Most Rewatchable Scene
The favela rooftop chase
In the discussion (14)
Approx. transcript time · 00:18:27Read transcript
- Picking a most rewatchable scene from this movie is hard; the opener, where the gang frees Dom from the prison bus, is nominated first as a great scene.
- Because nitpicks and unanswerable questions are inherent in these scenes, the hosts jump the gun: prisoner transports in action movies always run down an empty highway with no police protection and no explanation, the bus driver alone with forty felons and one guard must be asking the same questions, and a prisoner seeing that empty highway would start to feel he might get out.
- The 'all accounted for except for one' beat is loved every time, compared to Michael Myers getting out in Halloween; the TV reporter announcing no fatalities after the bus flipped some 85 times drew laughter in the theater, since handcuffed prisoners without seatbelts would have gone through a window, so throw in two fatalities.
- The physics of the car angling into the bus to tip it is a crazy plan that shows how 'precisive' (as transcribed) the drivers are; a controversial take follows, being upset they broke Dom out of prison and wanting a year or two of a Dom in prison movie, and the other agrees the film could have opened with Dom in a prison fight and being moved for his own safety.
- For the train heist the hosts first note Vince from Fast One, underrated and given a raw deal as the semi bad guy who was right about Paul Walker being undercover FBI; he is living in the favelas in Brazil when Paul Walker and Jordana Brewster arrive on the run with a job getting cars off a train, one of the craziest four-minute scenes of all time.
- Justin Lin wanted as little CGI as possible, so the cars jumping off the train were real stunt drivers; the fight on the train gets agents shot, Brian jumps onto Dom's car and they drive off a mountain, a drop called 350 feet easy; picking nits, they should have exploded on hitting the water, which at that height is like concrete, and the car already in the water is a factor.
- The first two picks being the first two scenes shows how incredible the movie is; the slow-motion shot of the car falling away from Brian took one host's breath away, and popping out of the water unwinded is the film telling the audience the series will get more and more ridiculous, so come along; a correction that the agents were DEA, not FBI.
- The favela rooftop chase was complicated to film in Puerto Rico rather than Brazil because real people live there; Rock and Vin Diesel finally lock eyes, Dom runs into Elena and she falls for him, as everyone who tries to arrest Dom does, Brian and eventually even the Rock included; Paul Walker and Brewster jump and fall through a house and nobody with a gun shoots, so impressed by the jump.
- The balcony barbecue scene after Brian's girlfriend's pregnancy is one host's personal favorite because the writers clearly needed a Vin Diesel monologue at the 45-minute mark and Paul Walker's 'what do you remember about your father' comes out of nowhere; the other is mad at the laughing, defends the question as coming from a man whose own dad wasn't around, and calls it his favorite scene, the same fight they had on the Fast and the Furious episode.
- Vin Diesel is called a phenomenal actor in these serious moments, probably talking about his real dad; the other's reason the screenwriters wanted the scene is how Diesel pronounces the word father, as if drunk, which earns a rebuke for making jokes again; they love the scene for slightly different reasons but just the same, and the series always works in a serious Vin Diesel scene whether it makes sense or not.
- At the warehouse the team invited to rob the drug dealer gets along, the opposite of the 2019 Celtics, with Vin watching like a proud dad before saying 'toast' as a sentence and giving the money-will-come-and-go speech ending 'salute me familiar' (as transcribed); this cements the family theme, of which the first film had only traces in the quarter-mile speech and the Jesse moment.
- Dom fights Hobbs is held for later; the Ambush is underrated and exciting even though Hobbs loses every man he has, a tough work trip for The Rock; the bank vault heist through the streets of Brazil and the ending where they open the safe as the song plays complete the nominees.
- Asked for a pick, one host votes for the get-the-team-together montage, the kind of under-two-minute scene to pull up on YouTube, and for a longer one the favela chase, the first time the crew is caught between Agent Hobbs and Hernan Reyes, where Hobbs's team mows everyone down in a flat-out bunch of murder the series had never shown, making the stakes feel real; 'that's my vote'.
- Thinking of most rewatchable as flicking channels two minutes before the scene arrives, the other might be with him on the favela chase, a great four minutes, even over the Rock fight; the other choice is the bank vault scene, an all-time 'how are they doing that' with no visible CGI; a son skipped Fortnite to lie back down for the Rock fight; in the end there is no right answer, two guys fighting or Brazilian property destroyed depending on mood, and everybody wins.