The Fast and the Furious movies have come a long way. From the tuner (and drag racing) culture in the first couple of movies, to the increasingly ludicrous heists in the last few, the franchise has evolved in a way that few saw coming (other than Vin Diesel, probably).
Hobbs & Shaw is, in a way, the next step in the franchise’s natural evolution. It’s more of an action comedy than any of the other entries in the franchise.
Hobbs & Shaw banks on the charisma and star power of its leads, Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson and Jason Statham. The film uses the old cliche “two guys who can’t stand each other” to good effect: Shaw thinks that Hobbs is just a muscular piece of mass (or a ‘boulder’, if you will), while Hobbs thinks Shaw has a ridiculously British accent that makes him sound funny.
The two, however, must come together to combat the threat of a ‘super-virus’ that can wipe out most of humanity in a matter of hours. Opposing them is a cybernetically-enhanced supersoldier, Brixton Lore (Idris Elba), representing a sinister organization named ETEON that’s bent on ‘saving the world’ by wiping out humanity’s weak links. Brixton is the self-proclaimed ‘black Superman’: he has a HUD overlay that can let’s him predict incoming attacks, and he can stop bullets with his hands. It’s only natural that it takes both Hobbs and Shaw working together to stop him.
There’s also MI6 agent Hattie (Vanessa Kirby), Shaw’s estranged sister, who also kicks plenty of ass. She gets to the virus before Brixton does, and injects the virus into herself, leaving her 72 hours to extract it before it goes off.
David Leitch (who previously directed Atomic Blonde and Deadpool 2) nails the pacing for the most part: for the first hour or so, the film transitions smoothly from fight scene to exposition to fight scene (and bantering) without dropping a beat. There’s a fun little cameo from Ryan Reynolds, and Kevin Hart also drops by later for a scene or two.
The film starts to strain its credibility by the third act, however, when Hobbs brings the other two to his homeland in the isle of Samoa, reconnecting with his family after 25 years of no contact. That’s how we get Hobbs (and the Shaw’s) facing off against a mercenary army with Hobbs’ Samoan brothers, armed with nothing but traditional Samoan weapons. The fight that follows is mostly entertaining, although it shifts from nighttime to daytime to a storm.
At times, the film feels like a dumber Mission Impossible story. And that’s not an indictment against the movie: it’s fully aware of what it’s doing and the response it seeks from the audience. However, the film does fall short of the most engaging Fast and Furious films, which succeeded because of proper emotional stakes.
It’s well known that Hobbs & Shaw faced a lot of behind the scenes drama when it was filming. Many of the franchise’s original cast were unhappy with the Rock trying to ‘steal the spotlight’ in a spin-off movie; Vin Diesel didn’t even pretend to wish the film good fortunes. Thankfully, the film turned out reasonably well despite such complications, although it must be noted that neither Johnson nor Statham are returning for the ninth movie next year.
For now, Hobbs & Shaw succeeds as a solid popcorn flick that’s sillier than most of the films you have seen this year. Don’t look for things like meaningful character development in this film: you can find that in Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time…in Hollywood playing in the opposite hall.
