Disclaimer: There may be spoilers below, so if any of the content pictured below is of interest, proceed with caution.
Four score and 87 Fast & Furious movies ago, we learned to suspend disbelief primarily by ignoring physics. The problem is that with each subsequent movie they have to ignore physics more. And logic. And probability. And common sense. And coincidence. And technology. At some point during this ride you get a really fun movie that is just over the top enough to be enjoyable if not a tad cheezy. F9 is way past that; way, way past that. So much so that they even make fun of this in one scene. For at least one scene they even run a few frames at a faster speed to make vehicles look faster than they are... after how many movies of using actual fast cars. Thousands of bullets fired, I don't recall a single car window being shot out. Anyway, how does this movie top the last? Fun with impossibly strong and convenient electromagnetics. And outer space. Quit laughing at me, I'm serious. Literally driving a car in space.
There are a lot of familiar faces you see in TV and movies frequently including Jon Bernthal, Aidan Gillen, and Jake Weber. While you may not immediately recognize the names, you are almost sure to recognize them. This movie promises fire, action, and drama. It starts out at a fast pace and keeps it throughout. However, the action is fairly routine as far as movies go and you can predict how it ends long in advance. Worse, the writers break from reality twice to force the plot along and both involve lightning. The first when Angelina Jolie sees lightning striking close to her fire tower and somehow predicts the next will hit the tower. Shortly after, running through a field the lightning hits over 10 times in less than a minute in the same small field, wounding her. Sad. Ultimately this is a pedestrian action film and despite the trailer and setting, the writers only used the fire in the most predictable way, which was too late and not compelling.
If you saw a trailer for this and thought "John Wick knock-off" I can understand why. Several friends and I expected just that and we were pleasantly surprised. Bob Odenkirk plays an unassuming family man, living a boring suburban life, with what seems to be a boring past. What starts with a simple bus ride and helping a woman being harassed turns into a fun winding saga that quickly boils into an epic movie. While the movie is a bit dark in ways, it also remains just light-hearted and fun enough to enjoy from start to finish.
As I began to watch, I took note that regardless of what happens, I had to give the show props for a surprise ending of the very first episode. I certainly wasn't expecting that, which is always a good sign for a show. Episode 5, bam, another unexpected twist! This show had promise despite some initial reservations and after those two surprises, the reservations manifested. It quickly turned into one of those shows that drags out way too many episodes and only has wings because the story changes considerably halfway through. This show would have been better served as two shorter seasons, each with a clean ending rather than dragging the first story out the entire season. Not bad, just not that good either.
