There’s no point in arguing against an all-female Fast and Furious spinoff…except there kind of is since it already sounds like something that could go the same way as Ocean’s 8, meaning that from a monetary standpoint it would be successful, but from a critical standpoint, it would fall flat. If there’s even a hint of bringing Gal Gadot back then it’s lost a lot of credibility already, since while a lot of the women, who are badass to be certain, are still alive in the franchise, Gadot’s character should have next to no chance of coming back. But the fact is that since Luke Evan’s character, Owen Shaw, came back after being booted out of a moving plane to what should have been a body-crushing fall, it’s possible that movie magic will work on Gadot as well. But the big sticking point here is that the Fast and Furious franchise is, for the most part, fragmenting the closer it comes to the end of its main storyline, which already has fractures deep enough to drop a semi-truck into. The story has evolved, that much is true, but it’s done so in a way that doesn’t feel at all natural.
Think about this, Dom started out as a street racer and a shop owner as well as a mechanic. Brian was a cop, Mia was a student, and everyone who’s still around had their own areas of expertise. Now to be certain, the events of the first movie felt a little more natural no matter how unlikely they would be in real life. But the rest, from dealing with drug lords, warlords, and world-class assassins, took the franchise to a level that was beyond ridiculous. Let’s be honest, Deckard should have killed Dom a few times over. In fact, the whole crew should have been dead a few times over and would have been if not for the cartoonish villains that they were faced with.
Now people want to see a movie with Letty, Mia, and several other women that are supposedly just as badass as the crew they’ve been working with but now need a girls night out to pull their own job or save the world on their own time and in their own way. There are bound to be plenty of people that will think that this is a great idea and will applaud it without hesitation. But among the women, there are only a few that make a lot of sense, since it’s still kind of ridiculous that Letty can fight two highly-trained fighters without any explanation of where she picked up her skills. It’s not a condemnation of the movie entirely, but a cautionary note that while people are going to want this movie, it’s bound to happen that if it is truly without any of the male cast members, it’s going to feel like it’s missing something. Keep in mind that no Fast and Furious movie has ever been without a female presence, since from the start, Letty and Mia were up front and noticeable, while a few of the movies have made their female stars either stand to the side of their male costars, so to speak. This need for an all-female cast for a Fast and Furious is also bound to make any male character that is of any importance out to be a villain or a fawning, drooling fool that means well but is kind of a dope, or just someone that’s there for the heck of it.
While it’s bound to happen, one still has to wonder why when the movies have been fairly balanced when it comes to men and women interacting and being a part of the overall narrative. There’s bound to be a lot of argument about this since women have been used quite often as objects of desire in these movies as the culture of street racing has been shown to attract women that love skimpy outfits and are all picked from the same modeling school. But an all-female cast doesn’t sound like something that’s going to change things, since the story is likely to objectify people just as much and show even less of a point.
The franchise isn’t bound to end without another spinoff or two that might go on for a while, and a musical idea that Vin Diesel has apparently been waiting to do for a while. But one of these days it’s going to be nice to talk about the Fast and the Furious in past tense and not wonder which movie we’re expecting now, and how the story has been forced to adapt and evolve yet again with the childish need for another addition or spinoff that’s constantly making it sound like someone changing the rules so that they can continue with their adolescent fantasy.
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