Fast & Furious is the Defining Action Series of a Generation

The year was 2001, and a new movie called Fast & Furious premiered with mixed reviews. The movie was actually intended to debut a new teen heartthrob and megastar in Paul Walker, but Vin Diesel – whose real name is Mark Sinclair – was a crowd favorite and unexpectedly stole the show; it spring-boarded his career, much to the surprise of Universal Pictures. The movie was mostly for young people whose disbelief was easily and graciously suspended, and who generally don’t care about details; instead, lime-green Hondas with body kits and dual exhaust would more than suffice. I was a sophomore in high school at the time, and it was the most fun action movie I’d ever seen. Over a decade later, it still is. Love it or not, the Fast & Furious franchise is the defining action series of my generation. Introducing us to the fictionalized world of underground street racing, the series speaks to the hearts of pubescent teenagers who love cars but don’t own one, love sex but don’t have it, and love action but spend their days doing schoolwork. It has its problems – its biggest being that it’s objectively terrible – but they don’t matter. The didn’t matter then because we were young, and they especially don’t matter now. The reviews, plot holes, acting – none of that matters when nostalgia is the lens through which you view something.

We grew up with Furious. Keep your Die Hard’s and Lethal Weapon’s – even Terminator doesn’t sync the same with 1985-born me. For some of us, Fast &am…