WARNING: The following article contains minor spoilers for Hobbs & Shaw, in theaters now.
Weren't the Fast & Furious films originally about street racing? How did we progress from 2001's The Fast and The Furious, a fairly-down-to-earth movie that was basically Point Break but with street racing instead of surfing to 2019's Hobbs & Shaw, an action movie about Jason Statham and The Rock joining forces to fight a super-soldier played by Idris Elba? Surely, the transition from "undercover cop infiltrates gang of street racers stealing DVD players" to "Hercules and The Transporter fight a self-described 'Black Superman'" was a gradual burn rather than a sudden leap in tone, no?
To track this ridiculous growth, we marathoned the nine films currently comprising the Fast & Furious franchise to chronicle the most ridiculous moments and aspects of each instalment, culminating with the overall most ridiculous moment in the entire NOS-fueled chronology.
Keep in mind that "ridiculous" doesn't necessarily mean "bad." As a matter of fact, most of the entries comprising this list double as our favorite moments from the entire franchise. Whether our disbelief was indefinitely suspended, the laws of physics were completely disregarded or characters received strokes of luck indistinguishable from divine intervention, these ten moments track the exponential growth of the overall ridiculousness of the Fast & Furious franchise.
I LIVE MY LIFE A QUARTER-MILE AT A TIME
Honestly, 2001's The Fast and The Furious is a fairly grounded film centered on an undercover cop infiltrating a gang of street racers hijacking shipments of Panasonic DVD players. Even the most ridiculous and/or memorable line of The Fast and The Furious, Dominic Toretto's motto of "I live my life a quarter-mile at a time" is embraced wholeheartedly in subsequent instalments, cementing the ridiculous quote as an identifying characteristic for Dom.
In retrospect, the most ridiculous part of The Fast and The Furious is Dom feeling remorse for mentally disabling a man after beating him with a socket wrench. It's a despicable act, for sure, but fast forward to 2017's The Fate of The Furious and Dominic is using his wheelman abilities to wipe out an entire squadron of soldiers with an onslaught of surface-t0-air missiles without batting an eyelash.
THE ESD
Despite being objectively the weakest entry in the franchise, 2003's 2 Fast 2 Furious introduces one of the most powerful weapons to the Fast & Furious mythos, the ESD or Electrical System Disabler. Crackling with blue arcs of electricity, these rifle-mounted "car bullets" will disable the electrical systems of any machine, killing its gas-powered engine in the process. No matter where it lands, the ESD will shut down a car so long as all three of the claw's prongs are piercing the vehicle's frame.
Despite effectively being utilized by the police to help rein in Roman and Brian, these car bullets are never referenced or used again outside of 2 Fast 2 Furious, most likely because every chase scene could be ended immediately with a single ESD round.
TOKYO DRIFT TAKES PLACE IN 2015
Serving as the proverbial Obi-Wan Kenobi of drift racing, Han Seoul-Oh (get it?) is both introduced and killed off in 2006's The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift when his vehicle is struck by a passing car during a freak drift racing accident. Despite his demise, Han returns in the following two Fast & Furious films, hinting after every heist that he will eventually return to Tokyo to meet his doom.
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During 2015's Furious 7, we retroactively learn that Han's death was no mere accident, as we witness Deckard Shaw orchestrate Han's fatal crash. Therefore, Tokyo Drift actually takes place in 2015. That means for some reason everyone participating in the 2015 Tokyo drift racing scene is obsessed with 2006 model cars and Twinkie (played by Bow Wow) gets into a fight for selling someone a nine-year-old broken iPod.
DOMINIC'S DETECTIVE VISION
The fourth entry in the franchise, Fast & Furious, kicks off the trend of Dominic Toretto believing that he's Batman. Seriously, out of nowhere Dom gets Dark Knight-worthy detective vision, using residue and skid marks from a crash site to mentally recreate Letty's murder with ridiculous accuracy.
As we learn two films later in Fast and Furious 6, the only thing that Dom got wrong in his mental recreation/hallucination is that the explosion that "killed" Letty actually blew her clean away from the crash site, bestowing her with plot-convenient amnesia. To be fair, Dom couldn't have accounted for Fast and Furious 6 not knowing how explosions work.
Speaking of impossible physics, Fast & Furious opens with a flaming oil tank trailer literally bouncing down a hill. Using precise timing, Dom dodge-drives under the trailer as if it were a bouncing barrel straight out of Donkey Kong.
DOM'S LAST STAND
Cooperatively towing a ten ton vault, Brian and Dom realize that the cops will soon catch them in 2011's Fast Five. Forcibly detaching Brian's from the safe, Dom makes his last stand.
Hitting his NOS, Dom tows the safe with ease, using drift racing to wield the safe as a wrecking ball, demolishing the entire (corrupt) police fleet with ridiculous accuracy. As it turns out, the safe was empty the entire time. So, why the tearful sacrifice and rampage? Why did the heist even necessitate two drivers to drag the safe when apparently a tank of NOS is all Dom ever needed?
While we're on the subject, Dominic repeatedly claims throughout the series that, "[It] doesn't matter what's under the hood. The only thing that matters is who's behind the wheel." Easy to say for a man who has literally never won a race without using NOS, but whatever.
DOM BEATS PHYSICS
Riding on top of a tank, Letty attempts to detach an anchoring cable in 2013's Fast and Furious 6. The tank abruptly stops however, catapulting Letty into the gap of a highway. Hanging out the side of a car, Dom intentionally crashes into the highway's railing, launching himself across the opposite side of the gap.
Spitting in the face of the law of conservation of motion, Dom perfectly catches Letty, keeping his trajectory completely unaltered as he safely lands on the other side of the highway.
Ignoring all of the calculus Dom needed to perform to get his entry vector and velocity just right, either Dom had to be supermassive or Letty had to be crazy underweight in order for the two of them to land safely across the gap, given their respective trajectories. Dom remarks that it was a lucky shot, which doesn't make any of this okay.
DON'T MISS
Racing out of a collapsing parking garage, Dom hits the NOS right as he launches off of a conveniently ramped section of the crumbling structure, bringing his car into the close combat range of a hovering attack helicopter during the ridiculous climax of 2017's Furious 7.
Whispering, "Don't miss," Dom not only narrowly avoids colliding with the chopper, but also stealthily attaches a bag of grenades to its underside. Noticing the tiny bag hanging off the side of the helicopter hovering at least thirty feet in the air, Hobbs pulls off three precise handgun shots, detonating the bag to destroy the chopper.
Brian pulls Dom from the wreckage, immediately performing CPR on him before being pushed away by Letty. Holding Dom, Letty reminisces, simultaneously curing her amnesia and resuscitating Dom. By our count, that's at least five miracles occurring over the span of a single action sequence.
ZOMBIE CARS
Remotely hijacking hundreds of cars, Cipher (played by Charlize Theron) commands her horde of "zombie cars" to overtake the Secretary of Defense's motorcade in 2017's The Fate of The Furious. After taking out the lead and follow cars, Cipher "makes it rain" by directing zombie cars in a nearby parking structure to fall around the Secretary's armored limo, effectively immobilizing the vehicle in a ridiculously precise ring of explosions and twisted metal.
The icing on this ridiculous cake comes in the form of Dom, who struts out into the wreckage donning the Fast and Furious equivalent of a Batsuit, wielding a riot shield and buzzsaw. Dom demands the Secretary of Defense hand over nuclear launch codes, using the saw to cut through to the limo's gas tank. As Dom ignites a road flare, the Secretary complies.
HOBBS IS STRONGER THAN CAPTAIN AMERICA
During the final chase sequence of 2019's Hobbs & Shaw, Hobbs must reel in an attack helicopter using a giant chain hooked up to a daisy-chain of customized cars. Suddenly, the tow-line unwinds from its spooling, prompting Hobbs to grab onto the chain and the body of the tow truck. Using his ridiculous strength, Hobbs holds back the helicopter long enough to reattach the chain to his car.
In no uncertain terms, Hobbs is echoing Captain America's similar heroic feat of holding back Bucky's helicopter in Captain America: Civil War. In fact, Hobbs' feat of ridiculous strength is technically more impressive than that of Steve Rogers, as Hobbs not only had to compensate for the added weight of the metal chain, but also had to physically pull back the chopper far enough in order to rewind the chain around its spool.
THE STREET ALWAYS WINS
Getting the drop on the cockney assassin, Dom has Deckard Shaw dead to rights in the climax of 2017's Furious 7. Dom asks, "You thought this was going to be a street fight?" Spending his one shotgun round, Dom tosses his firearm away. Pulling out two oversized wrenches, Dom confirms: "You're goddamn right."
Following suit, Shaw tears off two long pieces of scrap metal from his wrecked car. Our duel wielding bald anti-heroes charge at one another, kicking off the most ridiculous and glorious brawl in the entire Fast & Furious franchise.
After an aforementioned attack helicopter completely misses Dom with a missile strike, the parking structure begins to collapse. Locking eyes with Shaw, Dom claims, "The thing about street fights... the street always wins." Dom punctuates this nonsensical remark by stomping his human-sized foot down, causing the parking structure to collapse precisely around Shaw.
Directed by David Leitch (Deadpool 2) from a script by longtime Fast & Furious veteran Chris Morgan, Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw stars Dwayne Johnson, Jason Statham, Idris Elba and Vanessa Kirby.