The definitive ranking of ‘Fast’ films
With 8 outings, there are good and very bad vehicles
Vroom vroom. The Fast and Furious franchise has made its mark with crazy car races, epic fisticuffs, super-macho male egos and scantily clad women dancing seductively in slo-mo before the next crazy car race. But since 2001’s The Fast and the
Furious introduced Vin Diesel’s street tough Dominic Toretto and the late Paul Walker’s cop/criminal/family man Brian O’Conner, the series of action flicks has shifted gears to being a tried-andtrue cinematic saga over eight films, including the just-released The Fate of the Furious.
The parade of nutty stuff they’ve pulled off is obvious. But how do they rank as actual movies and not just stunt extravaganzas? Let’s break them down:
1 FAST FIVE (2011)
Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) was the muscular jumpstart that the Furious series was sorely missing, giving Dom a powerhouse authority figure who could match him punch for punch, testosterone-laden stare to testosterone-laden stare. But the fifth film is also the most fun for Fast diehards as well as newcomers: It crafts a high-stakes global adventure that nicely ties together (and expands) the mythology.
2 FURIOUS 7 (2015)
Some heady themes come to the fore along with the spectacle: The checkered past of Dom’s crew comes back to haunt them in the form of supervillain Owen Shaw’s dangerous big bro Deckard (Jason Statham), and Brian weighs his growing family vs. an adrenaline-fueled life. The seventh movie also offers a tearjerking tribute to Walker as Brian rides off into the sunset and his buddy Dom races into the future.
3 FAST & FURIOUS 6 (2013)
After so many boys and their toys, No. 6 was noteworthy for letting the women take the wheel. Amid a globetrotting adventure that saw our favorite outlaws take on Shaw (Luke Evans) — and Dom jumping off a tank on a highway — Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) gets a pair of great fight scenes with Shaw’s imposing No. 2 (mixed martial artist Gina Carano).
4 THE FATE OF THE FURIOUS (2017)
Who needs James Bond when we have an American crew of world-saving antiheroes who are weirdly good at spec-ops missions? When Dom turns bad in the eighth film and teams up with an international hacker queen (Charlize Theron), his pal Hobbs takes the lead in bringing them down. Things have never been this ridiculously silly but there’s no denying the appeal of giant wrecking balls taking out a highway of cars and a Dodge Charger taking on a Russian nuclear submarine.
5 FAST & FURIOUS (2009)
For anybody needing to reboot their franchise the right way, here’s the template: The fourth installment killed off a main character (at least for a couple films), began to embrace the extreme camp and focus on family that would be franchise hallmarks, but brought back the simple magic of Dom and Brian getting fast and furious.
6 THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS: TOKYO DRIFT (2006)
The third film is a novelty in that it takes the racing to Japan and centers on teenager Sean Boswell (Lucas Black) getting into trouble with gangsters. Embrace the surprisingly deep Daniel/Mr. Miyagi dynamic with Sean and Han Lue (Sung Kang) and try to forget that its lead character may be the worst driver ever.
7 THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS (2001)
Average action, poor visual effects and a weak plot don’t help the series opener. Yet this fourwheeled take on Point Break is at least watchable thanks to the chemistry between Dom and Brian, who’d rather not believe that his hot-rodding svengali is responsible for jacking truckers.
8 2 FAST 2 FURIOUS (2003)
The only Fast film with no Diesel, it would be the worst regardless, but 2 Fast is a pretty terrible movie. It’s like a bad two-hour episode of Thunder in Paradise in which Brian and childhood frenemy Roman Pearce (Tyrese Gibson) team up to take down a Miami drug lord. Probably a small miracle this didn’t kill the property dead.