Worst of the franchise

Rating: 3/10 (24 September 2015)

I awarded this film 3 stars mostly out of respect to Paul Walker. Unfortunately, he's not in the film enough to elevate it over its cliché-riddled, cartoonish, incoherent final cut. Clearly, the franchise has run out of any credible plot lines. What is left is tired. Vin Diesel mumbling through his lines, espousing all things family has gotten old. Michelle Rodriguez is still suffering from memory loss, although it doesn't really add anything to the film other than to make it more frustrating. And, Dwayne Johnson takes muscle bound buffoonery to eleven. Nothing about this move makes any sense. Things happen for the sole purpose of setting up an action sequence. It's starts from the beginning, where Jason Statham shows up as the brother of the previous films baddie, Shaw. How convenient! Also, how lazy. Inserting Statham into the equation is a micro chasm of all that is wrong with this movie. Everything feels manipulated and artificial. Introducing the character of Hobbs in Fast Five was great. The chase that ensued was fun to watch, kept the movie going at a good pace, and kept all the characters involved. But, bringing The Rock back for the 6th film took the franchise where it was never meant to go. Somehow, a team of gear heads planning military style ops and having large scale shootouts is just plain silly. It's also not fun to watch. Everyone looks too old. Everyone seems like they're trying too hard to get their lines out. Ultimately, Fast and Furious 6 showed how far away from the original concept this franchise had come. Watching F&F 7 felt like watching an old episode of Scooby Do. I kept waiting for someone to come along and pull the mask off of Jason Statham to reveal the REAL bad guy. Who knows, maybe Scooby will show up in the next movie.