Movie Review: Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (PG13 – 142 minutes)

 

I waited almost a month to post this review – I tried to stay spoiler free, but there are a couple below – so spoiler warning up top!  If you have seen the movie, and you want to hear myself and a handful of other LAMB members rave about it, listen here: https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/lambcast/episodes/2021-09-07T08_55_22-07_00

The Marvel Cinematic Universe continues to strive forward after its own Endgame, first with new stories with familiar characters in the Disney Plus shows and in Black Widow, and now with an origin story of a brand new MCU hero.

Shang-Chi made his comic debut in 1973, during the height of the martial arts craze.  The books were big successes, leading to several attempts to bring him to the screen – including Stan Lee’s idea to do a movie in the late 80s starring Brandon Lee. Now, we finally get Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.

The movie begins in a similar fashion to Black Panther, with Shang-Chi’s mother telling him as a child the story of his father, who found the ten rings and used them to conquer, accumulate power, and gain near immortality over a thousand years or so. After meeting her, he put them away to focus on his family and she stepped away from her village in a different dimension, setting aside her powers as well.  Her powers as less clear, but seem to be elemental?  

She gives the young Shang-Chi a pendant and we jump ahead to meet him as Shaun, a happy young man working as a valet in San Francisco with his best friend Katy.  On a bus ride to work, some members of his father’s crew, including the aptly named Razor Fist, show up to collect the pendant and threaten to go after his sister. Determined to save her, he comes clean about his past to Katy, who insists on joining him as he goes to see his sister. They head to Macao, but his sister Xialing is doing just fine for herself, running an underground fight club that features fights with ‘enhanced individuals’.  Just as Shang-Chi and Xialing are reconnecting, their father, Wenwu (or The Mandarin, or any of the other multiple names folks have been calling him), shows up to collect both pendants and both children – and Katy for some reason. At his compound, he reveals the reason Katy is there - to justify lengthy exposition of his history and new goal of rescuing his wife from behind a huge gate at her village. His children, having watched her die, know he is starting to lose his mind and set out to save her village from their father – with Katy.

I loved this movie. I have seen it three times and enjoyed it each time more than the previous time. It can feel a little slow in the middle where all the exposition is happening, but I am not sure how you could have skipped any of it because it helps to clarify and develop all the characters and their backstories. Directed by Destin Daniel Cretton, the movie integrates flashbacks throughout the entire piece, creating a layered narrative that works really well for this particular hero. Several flashback scenes are used repeatedly, but with more information each time, filling in the story as the movie progresses.  This allows you to feel very connected to both Shang-Chi and Xialing by the time the climatic action sequence happens.  The look of the movie is stunning, especially when it shifts to Tao Lo, the village in another dimension, filled with various creatures from Chinese mythology.  The fights and actions sequences are spectacular, especially the bus fight early on.  But what really elevates this fairly straightforward comic-book action movie (like most MCU movies) is the actors and the performances.

Simu Liu is the perfect choice for Shang-Chi. He is so likeable and relatable. I appreciated that while being an origin movie, we didn’t get an intense training sequence for him – his training is conveyed during flashbacks and setups so that what would have been a training montage in other MCU origin stories is covered in pieces that enhance the story.  As a side note, if you have not watched Kim’s Convenience yet on Netflix, go ahead and binge all four seasons of that incredibly charming Canadian sitcom to fall in love with Simu all over again.

Meng’er Zhang is absolutely wonderful as Xialing. She has a compelling side of the story, but I almost wish there was a little more of her. She is a bit bitter at Shang-Chi for leaving her behind years ago, and as a result, has crafted herself into a bit of an underworld boss.  As a slight spoiler – stay through all the credits – I cannot wait to see what they have in store for her next, she was a true bright spot in an already bright movie for me.

Tony Chiu-Wai Leung is a legend in Asian cinema but this may be the first time some American audience members have seen him. On the surface, this version of the Mandarin could be pure evil, and written off as just another MCU throwaway villain. However, through some delicate touches and beautiful moments, he manages to make Wenwu sympathetic in moments, driven to desperation by how much he misses his wife. Only someone with his skill can pull that off. 

Awkwafina plays Katy and begins as regular Awkwafina (I do enjoy Nora from Queens on Comedy central, but mainly for B.D. Wong and Grandma), but evolves over the course of the movie to a pretty high-level sidekick. She functions as the audience “in” to the story, because everyone else knows what is going on, so she gets to ask the questions we would ask.  I love that she and Shang-Chi have a very strong platonic friendship with no forced romance. 

Of course, since the Mandarin is the villain, we are treated to the return of Ben Kingsley’s Trevor Slattery – or “Fake Mandarin” from Iron Man 3 and the Marvel One-shot Short, “All Hail The King”, which is now on Disney+.  He is a treat and I love LOVE his buddy Morris, the Dijiang. Delightful.

Florian Munteanu, most recently seen as Ivan Drago Jr. in Creed 2, plays Razor Fist. He is a old-fashioned comic-book movie villain who is able to quickly adapt to a situation that gets out of his control. Plus, he has a pretty sweet car. Andy Le is great as Death Dealer, but I could have used a little bit more of him.

The incredible Michelle Yeoh continues to be incredible as Ying Nan, the siblings’ auntie who lives in the alternate dimension. She’s there to fill in any exposition holes that Wenwu missed in the previous scenes as well as clarify some of Shang-Chi’s abilities to prep him for the final battle. 

Overall, the movie is beautiful with fantastic action and great soundtrack and score.  I normally only notice the score when it is bad or really good. Here, Joel P. West’s score is noticeably epic, blending traditional Chinese instruments and sounds with modern Asian hip-hop beats and tempos. I love the music behind the final action sequence. I also love the cultural moments, yes, he’s the first Chinese superhero to have his own movie, but even more lovely are the smaller cultural moments in the movie. He goes to pick up Katy from work and has a discussion with Katy’s grandmother about how she is preparing to remember her late husband. Continued representation is key to allow all movie-goers the opportunity to see themselves, their traditions, and culture reflected in the movies we all watch.  The movie is a fantastic origin story – certainly one of the best in the MCU and I cannot wait to see Shang-Chi join up with other heroes in upcoming stories.

9 out of 10

In case you were curious how that Dijiang came to be and why he is so adorable! Spoilers! https://www.etonline.com/how-shang-chi-brought-morris-the-scene-stealing-chaos-god-to-life-exclusive-171995

Movie Review: Free Guy (PG132- 115 minutes)

 

Having played all the Batman Arkham games and the two Spider-Man games, I have a passing familiarity with NPCs.  These are the non-playable characters that populate an ‘open-world’ game. Basically they are the background folks, programmed to walk around and do/say the same things over and over. They provide filler to the game so that the ‘world’ of the game seems more real. In the Miles Morales Spider-Man game, there are a couple that you can high-five, which is of course, the best. 

Free Guy is a movie highlighting one of those NPCs in a popular game who is accidentally given Artificial intelligence programming and begins to evolve and get smarter and more skilled as he takes control of his own destiny.  While he does this, player Millie and programmer Keys work together to determine if game company CEO Antwan stole their game and code to build his empire.  Hijinks ensue.

Director Shawn Levy is the Canadian behind the Night at the Museum franchise and works the same level of action and comedy with just enough tender moments here. The world of the game feels familiar to anyone who has played an open-world adventure game, but the story is straightforward enough that even those who have not played one of those games will get the gist and be able to enjoy the movie.  The tone is just right, balancing the zaniness of the game world with the exasperation of the real world. The cast is perfect and elevates the material at hand.

Ryan Reynolds gives his all and proves once again that action-comedy is his sweet spot.  As the naïve and hapless Guy in the game, he is perfectly satisfied with the monotonous everyday drivel that he and his fellow NPCs are doing, until he meets Jodie Comer’s Millie and realizes that he is capable of more. Reynolds is perfect in this type of role, hilarious and genuine.  Comer is the perfect counterpoint as a woman focused on her own interests until she sees Guy’s potential. I also enjoyed how they played with her accent between her real and game personas. 

Lil Rel Howery is fantastic and slightly understated as Guy’s best friend, Buddy.  He is satisfied with their life as it is and cannot quite understand why Guy is beginning to look for more. But, like a true best friend, he is there when Guy needs him.

Joe Keery plays Keys, the programmer working for Antwan, who begins to suspect that Antwan may have stolen some of his work when Guy’s self-awareness becomes apparent.

Utkarsh Ambudkar plays Mouser, Key’s co-worker and not-quite-friend. There are also plenty of cameos, so keep your ears peeled for voices you may recognize, and if you follow Youtube gamers, you may catch some of them too.  No shock here, but Taika Waititi as Antwan steals several scenes. He is completely over the top and just this side of a mustache-twirling villain as he attempts to keep Keys and Millie from discovering the truth.  He is clearly having a ball being bad. 

Overall, the movie is very fun, and will satisfy gamers and non-gamers alike. It is perfectly charming and has a nice tight run time (no movie needs to be more than two hours long).  It is certainly worth checking out.

8 out of 10

 

Movie Review: The Protégé (R – 109 minutes)

 

Every once in a while, I appreciate a straightforward and simple action movie.

The Protégé tells the story of Anna, a woman recruited by a man named Moody in Vietnam when he encountered her after she killed a bunch of guys who killed her family and captured her.  He trained her as an assassin and together they had a very successful career.  Now, Moody is very sick and thinking about his legacy while getting affairs in order.  He asks Anna to dig into the son of a hit they carried out years ago.  Asking about the son lands Anna deeper into a mess involving shady characters, a return to Vietnam, and a man named Rembrandt who is both intrigued by Anna and prepared to eliminate her.

I really enjoyed this movie. Martin Campbell as a director is great with action – I enjoyed both his Banderas Zorro movies and The Foreigner, and for some reason I have always enjoyed Vertical Limit.  Here, he takes his action-directing skills to smaller sets and more hand to hand fights.  The cast is game and the story is simple with enough twists to keep the audience engaged.  The movie does have some questionable points – I’m not sure what it is saying about Vietnam, but it certainly does not feel complimentary.  The age difference between Keaton and Q is significant but I let that go because I felt like the chemistry between them was good.  And why is there a biker gang of mostly white guys roaming around Vietnam?  Maybe that’s a thing, I have never been there.

Maggie Q has been great for a long time, best known for her run on the CW version of Nikita, not the 90s Peta Wilson version, and not either of the film versions (Point of No Return, or the original La Femme Nikita). It was wonderful to see her as the lead here, and she was completely believable as a ruthless killer when necessary who also enjoys running her antique bookstore.

Michael Keaton is even better in this – it made me remember the 80s crush I had on him. As Rembrandt, he has great chemistry with Maggie Q, chasing her and becoming even more interested as she gets the better of him in a couple of instances. It was also wonderful to see him in an action piece again – but it did just make me want a Batman Beyond movie.

Samuel L. Jackson as Moody is really in this to provide exposition and guide the story.  He is basically playing himself and it was charming to see him attempt to set up Anna as he approaches the end of his life.

Ray Fearon plays the lead henchman of the security forces that Anna comes up against. He is perfect as the cocky and slimy villain.

Robert Patrick surprisingly shows up as a contact Anna has in Vietnam, ready to offer support and muscle when needed.

Overall, the movie is simple, quick, and entertaining. It was exactly what it promised to be and had some great action sequences along with a great deal of charming flirting between Anna and Rembrandt. It’s a sexy action thriller that maybe needed a more general nondescript setting.

6 out of 10

Movie Review: The Green Knight (R – 130 minutes)

 

Do you remember having to read about Sir Gawain and the Green Knight in your high school English Literature class? Vaguely? It seems like the makers of this film also vaguely remember the original story.

Be sure to check out the LAMBCast episode on the Green Knight to hear myself and several other LAMBs attempt to better our understanding of this film:  https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/lambcast/episodes/2021-08-02T13_29_30-07_00

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a 14^th century poem written in alliterative verse that uses various symbols and allegories to highlight the code of chivalry, what it means to be a knight, and passing challenges to prove one’s worthiness.  This movie skips several of those themes. The poem tells the tale of Gawain, King Arthur’s nephew, during a celebration, the Green Knight shows up and issues a challenge to the court: one of the knights can land a blow on him, but then one year from then, the Green Knight gets to return the blow.  Gawain accepts the challenge and cuts off the knight’s head, thinking he has beaten the game. However, the knight picks up his head, reminds Gawain of the year-challenge and takes off.  Gawain then sets off on a journey, encountering many challenges that help prove he is ready to be a knight of the round table.

This movie starts out the same with the challenge and beheading but adds scenes to show that Gawain is basically a lazy drunk, spending his nights in a brothel. His mother seems to cast a spell that conjures the Green Knight.  Gawain attempts to drink away the year, but Arthur shows up and reminds him that he must seek out the knight and finish the challenge.  Along the way, he encounters a thief, mushrooms, a fox, giants (that either speak fox, or the fox speaks giant), a ghost, and a couple in a hunting lodge.  You expect him to grow with each of these various aspects of his journey, showing that he is worthy of becoming of knight (which is the point of the poem). However, he barely survives most of the encounters, and certainly does not seem to improve as a person. When he finally re-encounters the Green Knight, he gets a vision of what his life would be if he runs away from the challenge and so he recommits to allowing the Knight his hit, at which point we get an abrupt end.

It feels like writer/director David Lowery wanted to create an epic fantasy movie based on this classic work. In my opinion, he falls short.  The movie looks amazing, the sets are stunning, the locations are beautiful, and the costumes are breathtaking. The characters and story are where I think it is lacking. 

Dev Patel is usually a capable lead, but here, he is flat and uninteresting.  The movie seems to want to be about his journey towards knighthood, but none of the challenges he encounters allow him to grow, become wise, or even adapt.  He ends the movie basically as annoying as he was at the beginning and it is hinted that he is now changed, but the movie ends before we see any proof of that evolution.

Sean Harris plays the creepiest version of King Arthur you have ever seen, realizing he is at the end of his life and regretting not getting to know his nephew earlier.  Kate Dickie plays Gwenivere, also very creepy and sickly. 

Sarita Choudhury plays Gawain’s mother, Arthur’s sister. In legend, she is Morgan le Fay, here she casts weird spells in a tower and creates a belt or sash that will protect Gawain that he promptly loses and then finds again.

Erin Kellyman plays a mysterious lady Gawain meets in a cabin who is dead and requests that he retrieve her head from the nearby pond.  It seems like he should learn a lesson from that encounter as well, but I could not begin to tell you what it was. He does at first ask what he will get in return if he gets her head, and she chastises him for that, so perhaps that good deeds are their own reward? Yes, that sounds good.

Joel Edgerton (who played Gawain in the Fuqua King Arthur) and Alicia Vikander play the lord and lady of the hunting lodge.  In nearly all other versions, the lord is also the Green Knight, but that is never mentioned here.  They enter into some very strange bargains involving favors, trades, hunting and kisses.

Overall, the movie looks hauntingly beautiful and is sweepingly gorgeous on the big screen. However, the story does not match the visuals and that left me disappointed. This version Gawain is very hard to root for because he feels charmless and unaffected. It is unclear if he learned any of the lessons of his journey, but then – it is very hard to tell what any of those lessons were.  I wanted to this feel like the Odyssey, where the point of the story is the journey, not the destination. However, both the journey and destination were so murky in this movie, neither felt like the point.  Oh well, at least the giants looked cool and the fox made it through unharmed.  

4 out of 10

Movie Review: Snake Eyes: G.I. Joe Origins (PG13 – 121 minutes)

Now that the Olympics are over, I can catch up on some of the other things I have been neglecting – first thing – a delayed review of Snake Eyes! When I first heard they were making this movie, I thought maybe they would let Ray Park get to play the character again.  That is once again not the case as he gets recast yet again. I am certainly not complaining, Henry Golding is wonderful.

I have zero knowledge of the original G.I.Joe toys or cartoons. I know they are by Hasbro, and that they were very popular in the 80s – and I know that knowing is half the battle. I certainly did see the two G.I.Joe movies, the first with Channing Tatum and the second with the Rock. Snake Eyes in those is basically a silent ninja all in black with a grudge against a ninja all in white on the bad guys’ team. 

This movie gives you Snake Eyes origin story. What’s that? You weren’t asking for his backstory? No worries, the majority of this movie plays like a really cool Yakuza martial arts thriller, and those are the parts I liked the most. We meet Snake Eyes as a child living with his dad in a very remote cabin.  We soon learn that his dad is in witness protection as a group of bad guys shows up and eliminates him. The killer has his dad roll dice to determine his fate and of course they come up snake eyes, and the child takes that name going forward.

We catch up with him as he is cage fighting for money. A yakuza boss shows up and offers him a job because he knows all about Snake (he really couldn’t find another name to use?) and his quest for his father’s killer. We then jump slightly forward to see that Snake is working for the boss and befriended another employee, Tommy.  Then, in a slightly confusing sequence – we learn that Tommy was actually undercover in the organization to keep an eye on the boss who had betrayed his family years ago. Snake saves him, and together they go on the run. Tommy takes Snake back to his family, where he undergoes three challenges to become a ninja of the highest order. 

That part of the movie is great, super interesting, fantastic action, and fantastic and engaging performances by Golding and Andrew Koji as Tommy.  It’s about at this point where the G.I.Joe bits come in: Snake learns Cobra (the bad guys) was actually behind the killing of his father because his father was a Joe, Tommy’s family has a magic weapon stone that they protect but are sworn not to use, and Cobra is after the stone, big time as they launch an attack on Tommy’s family’s compound – oh, and there’s a pit with giant snakes. It all gets to be a bit convoluted but stays entertaining.

Director Robert Schwentke does a great job with both halves of the movie, but they do feel a little like two separate things. I really enjoyed the first half but spent a lot of the second half rolling my eyes.  Golding and Koji are great, with Koji being even more interesting than Golding. It is pretty obvious from early on where his character is going, and I might be interested to see more from him.

Haruka Abe plays Akiko, Tommy’s head of security who goes from distrustful of Snake to suddenly in love with him? A little confusing there, but she did what she could. The standouts are, of course, Ido Uwais and Peter Mensah as the two masters on staff at Tommy’s compound who walk Snake through his challenges. They are both wonderful, action-packed, and bring a light fun touch that most of the rest of the movie was missing. Everyone else was working hard, these two were having a good time while working hard.

Ursula Corbero plays the Baroness and Samara Weaving plays Scarlett, the opposing sides of the same coin that feels forced into the story.

This movie is clearly setting up additional G.I.Joe movies which I found interesting, because it does not seem to be an IP that is having any kind of resurgence – the cartoon hasn’t stayed on, it hasn’t been rebooted (as far as I know), so the fan base is basically those who loved it in the 80s and want to see more. That can be a little tough to get the tone of the movies correct. It seems like this movie did that, but I would be curious to know what die hard Joe fans thought and if they even want more live-action movies.  Personally, I would have been happy if this was just an organized crime martial arts thriller – which it almost is, so I was almost happy.

6 out of 10

Movie Review: Black Widow (PG13 – 143 minutes)

 

After so many delays, it was an absolute delight to see Black Widow in a theater nearly full of Marvel fans. 

In case you are a casual Marvel Cinematic Universe fan who only saw Endgame – do yourself a favor and watch all twenty plus movies – but beside that you may be wondering how Black Widow can be starring in her own movie when she is clearly dead, having sacrificed herself to ensure the survival of her found family.  This movie takes place between Captain America Civil War and Avengers Infinity War.  In case you forgot, after the events of Civil War, Nat had bucked against the system, turning against General Thunderbolt Ross and his Sokovia Accords to help Cap and Bucky get to Siberia to stop all the other potential Winter Soldiers.  After a cold open highlighting Natasha’s seeming idyllic childhood in Ohio – a cover for an undercover Russian sleeper cell - we go forward to Ross being miffed and trying to hunt her down. 

Natasha, haunted by her past and troubled by her future, is trying to live off the grid when her ‘sister’ sends her a package from Budapest, bringing up memories of the mission we have she and Hawkeye mention a couple of times.  Nat heads to Budapest, encounters Yelena, and together they step back into conflict with the ‘Red Room’ system that trains Black Widows as assassins and killers while dodging the Taskmaster – a baddie who can replicate everyone else’s fighting style. This is a cool trait as it often pits Nat against various Avenger fighting bits. The Red Room has stepped up its game and found a way to remove nearly all of the human element from their agents while remaining very difficult to find. Nat and Yelena find their former ‘parents’ to get the information necessary to bring down the Red Room and its shadowy leader, Dreykov.

Directed by Cate Shortland, the movie certainly feels like an MCU movie with a great balance between action and comedy.  The scenes with the family unit reunited are charming and fun even though they layer over the horrible things the members were responsible for accomplishing.  I did think the actual mechanisms of the Red Room were glossed over a bit, but if you truly dug into that process, it may need to slide into R Rated territory, and that is not really MCU fare. What I liked best about the movie was Scarlett Johansson playing the ‘straight man’ to center and ground the film while everyone around her got to be bigger and a little more zany.

Scarlett has been playing this character since Iron Man 2, and here, really gets to allow Black Widow not only to accept her own history and fate but make peace with everything she has done. It gives her sacrifice in Endgame even more weight.  As a producer on the movie, she made the right call in allowing everyone else to step up and shine.

David Harbour and Rachel Weisz as Alexei and Melina respectively were great, as expected.  Weisz gives Melina a chilling coldness as she talks about the mind control technology she has perfected and casually tortures one of her pigs.  I knew Harbour would be fun and charming, and he is – but he is also good at the action and emotional scenes.

By now you have heard that the true standout in the movie is Florence Pugh as Yelena. She is fantastic in the action sequences, and completely sells herself as the next Black Widow. What I was not prepared for is how funny and entertaining she is. Her interactions with Natasha are brilliant – balanced between sibling love and rivalry. I expected Harbour to steal his scenes, I was not prepared for Pugh to steal the entire movie. It functions to set her up for future MCU appearances, and I cannot wait to see more of her character.

Ray Winstone is an interesting choice as Dreykov. He’s so incredibly cockney that the Russian accent feels very forced, but he certainly can play a villain.  I wanted him to be the voice of Rocket Raccoon from the beginning, so it is a bit of a treat to see him in the MCU, even if this villain is not as developed as he could have been. Likewise, the other slight disappointment is Olga Kurylenko as Antonia, she could have been given a lot more work to do and while her character was fascinating, it felt almost tempered, and I would have liked to see that character cut loose.

Overall, I certainly enjoyed the movie from start to finish and it was even more wonderful to see it in a theater where no one moved once the credits started rolling, because we all knew to stay put and wait for the end credits sequence.

8 out of 10 – Pugh has done wonders for the sale of pocketed vests, I’m sure.

Movie Review: F9: The Fast Saga (PG13 - 145 minutes)

 

What a fantastic flick to welcome folks back to summer blockbusters in the theater. If you want to hear me and a couple of other LAMB members rave about this highest level of quality nonsense, be sure to give the LAMBCast episode on F9 a listen: https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/lambcast/episodes/2021-06-28T12_24_53-07_00

I could try to start this review with a quick summary of what happened in the previous 8 movies and who all these characters are, and what brought them to this situation, but honestly – it is not at all necessary. Suffice it to say that Dominic Toretto leads a ‘family’ of street racers who started in The Fast and The Furious in June of 2001.  In that movie, twenty years ago, they were stealing DVD players from trucks while driving. Now, 9 movies later, they are basically a group of international spies, hackers, geniuses, sharpshooters, hand to hand combat masters, and Corona drinkers (that part hasn’t changed).

The cold open gives us the visualization of the story that Dom has told us before, his father getting run into the wall while racing in 1985 and him going to jail for beating the other driver with a wrench.  We then get some fun credits and jump to present day where Dom and Letty enjoying married life with his son (with Elena), little Brian, completely off the grid and away from everyone else.  Well, Dom is enjoying being off the grid.  Letty seems very dissatisfied. They are suddenly visited by Tej, Roman, and Ramsey who bring news that Mr. Nobody’s plane has been brought down in a generic south American country. He had some dangerous cargo and sent a distress call that only our Fast Family would receive.  Dom refuses to go help, but Letty sets out to join the others. While reviewing the footage, Dom notices a duplicate of his cross necklace, and suddenly decides to join the mission.

During what is an insane opening action set piece that feels absolutely built to be added to the Fast and Furious bit of the Universal Studios tour (just give them their own ride in a full soundstage like the Transformers ride – they need it!), Dom realizes that his long-lost brother, Jakob, is his new foe.  Jakob steals the piece of tech and escapes by jumping his car OFF A CLIFF TO BE CAUGHT BY A PLANE WITH A MAGNET. And that is before Dom drives his cliff into the remains of a bridge to catch a cable and SWING LIKE TARZAN.  Just in the first action set piece!

The movie only continues to get more exciting from there, finding ways to bring back additional members of the Fast Family – including my favorite, Han, who died a few movies ago. It also gives both Mia and Letty, and even Ramsey more to do this time around. Director Justin Lin has outdone himself with this one, and I can’t even begin to speculate where the tenth movie will go. This one felt appropriate in a way as a near-finale because it brought back so many people, established Jakob, and then rehabilitated Jakob (I can only assume he will join the family next movie) – it even worked in a touching tribute to Paul Walker and gathered everyone for a barbeque and Coronas at the end. It is near perfection.  Oh, and they drive a car in space – THEY DRIVE A CAR IN SPACE.

I will say that I felt Vin Diesel as Dom was more invested in this one. While it may feel strange to say, this movie benefits from being Rock-less.  The Rock is a star, and he didn’t really ever fit in with the Fast Family as his nature is to outshine everyone around him. With him not in this movie, the family could retrieve their group chemistry and truly place Vin back at the center, where he wants to be. John Cena as Jakob is much more capable of joining an ensemble and working towards a group goal.

Jordana Brewster has always asked for more stunts and Michelle Rodriguez has mentioned in the past that she would not return if Letty didn’t get more to do. Both have action set pieces in this movie and more family scenes as well. It returned each of them to being some of my favorite characters.

Ludacris continues to shine as Tej, and he and Nathalie Emmanuel as Ramsey were wonderful in working out all the details of the completely insane plans. I loved Ramsey’s non-driving during the action set piece in Edinburgh. I also enjoyed the two of them teasing Tyrese’s Roman through most of the movie. Tyrese once again is exceptional and definitely provides the audience viewpoint in this insane world as he sums up the action from previous movies, to the point of mentioning how completely ridiculous some of their adventures have been.

Charlize Theron returns as Cipher – so far the only villain to not eventually be turned to joining the Fast Family, which I hope she never does, because after all, she did kill Elena.  She’s delightfully evil in this as she tries her hardest to out-bad-guy Thue Ersted Rasmussen’s Otto, the generic money-behind-the-villain’s-plot. She easily succeeds.

The return of Sung Kang as Han while eating a bag of chips was fantastic – I can only assume that Gal Gadot will return in the next one as Gisele just fell off a car and these folks have proven to be nearly impossible to kill. 

Michael Rooker shows up as Dom’s dad’s racing buddy Buddy. Helen Mirren returns for a bit as Queenie Shaw, the matriarch of the insane Shaw clan.  Don Omar returns briefly as Santos. Shea Whigham returns as Agent Stasiak. Even better was the return of Shad Moss (Bow Wow) as Twinkie and Lucas Black as Sean from Tokyo Drift. They have now been completely returned to the fold to the point that they got to join the barbeque at the end.

I love these movies – I love the inclusive cast, the international feel, and finally in this one it feels like the tone is completely understood and accepted by everyone involved – they all embrace the over-the-top nonsense joy. I think this might be my new favorite in the series.  It doesn’t matter if you have never seen any of the other movies because characters keep reminding everyone what happened previously, at least enough to let you enjoy the action of this one. Grab your family and some Corona and some popcorn, turn off your brain and hit the NOS button for an absolute summer tentpole blockbuster.

9 out of 10 – losing one point for not bringing Gisele back from the dead yet…fingers crossed for the next one.