All 11 Fast and Furious Movies (Fast X), Ranked from Worst to Best

 

Believe it or not, the Fast & Furious saga is 11 movies in and 202 years strong. But the individual films were created by different writers, directors and, at times, different actors. So naturally, the flicks vary in quality and entertainment value. Some are definitely better than others and some aren't even worth a watch. We've ranked all 11, in order from the lowest of the low to the not-so-bad.   

11. Fast X

While the previous entry in the Furious saga, F9, was a step in the wrong direction, Fast X has plumbed new depths -- to audience's mass dismay.

10. F9

Following pandemic-related delays, the 10th installment (including spinoff Hobbs & Shaw) in the Fast and Furious Saga arrives 20 years and three days after the inaugural film, The Fast and the Furious. The Toretto extended family story has come a long way in the last couple of decades, from obvious Point Break ripoff to ushering tuner culture into the mainstream to a 10-part franchise with two billion-grossing movies under its belt.

While F9 picks up where the last mainline movie, The Fate of the Furious, left off, it also serves as main character Dominic Torreto's origin story via numerous flashbacks. As spoiled by the poster and the trailers, F9 introduces us to Dom's long-lost evil brother, Jakob, portrayed by yet another WWE alum (after Dwayne "the Rock" Johnson and Ronda Rousey), John Cena. We also finally see events referenced in the first movie; namely, Dom's father dying during a stockcar race and his son enacting the vengeance that lands him in Lompoc, effectively kicking off his criminal career. Most of the gang returns, including some surprising members, and, thanks again to trailer spoilers, one not-so-surprising member in the form of Han Lue. For those unfamiliar with the overarching story, Han was killed (or so it appeared) in a car explosion in the third film in the series, Tokyo Drift, way back in 2006. Anyway, just like in the 6th, 7th and 8th entries, the team is tasked with preventing a super-powerful tech device from falling into the wrong hands and their mission leads to various points across the globe -- with car-related hijinks along the way. 

As if things hadn't already been outrageous, it's really getting stupid now, what with the long-lost brother soap opera shenanigans and the second return of a dead character -- so far. In case you missed it, Dom's longtime girlfriend, Letty, was killed (seemingly) in an explosion in Fast & Furious back in 2009. She was revealed to have survived, afflicted with AMNESIA (!) and working with an international crime ring in Fast & Furious 6 (2013). I promise I'm not making this stuff up. Maybe Brixton Lore and Johnny Tran'll be resurrected in the next movie. Our own John Zenoni can't get over the fact that Furious 7 featured a car jumping from one skyscraper to another and if you feel the same way, you really won't be able to handle the Tom Cruise-defying stunts in this one. The days when a character jumping from one moving vehicle to another actually seemed like he was in danger are long gone.

The plausibility of street racers being assigned impossible missions by the CIA aside, my biggest issue with this saga is the ongoing tendency for the white villains to survive (like Cipher) , and in some cases, to even be given (unearned) redemption, complete with a spot on the team (Owen Shaw and Deckard Shaw). Meanwhile, most of the minority antagonists are either sentenced to a million years in prison (Arturo Braga) or killed off and never given a second thought (Mose Jakande, Kiet, D.K., Hernan Reyes, Fenix Calderon and the aforementioned Brixton Lore and Johnny Tran). That's a pretty foul track record for a series that's frequently praised for its ethnic diversity.

Anyway, F9 is pretty much guaranteed to become the highest-grossing movie of the year when it hits western theaters (it's already debuted in China, Russia and South Korea to the tune of $244 million) -- at least until the MCU returns to multiplexes. Never mind #JusticeforHan, skip this movie and the entire franchise unless and until the filmmakers provide justice for the minority antagonists.

9. Tokyo Drift

Because Tokyo Drift is so bad -- so bad that it nearly brought the entire series to a screeching halt -- various contrarians have attempted to defend its "merits". Honestly, the actual drifting looks exciting. But even that wasn't revisited in subsequent installments. Initially, Drift was a part of the Fast saga in name only (and a blink-and-you'll miss it cameo from Vin Diesel at the very end). And it should've stayed that way -- if it had to be made at all. It says a lot that none of the series regulars (Paul Walker, Vin Diesel, Tyrese Gibson, Jordana Brewster, Michelle Rodriguez) reprised their roles for any significant amount of screen-time.

8. Hobbs & Shaw

The twin highlights of Hobbs & Shaw are its celebration of Samoan culture and the fact that it showcases Jason Statham's dry wit. Other than that, it's pretty unwatchable. There's a substantial -- and ridiculous -- sci-fi element that should've been left behind and it represents the kind of return to inane action movies that the Expendables movies mock. All of the actors involved (Idris Elba, the Rock, Jason Statham, Cliff Curtis, etc.) can do and deserve better.

7. Fast & Furious

Fast & Furious isn't bad so much as it's boring, which isn't good for a movie full of shootouts and car chases. F&F reintroduced Han Lue, Brian O'Conner, Mia Toretto and Letty Ortiz to the story, following Han's death in 2006's Tokyo Drift and Brian's absence since the second movie -- Mia and Letty were absent since the first.

Five years after escaping from prison, Dominic Toretto discovers that now FBI agent Brian recruited his girlfriend, Letty, for an undercover operation against Mexican drug kingpin Arturo Braga that got her killed. So Dom and Brian target Braga for vengeance.

You do get to see modified cars racing at top-speed through tunnels under the US/Mexico border but the highlight of the movie is the inclusion of a 1972 Ford Gran Torino Sport. 

6. 2 Fast 2 Furious

Twelve years after Boyz N the Hood, John Singleton traded Doughboy's '63 Impala and Trey's '72 Cabriolet for Roman's '03 Mitsubishi Eclipse Spyder and Brian's '99 Skyline GT-R.

Appropriately enough, Singleton's contribution to the Fast and Furious series infused some Blackness into the wildly popular franchise. And new additions Roman (Tyrese Gibson) and Tej (Chris "Ludacris" Bridges) have since become mainstays in the car-chase saga.

After allowing wanted criminal Dominic Toretto escape arrest, LAPD Officer Brian O'Conner is wanted for arrest himself. So he high-tails it outta Los Angeles and eventually makes his way to Miami, financing his cross-country road trip by entering illegal street races along the way. Upon arriving in Magic City,

Brian meets up with his childhood friend Roman Pearce, who's currently under house arrest after serving time in prison for possession of stolen cars -- for which he holds Brian responsible.

The now-fugitive Brian also reconnects with his old friend, Tej Parker, a mechanic who arranges underground street-racing events.

Following one such race, Brian is arrested and offered a chance to both avoid prison and resurrect his law enforcement career. The same FBI agent who oversaw Brian's undercover operation in LA proposes that he participate in a joint investigation with U.S. Customs. The target is drug kingpin Carter Verone, with whom undercover agent Monica Fuentes has ingratiated herself. Brian agrees to the deal, with the caveat that he be allowed to recruit someone whom he trusts. When the feds reluctantly agree,

Following an introduction by Agent Fuentes, Verone hires O'Conner and Pearce to transport drugs for him, contingent upon the duo proving their skills by retrieving a package from a car in an impound lot before another team of drivers. The pair win the competition, in spite of interference from Fuentes' Customs supervisor.

While Brian is able to gather intel on Verone's plans to flee the country, he frustrates Roman by developing feelings for Fuentes, compromising his focus.

When a corrupt Miami police detective attempts to have O'Conner and Pearce arrested, Tej arranges a diversion comprised of several import tuners, allowing the pair to evade the police and save Fuentes, who Verone had determined was a federal agent. After making their way onto the drug baron's yacht, where he's holding Fuentes, Brian and Roman rescue Monica and incapacitate Verone (Brian even shoots him).

5. The Fast and the Furious

The Fast and the Furious essentially takes Point Break -- a film about extreme athletes who rob banks -- and substitutes import tuners for surfboards (and semi-trailer trucks for banks). But in the same way that I'd rather watch Joker's burgeoning supervillain than The King of Comedy's delusional comic, I prefer street-racing to surfing. 

Undercover LAPD officer Brian O'Conner ingratiates himself into ex-convict Dominic Toretto's circle of friends as part of a federal investigation into a rash of truck hijackings. Brian, a former car thief (which we'll learn in the sequel), finds common ground with Dom by participating in the local illegal street racing scene, in which Dom is revered. Along the way, the cop falls for the criminal's sister, Mia, and eventually learns that Dom and his crew actually are behind the robberies. So he lets Dom go, throwing away his career in the process.

The success of The Fast and the Furious catapulted both street racing and, especially, import tuning into the mainstream, spawning copycat movies and several automotive-based reality shows, the most famous of which was MTV's Pimp My Ride.

The franchise would eventually involve globe-trotting, world domination schemes, the CIA and space travel but The Fast and the Furious is an LA crime story about very mortal people trying to get ahead.

4. Fast & Furious 6

Fast & Furious 6 upped the melodrama significantly. F6 reintroduced Letty to the series after she was murdered in Fast & Furious. It was revealed that the car explosion that "killed" her actually blew her away from the wreckage and down a hill, which left her with amnesia, soap opera-style. Her memory loss allows her to be recruited by international criminal Owen Shaw and she goes so far as to shoot ex-boyfriend Dom when they see each other again. Team member and former Mossad agent Gisele Yashar is killed off -- like Han and Letty before her. So maybe she'll be back.

The highlight of the movie is the high-speed tank chase on the freeway.

3. The Fate of the Furious

The Fate of the Furious wasn't the first Fast and Furious movie without Paul Walker, but it's the first to be produced after his death. Director F. Gary Gray, who helmed Straight Outta Compton, replaced Justin Lin, who moved on to shoot Star Trek Beyond. Furious 7 made over $1 billion at the box office and this follow-up did the same thing. Fate went even bigger in order to capitalize on the momentum and it paid off. 

The highlight of the movie is the sequence that cuts back-and-forth between the submarine chase and the Shaw brothers' mid-air jet infiltration.

2. Furious 7

Paul Walker was killed in an off-set auto accident before Furious 7 completed production and as a result, this is his final Fast movie. It's also the best-reviewed as well as the highest-grossing entry in the series. Interestingly enough, Walker's character, Brian O'Conner, takes more risks than he ever has in one of these flicks. 

The Toretto gang finds themselves hunted by Deckard Shaw (who starts by "killing" Han), brother of Owen Shaw, which necessitates a team-up with the CIA in order to both stop Shaw and to recover a tech device that's too powerful to fall into the wrong hands. 

The twin highlights are the airdrop-turned-car chase in the Caucasus Mountains and Dom and Brian's jump between Abu Dhabi skyscrapers in a Lykan HyperSport.

1. Fast Five

Fast Five introduced The Rock's Luke Hobbs to the series and got the entire saga back on track after a less-than-entertaining trilogy. Most Fast movies involve heists and the highlight of the movie -- and the entire franchise -- is the $100 million high-octane bank robbery in Rio de Janeiro.

Updated 7/12/23