I’ve never seen a Fast and Furious movie in my life. I don’t have anything against them, I just don’t think we’d get on. From what I can gather, the main bulk of the films consists of cars, explosions, and family. For one, I don’t know anything about cars. You could quite easily convince me that a Toyota Yaris is a special move in Kung-Fu, and I only learnt to drive so that I could get a license and wouldn’t have to use my passport as ID. So the vehicles aren’t a huge attraction for me. Explosions are fair play. I’m partial to a good explosion, but Fast and Furious hasn’t monopolised them. I can get my fix of explosions elsewhere, without having to sit through an expensive drag race. In terms of family, they aren’t a proper family are they? They’re just a bunch of mates who like driving their cars into each other, which is not a family I can relate to. Fast and Furious might be more up my street if there was a scene where Vin Diesel tries to avoid watching the news with his dad, or Jason Statham desperately steers the conversation with his grandma away from immigration. That’s a far more realistic family dynamic.
Vin Diesel (Image: Wikimedia)
However, despite not having seen Fast and Furious 8 or any other Fast and Furious film, I’m going to lay out the exact plot of Fast and Furious 8 according to my imagination, using a combination of the trailers for it and my vague cultural knowledge of the franchise. I bet I’ll nail it. You might see this as a pointless endeavour, and you’d be right. But my reasons are thus: one, the world is a bit crap, so let’s not think about it for 1,200 words or so (seriously, this thing is longer than most of my essays), and two, I am playing fast and loose (and furious?) with the definition of journalism.
“The film starts and everybody’s favourite petrol-sniffing family have been split up.”
Here we go. The film starts and everybody’s favourite petrol-sniffing family have been split up. I know, hard to believe, right? But Vin Diesel has betrayed the family *heartbreak emoji* and The Rock has been arrested and locked up, presumably for being too extreme. But, it is soon revealed that Vin Diesel didn’t have a choice in his betrayal, because Charlize Theron implanted a micro-chip in his head which will allow her to blow his head up if he doesn’t do what she says. The Fast Family are of course unaware of this, and have no idea why Vin Diesel betrayed them. “It’s not his fault, The Rock!” the audience yell at the screen in unison.
“They arrive at Furious HQ exchanging witty insults with each other.”
Anyway, it turns out The Rock is in the same prison as Jason Statham (who I’m 90% sure was the bad guy in the last one) which is just The Rock’s luck! They realise, however, that being the baldest men in the prison, they have put their differences aside and work together to escape. “If we’re gonna do this, we’ll have to be fast,” says Statham, “and furious,” adds The Rock. The audience whoops and cheers. Statham charms the ‘sexy lady-guard’ who is patrolling their cells, while The Rock channels all his strength and breaks the lock off his door. He lets Statham out of his, and the two proceed to open a can of whoop-ass on anyone who stands in their way, and break their way out.
They arrive at Furious HQ exchanging witty insults with each other. “You look like an egg,” quips Statham. “Oh yeah?” The Rock responds, “well you look like an egg…with stubble.” The audience are in hysterics. “You two are gonna have to work together if we’re going to figure this out,” says Michelle Rodriguez. Statham and The Rock share a spiteful but understanding glance. In the next scene, the whole Fast Family are racing through the streets to corner Vin Diesel. They reach him and fire their car-harpoons (carpoons?) into his car. This is it. They’ve got him. Suddenly, he performs an amazing manoeuvre (reversing) and crashes the Fast Family’s cars together, whilst simultaneously freeing himself of the carpoons. The Fast Family all tumble out of their cars, exhausted. “He’s too fast,” gasps The Rock, “and furious,” breathes Michelle Rodriguez. Vin Diesel looks back at them, his face emotionless, his micro-chip blinking. He speeds away from the scene as Charlize Theron gives him a lap dance.
“The audience is hootin’ and hollerin’ at this point.”
Okay, so I’m not quite sure how, but they end up in some sort of version of Antarctica or the North Pole or something. There’s cars, tanks, a submarine comes up through the ice. It’s basically a huge mess. They’re chasing Vin Diesel across the ice like Frankenstein. The Rock is in his car driving away from the submarine. “Holy baloney that thing is fast!” he says, “and furious,” says a grinning Statham as he pulls up alongside. The two have resolved their differences, Statham truly is family. The touching moment doesn’t last long, as they look in their wing-mirrors and three chrome Lamborghinis have emerged from one of the submarine’s hatches, and they’re being driven by ninjas. “Let’s finish this!” yells The Rock, as he cranks his car into 11th gear and accelerates towards Vin Diesel. Tyrese Gibson sorts out the three ninjas by pressing a button in his Ferrari that makes their Lamborghinis reject gravity and float up into the atmosphere, or something ridiculous like that. The audience is hootin’ and hollerin’ at this point.
Meanwhile, Vin Diesel and Charlize Theron are at the head of the pack in their car, The Rock is quickly approaching. Vin Diesel looks in his mirror and is momentarily blinded by something flashing in The Rock’s car. His eyes adjust, and he realises that the light is reflecting off The Rock’s gold chain necklace that has the word ‘family’ on it. He has a moment of clarity. He can’t believe he’s put them through all this just to save his own life. He stops the car. “What are you doing?!” demands Charlize Theron. “Family comes first,” he says. There are audible sobs in the audience.
“roses being tossed toward the screen.”
Vin Diesel gets out of the car. The Rock pulls up and gets out too. “I’m sorry, I didn’t want to do any of this, but I can’t put you all through it anymore,” says Vin Diesel. The Rock notices the micro-chip in his head, and Charlize Theron is moments away from pressing the button that will blow his head up. Statham arrives and gets out of his car with a pistol pointed at Vin Diesel. “No!” shouts The Rock, but Statham fires. The audience gasps, but soon breathes a sigh of relief, as Statham’s precision-shot just took the micro-chip off the side of Vin Diesel’s head. Charlize Theron frantically presses the button, but nothing happens. “You should have been more fast,” Vin Diesel tells her, “and furious,” says The Rock, as he joins Vin Diesel and lovingly clasps a hand on his shoulder. It fades to black as the audience gives a standing ovation, complete with roses being tossed toward the screen.
There you have it, an accurate telling of Fast and Furious 8. If you try and tell me that the story unfolds in any other way then I’m not having it. This is canon. Join me in two years’ time when I’ll take you through Fast and Furious 9, in which they probably have a monster truck rally on the moon.
