Cars. FAMILY. Willing suspension of disbelief. These three words can basically sum up the two-decade sprawling franchise of the “Fast and Furious” saga. While the premise of the movies has transitioned from more grounded illegal street racing to pure nonsensical fun action heists, it’d seem the relevance of the franchise is fighting against time, but the box office numbers have to say otherwise. However, nine movies—which are part of the original series, one spin-off movie, and even an animated series—later, the franchise is going to end its lap with a movie trilogy, starting with the first part, Fast X, which is releasing this week. With numerous actors already associated with this ever-expanding action franchise, it’s easy to lose track of everything regarding the main narrative. We will like to bring viewers up to speed by trying to chronicle the important events in the “Fast and Furious” franchise.
Spoilers Ahead
The Beginning: Meet Brian And Dom
The chief protagonist duo of the Fast franchise, Dominic Toretto and Brian O’Conner, are introduced to the audience in the first movie, The Fast and the Furious. With the LA suburbs as the setting, the duo initially found themselves on opposite ends of the spectrum. Dominic ran a crew that took part in illegal races and also orchestrated a series of truck robberies to get out of a lifetime of poverty and crime that they had been thrown into since birth. Brian, working as an LAPD officer, was sent to Dom’s neighborhood to infiltrate the local underworld to put a stop to the serial robberies.
Working as an undercover operative, Brian snooped around Dom’s garage and gradually got into a romantic fling with Dom’s sister, Mia—something that didn’t sit well with Dom and his crew due to him being an outsider. However, to prove his mettle, Brian took part in illegal street races and saved Dom’s back when authorities approached. Eventually, Brian got to know about Dom and his crew’s involvement with the robberies and confronted him about it. However, when push came to shove, Brian allowed Dom to escape from authorities, as, through the course of events, he had grown a sense of respect for Dom, who has a moral code of his own that he wields to protect his crew, or as he prefers to say, his family. The bromance between Dom and Brian constitutes the emotional crux of not just the first movie but of the majority of the series. As the series progresses, Brian gets married to Mia, the couple has kids, and eventually, Brian retires from this life of thrill-seeking to tend to his family. We are also introduced to the character Letty, Dom’s loving girlfriend, who plays a significant role in the lore of the Furious Saga.
Who Are Roman And Tej?
After the escapade in LA, Brian lost his credibility as an officer for letting Dom and his family escape and turned into a fugitive. Thereafter, he shifts to Miami and gets acquainted with the tech wiz Tej Parker, who organizes illegal races of all sorts and also fine-tunes hot wheels. However, the authority catches up to Brian and offers his reinstatement into the force in exchange for taking down drug lord Carter Verone. Brian seeks the assistance of his childhood friend, the loudmouth hot rodder Roman Pearce. Both Roman and Tej were instrumental in taking down Verone, and from thereon, they have acted as a sort of comic relief in the franchise, adding a necessary dash of self-awareness to their buffoonery. After taking down Verone, Brian becomes an FBI agent, and he crosses paths with Dom once again.
Letty And Han’s Death And Return
After escaping from LA, Dom’s association with a life of crime made it difficult for him and Letty to start a family of their own, and Letty secretly sought out Brian, who was an FBI agent during this period, to get some help clearing Dom’s records. Brian let her operate undercover and infiltrate the druglord Arturo Braga, but she apparently lost her life when Braga’s right-hand man, Fenix, exploded her car. Dom and Brian take down Braga and kill Fenix in order to avenge Letty’s death. However, unbeknownst to either of them, Letty had survived and was afflicted with amnesia, and a deadly merc named Owen Shaw, who played a key role in Braga’s rise to power, recruited her into his team. Letty eventually rejoined Dom’s family after the defeat of Owen Shaw and gradually gained back her memories thanks to Dom’s commitment.
Staying dead in the “Fast and Furious” universe is hard, as yet another of Dom’s close associates, Han Lue, faked his death when Deckard Shaw tried to avenge his brother’s defeat by Dom’s crew. Han was secretly recruited into a global weaponry control program known as Project Aries, operated by an elusive government organization named Agency, which was led by Mr.Nobody. Han was romantically involved with Gisele, a former Mossad agent who tried to infiltrate Braga and later joined Dom’s crew, and it was through Gisele that Mr. Nobody got to know about both of them as well.
Lucas Hobbs And The Shaw Family
Dom and his crew came into direct conflict with DSS agent Lucas Hobbs, the burly, no-nonsense manhunter who went after Dom during the events of Fast Five, when they were indicted for killing several DEA agents. However, Hobbs gradually showed reverence for Dom after getting to know him up close and had to acknowledge his crew’s efficiency as he sought help from them several times in his missions that needed extrajudicial assistance. Mr.Nobody sought the help of Hobbs and also of Dom’s crew multiple times in a number of situations that would have caused global catastrophe.
The Shaw family is led by the matriarch, Magdalene, aka Queenie Shaw, whose criminal past led all her children—all excellently skilled combat agents and ex-SAS, MI6, and military assassins—to pursue similar interests later in life. Her youngest son, Owen Shaw, tried to create a modified EMP known as the “Nightshade’ device and was beaten by Dom’s crew. To avenge his brother, the eldest Shaw sibling, Deckard, starts hunting down Dom’s family, apparently killing Han by crashing into his car. He later assisted a terrorist named Mose Jakande in retrieving an overpowered tracking program named ‘God’s Eye,’ and both of them were defeated by Dom’s crew. During his incarceration, he was joined by Hobbs as well (who was imprisoned for the failure of an out-of-protocol mission), and the duo broke free from the prison. Both Shaw siblings and Hobbs assisted Dom’s crew when Dom had to go rogue and assist the notorious criminal mastermind, Cipher, who blackmailed him with an extremely personal stake. The youngest of the Shaw siblings, Hattie Shaw, makes an appearance while assisting Deckard and Hobbs to foil the plans of Brixton Lore, which was a misadventure unrelated to the main Fast saga. Among the Shaw siblings, Deckard is going to play a key role in Fast X.
Who Is Cipher?
Cipher is the evil genius behind all the plans involving the Shaw brothers and orchestrated the stealing of both the ‘Nightshade’ and ‘God’s Eye.” She later tried to gain her hand on nuclear weaponry by using none other than Dom. Cipher blackmailed Dom with the lives of Elena (a former police officer at Rio with whom Dom was romantically involved after Letty’s presumed death) and her son, whom she had conceived with Dom. Cipher succeeded in turning Dom against his family, but with the combined effort of the Shaw brothers, Hobbs, and Dom’s family, her plans were thwarted. However, she managed to kill Elena and escape thereafter, although only for a short while, as Dom’s brother Jakob had abducted her. Cipher had managed to escape by pinning Jakob using his handler’s turn against him and will return in Fast X in all her villainous glory.
Who Is Jakob?
Jakob is Dom’s estranged brother, who had to part ways with him after Dom wrongfully accused him of being the reason for their father’s death. Jakob’s resentment grew since Dom, who claims to prioritize his family over everything, had turned his back on his own brother, and he acted out his revenge by going after Dom’s crew, beating them miserably during their initial clashes. Jakob was a former agent of the agency under Mr.Nobody and had turned rogue, stealing a weaponry program named Project Aries. However, Jakob is later betrayed by his handler, Otto, who sided with Cipher, and as he helped Dom’s crew beat the duo, he has since been forgiven for his crimes. Dom also came to know the truth regarding their father’s death and made amends with Jakob. In Fast X, Dom’s brother is going to play a vital role in protecting his family.
Who Is Dante?
During the events of Fast Five, Dom and his crew ransacked the druglord Hernan Reyes, who had framed the team for murder and stole his entire fortune. Also, in the end, Hobbs killed him as a form of vengeance for his comrades. As we know from the trailer of Fast X, Dante is the son of Hernan Reyes, who is out for revenge, and he will move heaven and earth to take Dom’s family apart.
