“The Fast and Furious” franchise has achieved cult status to the point where the audience has whole-heartedly accepted that when Dominic Toretto steps inside his Dodge Charger, anything goes. So, considering how F9 sent a car into space, Vin Diesel’s statement that “Fast X” will be more grounded needs to be taken with a pinch of salt—salt as per taste, to be frank. The trailer for “Fast X” dropped on February 10, and needless to say, the only thing new is the cast, which is an amalgamation of all the actors that have appeared in the previous Fast and Furious films. The rest is just cars and their destruction, courtesy of a new villain. So, let’s break the trailer down and look for what’s new.
The beginning of the “Fast X” trailer shows Dom’s grandmother (Academy Award winner Rita Moreno) speaking to the table about how much they all have endured and yet persisted together as a family. But we all know that Dominic aka Dom (Vin Diesel) lives a pretty spontaneous life believing any day could be his last. It is this very life that is about to bring him face to face with yet another handful of spontaneous days, those that he will never forget. Enter Dante.
Jason Momoa will play the villain, Dante, in “Fast X.” Now, much like the last few films, this film, too, has an extra family layer to it. For example, Furious 7 introduced Deckard Shaw, the brother of Owen Shaw who was the antagonist of Fast and Furious 6. Then in F9, we got to see Jakob, who is Dom’s brother. Now, in “Fast X,” we have Dante, who is the son of Hernan Reyes, the guy whose vault, containing $100 million, was stolen by Dom and Brian in Fast 5. Dante is back to avenge his father’s death. In this trailer, we see that Dante was inside one of the two black SUVs, which fell into the river after Dom hit it with the vault attached to his car via a cable. In the other SUV were Reyes and his right-hand man, Zizi.
What’s funny is that Dom wasn’t the one to kill Reyes but DSS Agent Luke Hobbs, who shot him and then told Dom and Brian to make peace with whatever demons they got left in the 24-hour window they earned themselves. Well, there is no end to demons, and the events of “Fast X,” 12 years later, will prove it. With Dwayne Johnson backing out of the franchise after his differences with Vin Diesel, the makers seemingly had to figure out a way to incorporate Dante. So we might just be in for some confusion and disentanglement. Be that as it may, Dante doesn’t seem to be the quintessential Fast and Furious villain we have all come to see in the Fast and Furious films. His only motive is revenge, and there is no alternative. So, we, the audience, are in for more explosions and street cred propelled by NOS. What’s more bizarre than his motive is his look. He is an eccentric guy with pink and purple nails and a lavender-colored car. And much like his fashion and taste, he also seems to be quite eccentric in his methods. In other words, as Tyrese Gibson’s Roman Pierce exclaims at the top of his voice, “Incoming!!”
Dante probably has some kind of connection with Fate of the Furious (F8) antagonist Cipher (Charlize Theron), also in the film, or maybe not. Maybe both will shake hands to bring an end to Dom’s family. Either way, things are going to get very personal as Dante is the one to bring in the cavalry and come after all that Dom holds near and dear to his heart, including his son Brian. Towards the middle of the trailer, we have a shot of some of Dante’s men firing at Dom, who is taking cover behind a car door on a bridge. This bridge seems to be the same bridge on which Reyes was killed. This is going to be some serious déjà vu for Dom.
As for the other characters, we have Alan Ritchson (Amazon Prime’s “Reacher”) as Aimes, head of the agency, who will probably be Luke’s replacement as someone who locks horns with Dom. Brie Larson is Tess, a rogue agent belonging to the agency as well. John Cena’s Jakob, as well as Jason Statham’s Deckard Shaw, will return. We also have the great Helen Mirren returning as Deckard’s mother, Magdalene “Queenie” Shaw. Other than all of them, we have the whole OG team back together, including Letty, Mia, Han, Roman, Tej, and Ramsey. The film was shot on a budget of approximately $340 million, which makes it the most expensive Fast and Furious film yet. The reason we say “yet” is because the end of the trailer shows the message that “The End of the Road Begins” and Fast and Furious 11, the final installment of the original Fast and Furious saga, has already been confirmed by Vin Diesel as well as Universal.
