It might seem like Furious 7 was just in theaters yesterday, but we’re now quickly closing in on the release of its sequel, Fate of the Furious. The Fast & Furious franchise has changed a lot since its humble inception, but its repeated box office and, more recently, critical success has kept it going, turning it into one of the most profitable franchises of all time. While we all love comic book movies and Star Wars, having another major tentpole that represents an original - yet still unique - property is a great way to get ready for the summer movie season.
The official second trailer for Fate of the Furious was just released, and while it covers many of the same highlights as the previous trailers, there’s a lot of new information revealed through a few new lines of dialogue and some previously unseen footage (including some insane action). Here’s our complete breakdown.
Gone, but not forgotten
After the tragic passing of Paul Walker during the holiday break for Furious 7’s production, the movie was finished with a combination of CGI and Walker’s brothers, who acted as stand-ins, wrapping up Brian O’Connor’s story and giving him a touching send-off.
While Brian O’Connor is no longer an active part of the story, his presence is clearly still felt, as the trailer includes a glimpse of a photograph featuring Dom and Letty With Mia, Brian, and their baby. Walker may have been written out of the franchise, but it’s touching to see that he’s still in the hearts of his team, as he surely is with Vin Diesel, who was a close friend of his.
‘Don’t give up on him so easy’
The very first trailer for Furious 8 dropped the bombshell that Dom had turned against the team - his family. It was initially played off as a full cold-blooded betrayal, but subsequent trailers have added some nuance to his decision. While it initially seemed like a reversal of Letty’s role in Fast and Furious 6, Dom isn’t suffering from amnesia and is understandably very upset about his coercion.
What is consistent with Letty’s turn in Fast and Furious 6 is that his team hasn’t given up on him. We’ve heard the “you don’t turn your back on family” like in almost every piece of marketing so far, but this trailer adds a new one: “don’t give up on him so easy.” It’s not clear if Dom will be the “villain” for the full duration, or if he’ll find a way to turn on Cipher to join his family before the thir act (he appears to be leading the pack in the submarine ice chase), but Letty’s not about to accept his betrayal as truth just yet.
‘One thing I can guarantee, no one’s ready for this’
Charlize Theron is joining the cast as the new villain, Cipher, but outside of the fact that Dom is apparently working for her and Kurt Russel’s “Mr. Nobody” has referred to her as “the very definition of high-tech terrorism,” there hasn’t been much revealed about just what that means. Until now.
It may not have been a surprise when the trailer revealed it, but we really should have seen it coming. Cipher is able to hack every car in New York city to create a car stampede, which is really only a logical inevitability for this franchise. This just might be the Fast & Furious equivalent of Neo vs. Agent Smith in Matrix Reloaded, and if that doesn’t excite you, then this franchise clearly isn’t for you.
‘Our paths have crossed before Dom, you just didn’t know it’
Like any long-running series, Fate of the Furious is about to add a major retcon. “London, Abu Dhabi, Cuba, our paths have crossed before Dom, you just don’t know it.” Just like how Han’s death in Tokyo Drift was revealed to be at the hands of Jason Statham’s Deckard Shaw, it appears the crew, or at least Dom, has a much longer history with Cipher than we would have known from watching the other movies.
Whether she was simply present as an observer or if she was actually pulling strings the whole time remains to be seen, but the events of Furious 8 may very well change the way the rest of the series looks for subsequent viewings.
‘If you’re gonna catch Dom, you’re gonna need some help’
Naturally, since the crew is facing off against Dom, they need to bring in a new member. That new member is Deckard Shaw, meaning there will be no shortage of outrageous name calling and threats coming from Dwane ‘The Rock’ Johnson’s mouth for the entirety of the movie. This is clearly an uncomfortable alliance, but it’s not yet clear if there’s something more going on. Shaw obviously wanted to destroy the team before, so could his cooperation mean he’s working with Cipher?
Having Shaw and Toretto both acting as double agents might seem more fit for The Departed than the Fast & Furious franchise, but as these movies continually have to remind us: nothing is off the table.
‘Alright, you get style points for that one’
It may have started with drag races and escalated to “ejecto seato cuz!” and hardcore drifting, but the steady increase of crazy stunts never stopped. Whenever fans begin to think that the franchise has hit its peak in outrageous stunts, another movie comes along and proves everyone wrong. Before long, leaping from speeding cars became commonplace, cars are parachuting out of planes, and Dominic Toretto jumps a car between two skyscrapers. Naturally, Fate of the Furious continues this trend.
In this newest trailer, we get to see Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson’s Hobbs go up against an enemy we’ve never seen him face before: a torpedo skating across a sheet of ice. Telling Roman (who’s apparently already lost his orange Lamborghini seen in other trailers) to take the wheel, Hobbs steps out to skate alongside the vehicle, redirecting the torpedo into another car. Clearly, the bar is raised yet again, and it looks like there’s a lot more where that came from in the full film.
‘You thought this was gonna be a street fight?’
Obviously, that torpedo came from somewhere. As we’ve already seen in other trailers, there’s a massive set piece in Fate of the Furious where they go up against a submarine on a sheet of ice. If that scene didn’t already look big enough, we now know that there’s a lot more to it than a simple chase. Torpedoes are launched from under the ice to obliterate cars on the surface, and missiles are launched to rain down from above. It’s hard to imagine how this scene could get any crazier in the actual movie, but Fast & Furious always finds a way.
Fate of the Furious, like its predecessors, appears to be bigger than any of the Fast & Furious movies to come before it. With Fast & Furious 9 and 10 also currently planned, it feels like it won’t be long before the Toretto team is fighting off space aliens - and no one would bat an eye.
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Next: Fast & Furious Getting Live Vehicle Stunt Tour In 2018
- Fast and Furious 8 Release Date: 2017-04-14
