Today on the 5: Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga is finally available to rent or purchase digitally. My wife and I have been waiting to see the latest entry in the Mad Max film series, so we set aside the time and watched it this past weekend.
Ozone Nightmare
Furiosa Spoiler Free Review
Welcome to your daily five for Tuesday, July 2nd, 2024. Over the weekend, my wife and I rented and watched and very much enjoyed Furiosa, a Mad Max saga, which I think became available to rent digitally. Maybe it was the beginning of last week and it was at some point during during last week, but we knew we were going to watch over the weekend. I've been waiting for this movie to hit digital and even though it is a little bit more expensive than most other films, unless $25 is now becoming the going rate for rentals for new releases. It's been $20 for a while. This one was $25, which I did not hesitate because I wanted to support the movie. I've been a big fan of all George Miller's Mad Max films and I know that this one at least at the time of this recording is around the break even point, which I know for a studio is going to be labeled as a disappointment. So I'm hoping that it has a rich life on video on demand and you know, physical media, I don't know. I've pre-ordered the 4K for it because again, I just was, I mean, I love Fury Road and I thought this movie was fantastic and about the only thing I would tell anybody coming into this movie is don't compare it to Fury Road. I think it's an unfair comparison, not only because it's not trying to be Fury Road again, it really isn't. And also, and this is kind of a separate discussion on its own, but Fury Road, the more I've read about it, then multiple watches of it. I really do believe that that movie is a singular achievement because of how long it took and everything that had to go into it. And I frankly think a lot of people involved in that movie, I think deep down, they never thought they were going to make another one and I think that they put probably an unhealthy amount of effort into that film, which resulted in a masterpiece, but is not something that we should really be expecting over and over and over again. And honestly, again, Furyosa is telling the backstory from what I've read. This was all the story that was leading up to Fury Road that George Miller and others have constructed, so that when they got to Fury Road, all the characters were well established. Everybody knew the motivations and it feels like that. It's a really, really well told origin story for a character that we certainly learned a lot about Furyosa in Fury Road just by watching her actions and that's great, but this really lays out everything that led up to where she literally leads up to Fury Road. And I think it is spectacular, but it is a different film. And that's the thing. It's the reason even outside of the excellence of this Fury Road, just the way that Fury Road is structured as a movie is almost completely the opposite here. This is storytelling. This is world building. This is in a way that most filmmakers fumble. This is filling it. I mean, we could just look at the Star Wars prequels for evidence of this. A lot of times when people go back and start filling in all the backstory of characters, it doesn't always work so well, especially because there's a lot with a Morton Joe, the main villain from Fury Road, and my concern there was, well, is that going to diminish the character? Because a lot of times with villains, when you learn a lot, it's not usually to the benefit of the character. It happens here and there, but a lot of times it actually makes the character weaker. And I'm glad that they did not emphasize the humanity of the character. They didn't try to humanize a Morton Joe at all. That's a, I don't know if that's even a spoiler or not. I don't think it is, but they didn't do, they didn't make the mistakes that I thought were possible. And instead, what we get is a really good lead-up and background on why Furyosa is the way that she is. I don't think it takes anything away from the Theron portrayal in Fury Road. I think it adds a lot of layering and depth. It also shows us a lot of this world that explains some of the things that we only get glimpses of in Fury Road and explains it in ways that work really well. That's the biggest thing. Prequels are often done poorly. It's just that simple. And so when you see one that's done well, that's done with what feels like actual intent and purpose, which makes sense since this existed before Fury Road was a success. They didn't make this up to scramble after Fury Road was a success. They were like, well, we have to figure something out. This was all laid out beforehand and it feels that way. It all feels like it organically ties into Fury Road. It doesn't feel like there's any of the shoehorning that often happens when prequels are done after a successful film or set of films. So I think if you just go in with the right expectations and you don't just look for another Fury Road, if you understand what this movie is trying to do and you're interested in what in the stories it's telling, then you're going to have a great time with it. We've all thought it was excellent and we immediately then wanted to watch Fury Road as soon as we were done, which I think that's the best thing you can ask out of a prequel to enjoy it for what it is and it should also leave you wanting to watch the next film because it led up so naturally and perfectly into it. So Fury Rosa, Mad Max Saga was excellent, worth renting. We had a great time with