Fast X (2023)
Twenty-two years after a modestly budgeted street-racing thriller about stolen DVD players became an unexpected box-office phenomenon, the Fast and Furious franchise has grown into one of Hollywood's most reliably profitable properties, and one of its most cheerfully ridiculous. What began as a point-to-point street race in Los Angeles has, across ten mainline entries and a spin-off, expanded to include international espionage, submarine chases, and, in Fast & Furious 6, a runway that apparently stretches the length of a small country. Fast X arrives as the first chapter of a planned two-part finale, carrying the franchise's accumulated mythology on its bonnet and the tagline "The end of the road begins," which tells you roughly how seriously the series takes its own self-awareness at this point. The film picks up threads from across the series, with the central conflict rooted in the events of Fast Five, bringing a new antagonist fuelled by old grievances into Dom Toretto's orbit and threatening the family unit that has been the franchise's emotional engine since at least the fourth instalment.
Behind the camera, Louis Leterrier steps in after original director Justin Lin departed the production early in the shoot, reportedly due to creative differences. Leterrier is a competent handler of large-scale action, with his work on films like The Incredible Hulk demonstrating that he knows his way around a set piece, even if his output tends to land in polished but unremarkable territory. His arrival mid-production is the kind of circumstance that rarely goes unnoticed in the finished film, and whether the seams show is something the review below addresses directly. The budget, reportedly in excess of $340 million including marketing, makes this one of the most expensive films ever produced, a figure that would have been unimaginable when the original The Fast and the Furious came out for around $38 million back in 2001. Universal and the producing partners at Original Film and One Race have bet heavily on this one, which makes any stumble feel rather more consequential than it might for a smaller franchise.
The ensemble is as crowded as ever, with Vin Diesel anchoring proceedings as Dom, the gravitational centre around which every other character orbits. Michelle Rodriguez, Tyrese Gibson, and Ludacris all return in roles that by now feel as comfortable and familiar as worn-in furniture, for better or worse. John Cena reprises Jakob from The Fate of the Furious-adjacent F9, and the franchise also welcomes new additions including Brie Larson, Daniela Melchior, and Rita Moreno. The headline new arrival, though, is Jason Momoa as the villain Dante Reyes, a performance that prompted considerable discussion on release. Momoa has range when given the right material, but a revenge-driven antagonist in a franchise that once made its name on a certain grounded, muscle-and-tarmac machismo is a fairly specific ask, and how well he meets it is at the heart of most critical conversations about the film.
Fast X (2023), directed by Louis Leterrier, arrives with the unenviable task of course-correcting a franchise that literally went to space in the last film. Credit where it's due: the film does pull back (just a little) from the absolute cosmic absurdity of F9. There are no cars in orbit this time, and the stakes, while still globe-threatening, feel marginally more grounded. But in trying to dial back the madness, the film inadvertently highlights its biggest problem: without the spectacle to distract, the cracks in the storytelling become impossible to ignore.
The film's central misstep is Jason Momoa's Dante Reyes, a villain who could have been a chilling, personal threat to Dom's family. Instead, Momoa's performance (flamboyant, joke-cracking, gleefully unhinged) feels imported from a comic franchise and not a logical continuation of the villains usually present in this series. He's more Deadpool or Joker than the grounded, menacing antagonists the series once thrived on (think Dwayne Johnson, Luke Evans, Idris Elba, Jason Statham). His "cuteness" and aloof charm undermine the gravity the plot desperately needs, turning what should be a vendetta into a quirky cat-and-mouse game. Equally jarring is John Cena's Jakob, who inexplicably shifts from cold-blooded super-spy villain in F9 to a slightly awkward, lovable weird uncle here, a character pivot that feels less like development and more like amnesia.
The action scenes are, as expected, flashy and technically impressive. Cars flip, cities crumble, and physics takes yet another holiday. But even the spectacle feels routine this time, lacking the novelty that once made the franchise's excesses fun. Worse, the script seems to have forgotten its own history: character motivations shift without explanation, relationships reset for convenience, and emotional beats land with a thud because the groundwork was never laid. It's a mixed bag: occasionally thrilling, often baffling, and rarely satisfying.
Fast X is a pretty average film, which is a real shame for a saga that once knew how to balance heart and horsepower. It's not unwatchable (there's enough noise and nostalgia to power through) but it's a testament to what happens when a franchise loses sight of its own rules and perhaps runs out of gas long before the finish line. If you're invested in the family, you'll keep watching. But don't expect it to earn your loyalty.
Fast X sits at an interesting, if uncomfortable, crossroads for the franchise. The series has always survived on momentum, on the understanding that if you keep things loud enough and move fast enough, the audience will come along for the ride. When that contract between film and viewer holds, as it did so memorably in Furious 7, the results can be genuinely affecting. When it frays, what's left is a lot of expensive noise in search of a reason to exist. Whether Fast X manages to thread that needle, or whether the franchise is running on fumes as it heads toward its finale, is a question only the next instalment will fully answer. Sometimes, though, the end of the road is less a destination than a warning.
Rating: ★★½ | Year: 2023 | Watched: 2026-05-28
Trailer
▶ Watch the official trailer for Fast X (2023) on YouTube
Where to watch
Watch in the UK
Rent: Sky Store
Buy: Apple TV Store · Rakuten TV · Amazon Video · Google Play Movies
Physical: Amazon UK · Zavvi
Watch in the US
Stream: Peacock Premium · YouTube TV · Peacock Premium Plus
Rent: Amazon Video · Apple TV Store · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Buy: Amazon Video · Apple TV Store · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Physical: Amazon US
Affiliate disclosure: Movies With Macca may earn a small commission on purchases or subscriptions started via these links. It costs you nothing extra.
