Is ‘Fast and Furious’ A Mythology?

The Fast and Furious franchise has been around since 2001. And as the sequels continue, the films become more and more insane. The stunts, the stakes, the characters, everything just becoming more and more crazy. There’s something that caught my attention, though — Tyrese’s character Roman Pierce mentioning the possibility they’re superheroes. What if the Fast and Furious saga is just essentially a modern-day fairytale? I mean, technically, yes, that’s what movies are when they aren’t based on reality, but hear me out. Could Fast and Furious be a tale of Dom Toretto and his merry band of thieves fighting for the greater good?
Robin Hood and King Arthur are two of the most famous names in history. Leonidas and the 300 Spartans are also in the conversation. We can even throw in Odysseus and the story of the Odyssey. Obviously, Dom Toretto isn’t a real person, but for the sake of argument in the Fast universe, he is. Let’s say the first film is the only film routed in reality, and everything after that is a story of outrageous proportion told to expand his legend. They also expand the story of his ‘family’ in 2 Fast 2 Furious and Tokyo Drift. The Green Knight is a poem about King Arthur’s nephew, Sir Gawain.
In Fast and Furious, we can see Dom as the prince that took over the LA street racing scene after his father died and he was released from prison. How and why he got there was never really expanded on until recently. Mia (Jordan Brewster) was the princess and Brian (Paul Walker) was a Knight sent there to take him down, and possibly claim his sister as well. The two end up becoming like brothers and joining forces. Dom eventually ‘gives’ Mia to Brian and the rest is history. Also, in each film, it seems like the villains get stronger and smarter. They also seem to get more ruthless. The addition of Jakob made the story a bit more fun and glued together as well.
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Now, for the mythos, it gets kind of crazy. We can think of the cars as horses, and in each story, they get bigger things to drive or ride. Jets and planes (dragons), tanks, and bullet runaway giant vehicles (elephants, rhinos, etc). They come to these new lands to help the poor and take down conquerors or topple evil governments. There are plenty of ways to interpret it. Dom also has his Knights of the Roundtable. Brian, Roman, Tej, Hobbs, Han, Tego, Don Omar, Vince, Jessy, etc. Dom loses some of the Knights and they get replaced, and some return from the ‘dead.’ These things are characterizations of mythology.
In Fast and Furious, each film gets more ‘ridiculous.’ The stakes also get higher as new characters join the family. In mythology, it works the same way. The stories get more elaborate and crazy. I mean, think of all the tales we’ve heard or seen of King Arthur. From Antoine Fuqua’s 2005 film to Guy Ritchie’s Legend of the Sword. Robin Hood is the same as well. There are so many tales and different versions of them. The only thing is a lot of mythology is either an anthology or there’s no constant continuation. That may be the one thing that separates this from other mythologies in a sense, is that the story is linear, which helps it in hindsight.
In conclusion, Fast and Furious could be the mythical tale of Dom Toretto and his band of misfits. They’re the Justice League or Avengers of their universe. They are King Arthur and the Knights of the Roundtable of modern times. Tyrese had a good point because it is very rare that the main characters are hurt or harmed. They always find a way out or a way back to life. Very few of them have died and actually remained dead. There’s a bit of self-awareness within the franchise that doesn’t go unnoticed, and quite a few things in the dialogue that lead me to conjure up this article.
What do you think? Is there a possibility that the saga is some strange mythology about Dom Toretto? Let us know below! – Rascal F Kennedy
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