in its own right. I assume Fast 6 and 7 have followed in those footsteps.
 
To me, in short I think the appeal (especially the later ones, 4-7) is that they embrace their ludicrousness and revel in it (the first one was cool because of the cars mostly, the second is just bad with some funny characters that pay off in later movies, the third is bad in a good way). Even though they are not really that much like 80s action movies, I think they have a similar feel in that they don't give a shit about what's realistic. They just cheese it up, have great set pieces, and have endearing characters. There is definitely a place for that in movies and I think it resonates.
 
The world of 5-7 and the world of the first few films are basically entirely different barring that the same characters show up.

By 5-7, they are one of the greatest crews in the world, taking down terrorists and international criminals. It's almost like Ocean's 11, if there were only about 5 of them, they drove a bunch of cars and have a habit of causing large amounts of property damage. Ridiculous amounts, in fact.

Racing is only incidentally involved, and there tends to only be a perfunctory scene or two involving it.

It's basically like they took some of the characters from an earlier series of movies and threw them into an entirely different movie series.

4 is the pivot point where it transforms from one series to another.
 
MMarston said:
I honestly can't blame anyone who wanted to catch-up but lost interest at 2.

Hell, I fucking started fast-forward skimming through the film after 30 minutes of watching it.

You guys are still missing out on Fast Five though.
Click to expand...

The audience began to drift away after 2?
 
Starting with the reboot in 4, they really changed the direction of the series. They're dumb but fun. But you can skip 2 because its holy crap terrible.
 
they're some of the least cynically made blockbusters around. There's not a shred of irony in its over-the-top car antics and shameless bro-vado.

They're dumb and silly but they use that to their advantage rather than try to pretend like dropping cars out of planes is some gritty realistic shit.
 
It's a fantastic franchise but the first three movies are totally different from the other 4.

I would recommend to keep watching since they are some of my favorite movies of all times.
 
1-3 and 5-7, despite sharing some of the same characters, feel like completely different film series.

The heart of 1-3 are street racing. The series was more or less left for dead at the end of the third, before it was largely rebooted by the 4th movie, and turned into an action franchise in the fifth.

It's not surprising you grew wary of the second, it and Tokyo Drift were largely seen as a step down and the domestic gross decline from 1 > 2 > 3.
 
I have only seen the first one and parts of one were they drive through an abandoned mine shaft. Sounds like I have a lot of catching up to do. I was surprised at how big the franchise was as well.
 
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Trying to judge it and figure it out based on the first or second (or third) movie isn't going to get you anywhere. The initial movies were popular enough that they made money and kept the series going, which let the series evolve with each installment. There's a perceptible change in the fourth movie, and then they really seem to figure out what it is with the fifth. That's where it really exploded and transitioned from a "cool cars and car races" kind of small, kind of bad movie series, to legitimately gigantic, incredibly well-realized action spectacle with a large, diverse ensemble that isn't really about car racing anymore but globe-trotting heists and over the top villains and The Rock covered in baby oil. The sixth film takes things even further (maybe a bit too far?)
 
The first four movies are kinda whatever. The first one may have some qualities, I guess, but the other ones are uninteresting to me as I have no actual interest in cars. The fun really starts with 5. From there it's just a fun and likeable cast, at least IMO, with ridiculous and funny action scenes. It knows it's over the top and revels in it in an amusing way. I guess it's kind of like a live action cartoon that isn't capable of giving a fuck about realism or the depths of human emotion.

I have to say that I feel like people are selling it short with this "dumb fun" moniker. Setting up some of the action scenes they have in these movies is nowhere near dumb and takes some serious skill and dedication to pull off. They actually dragged a gigantic damn vault through a city! Not trying to be realistic does not equal being dumb.

Vincent Grayson said:
Fast 5 is the only one I've seen start-to-finish, and it was a pretty fantastic action movie in its own right. I assume Fast 6 and 7 have followed in those footsteps.
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6 is a little worse but still fun, 7 might be the best one yet. I haven't decided on that one yet.
 
Just watch 5 it the high point in series I'm baffled how 7 made so much money it weakest since the whole heist reboot started
 
"Plot" got left behind in this series awhile ago.

Heck current plot is so clichéd it's amazing. They even go so far as "secret gov agency needs the racing thieves help".

You go to these movies to see hot men/women who punch each other and do flips in their cars with explosions.

the only one IMO that stands up to being an actual "good" film is the first.
 
It's really two different movie series.

F&F 1-3 are very car culture, all big engines, NOS, boost, drifting etc.

Then there is FF4 which IMO was a misstep.

Then you have 5-7 which are basically The Expendables but with cars. They're just crazy arse action movies with ridiculous stunts and cars.

I like both series. Not a huge fan of the second movie, and 4 was shit though.
 
As others mentioned with 4 they changed direction. Plus as plot hole filled and ridiculous it is there is a story that follows its own internal logic even if it would fall apart in the real world.

Most important it's fun to watch a dumb action movie that 1. Isn't trying to recreate the 80's 2. Isn't starring people like Matt Damon who I don't buy as action stars 3. Isn't just another installment in Michael Bays continuing saga, Explosion:The movie.

Plus I like a lot of the cast.
Those are my reasons.
 
I started watching the series with 4. I love Fast and Furious now. I probably wouldn't have liked the movies if I had started with 1-3, but I find them to be pretty fun movies because I watched them last and already know the characters because of 4-7.
 
Asides from 5-7 just being good action movies that can be recommended to action movie junkies with lots of memorable setpieces and an overall care-free positive atmosphere with a central theme about family compared to other action movies and car culture in general, there is also diversity representation.

Furious 7's biggest demographic was Hispanic (37%), while Caucasian and African Americans followed (25, 24%). 75% of the American audience was non-white.

Not many action blockbusters out there with a diverse cast.
 
At first, it was a franchise to fulfill the desire of teenage boys for fast and tuned cars who were fans of Need for Speed and other games. Then it developed to an action series but they actually kept the charismatic cast.

I think it wouldnt be the same if Vin Diesel and Paul Walker were replaced for the sequels.
 
Ganzlinger said:
At first, it was a franchise to fulfill the desire of teenage boys for fast and tuned cars who were fans of Need for Speed and other games. Then it developed to an action series but they actually kept the charismatic cast.

I think it wouldnt be the same if Vin Diesel and Paul Walker were replaced for the sequels.
Click to expand...

The Fast and the Furious influenced Need for Speed, not the other way around.
 
First, ignore the first four. The first movie is good, third is okay, but the second and fourth are mostly crap. These are all different from what this franchise is today. What you need to focus on is what came after. What happened when part five starring The Rock came along?

You know superhero movies? See how Avengers is so popular?

Fast Five, and its two sequels, are pretty much better superhero movies than actual superhero movies, including Avengers. That's why they're popular. They're blockbusters done right for the most part.

Now listen to this, and feel better.
 
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