I don’t even know where to begin talking about Furious7. Except that I enjoyed it, and I had more than one case of the feels admittedly, watching it; whether it was from the farewell piecemealed together for Paul Walker and his character, or the repeated monologues spouted by Vin Diesel about the importance of family.
Sure, it was a completely absurd movie, as every single one in the franchise was, and there was no length too far for the action sequences to go just a little bit more over the top than the one before it. Who cares about the logic of how like a Somalian mercenary terrorist with a troupe of very American-sounding mercs manages to get a helicopter armed to the teeth with an accompanying Predator drone into Los Angeles airspace without alerting everyone in the city until it starts firing upon Toretto & Co. Who cares about Kurt Russell basically being Nick Fury with SHIELD behind him? Where does Dominic Toretto seem to house his endless supply of classic muscle cars that he just ends up destroying one after another?
Honestly, I feel bad for all the actors with legit fighting experience who have all had to do the job throughout the series. Whether it’s been Jason Statham, Gina Carano to Tony Jaa and Ronda Rousey in the latest installment, it makes me wonder what these actors feel knowing that they have to ultimately lose to people that they know they could floss their teeth with in reality?
Either way, I still liked it. I liked just about all of the movies for that matter. And I was thinking about why this is the case when I was on my way home from seeing it, because let’s face it, admitting that “I like the Fast and Furious franchise” isn’t something that just everyone would willingly admit to.
Ultimately, I think it boils down to the whole notion of the surrogate family that really does it for me. I’m the kind of person who doesn’t have a tremendous number of legitimate friends in the world, but the ones that I do decree my friends are usually considered “more like family” at some point. I have a whole bunch of guys in my life I declare more like brothers than I do simply just friends, like a bad kung-fu flick, and there are many other people whom I would consider something of a surrogate family as well.
This is not to say that I hate my biological family, that absolutely couldn’t be any further from the truth, but I’ve made no secret about how tumultuous things have been between my parents and myself over the last recent years, that sometimes makes me become either more reclusive, and/or seek the comfort and ears of those I may not necessarily be related to by blood or heritage, but would share similar considerations to that of those who were.
But I just enjoy seeing the patchwork family unit that is ultimately cobbled together by Dominic Toretto, constantly reinforced, and the unwavering loyalty that’s exhibited by all of them throughout the series. The moments throughout the series, where the familia is brought together, toasts are made, spoils are shared, and it just looks like people having good times, are the parts that get me the most. They’re why I really like the series, when it really comes to it.
It’s kind of how I’d like to live my life, in some capacity; a quarter-mile at a time.
