Having finally taken the leap beyond the final frontier in the previous installment, longtime fans of the Fast & Furious franchise were wondering how on earth Fast X would ever manage to top heading into outer space. There was one suggestion right at the top of the list, though, and it was a doozy. To quote Mark Ruffalo’s Hulk in Avengers: Endgame: “Time travel!”
When the first trailer for Louis Leterrier’s blockbuster action sequel dropped to reveal archive footage of Paul Walker while establishing that Jason Momoa’s Dante was the son of Fast Five villain Hernan Reyes, the theory suddenly gained widespread traction that The Fast Saga was really going to introduce some temporal tampering into the mix.
Sadly, it wasn’t to be, but Leterrier clearly underestimated the demands of his audience when reflecting on how he coped with the pressure of having to raise the bar for insanity in an interview with Entertainment Weekly.
“What could I do? Time travel? There’s nothing I could have done that’s bigger than that. There’s no way. They went to space, so I was like, ‘Let’s bring it back to Earth.’ I love the Fast & Furious movies with international espionage and going to space and everything, but that’s not why I watch these movies. If I get to do a Fast & Furious movie, it’s the one that brought back racing to the forefront. That’s my legacy as a director, I wanted to bring cars back to the forefront of Fast & Furious.”
Based on the fact Fast X is currently riding a wave of apathy as the brand’s worst-reviewed installment for a decade and a half, maybe time travel should have been kept on the table. Then again, provided that it does what’s expected and conquers the box office with the greatest of ease, Leterrier’s disappointing decision to ignore that which was staring him straight in the face will be justified.