Opinion: Why Fast & Furious: Tokyo Drift Was The Last Good Movie In The Series

In the more recent Fast and Furious movies, Dominic Toretto and his crew have inexplicable super strength and invulnerability. They quite literally can't be hurt in any way--unless the story specifically calls for it--and they regularly and very casually perform stunts that totally abandon logic, physics, and common sense. We're talking feats that would give the Avengers pause.

But this series had humble beginnings. Dom (Vin Diesel) and his "family" started out as amateur street racers and petty thieves who stole DVD players from the backs of trucks; Brian (Paul Walker) worked for the LAPD and was tasked with infiltrating the group to thwart their minor crime spree. In 2 Fast 2 Furious, Brian recruited his friend Roman (Tyrese Gibson) to help him infiltrate a different criminal group in Miami. The Fast & the Furious: Tokyo Drift, released 15 years ago to the day, introduced a completely new set of characters with no relation at all to the Toretto crew--except for Dom's post-credits appearance that revealed his connection to Han (Sung Kang). Instead, it followed Sean Boswell (Lucas Black) as he traveled to Japan and eventually took on the Yakuza in a street-racing duel.

And that was OK. With Tokyo Drift, the Fast franchise had continued on its established road: This was a series about relatable protagonists using their considerable, but still human, street racing skills to infiltrate or otherwise contend with criminal groups of thieves, drug lords, and gangsters.

Read More: The Fast And The Furious: 15 Things You Forgot About The Movie That Started It All

Rather famously, though, the franchise almost went straight-to-DVD after Fast 3, a death sentence in the age before streaming premieres. As Universal Pictures co-president of production Jeffrey Kirschenbaum told The Wrap in 2013, "The talk internally was that the franchise was played out...At that point we were weighing whether to go straight to video or not for future sequels. We weren't sure what we were going to do."

What happened instead was Vin Diesel's return to the series, along with much of the original movie's cast; and a major tonal shift that, starting with Fast 4 and continuing to this day, gradually turned these once-humble cops and robbers into superheroes who can be flung through the air at nitrous-infused speeds and land safely on car windshields, or survive an exploding nuclear submarine by taking cover inside a Dodge Charger. Oh, and the series has made more money than anyone could have ever imagined.

The Fast and Furious movies are undeniably fun popcorn blockbuster fodder. Fast 9's impending arrival will be a benchmark occasion for once-habitual moviegoers who have been held back from visiting theaters by the global pandemic. In it, John Cena will join the cast as Dom's formidable brother, the gang will use giant magnets to cause havoc on city streets, and Roman and Tej will apparently fly a car into space. And that's just what's in the trailers.

For all the enjoyment these movies have given us, what's been lost along the way? Any sense of realism, certainly, and the ability to suspend disbelief if you're the type of moviegoer who prefers things to generally make sense. Beyond basic plausibility, though, the Fast franchise has lost the intimacy that characterized the first few films. For all that they contend to be about "family," as each movie gets bigger and crazier, adding members like Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Jason Statham, Charlize Theron, Kurt Russell, and now John Cena, the series feels more and more like a rotating cast of superpowered movie stars locked in a never-ending struggle to somehow outdo the insanity of their previous outing.

There's something to be said for the simplicity of the first few Fast movies, including the original, which turns 20 this month, and up through Tokyo Drift. They're definitely tame in comparison with what the series became--remember when drifting cars up a spiral parking structure ramp seemed crazy? But they have a gritty charm that the franchise left behind when it started resurrecting dead characters through convoluted retcons, making its protagonists invulnerable to any harm, and shoehorning in more and more unbelievable stunts just for the sake of one-upping itself. Personally, I miss when the Fast and Furious movies were about scrappy street racers just living their lives a quarter mile at a time.