LOS ANGELES — Fans of the blockbuster Fast and Furious film franchise are voicing concerns about the direction of the latest movie in the series, The Fate Of The Furious, which officially puts the films ahead of the popular book series that inspired it.
“I don’t know how they’re going to match the rich, detailed world of the novels when they don’t even have a new book to go off of,” said Trent Birgman, a collector of the original FF novels. “Just look at the dialogue from the fourth book, The Fast and The Furious: Vroom. ‘Woah,’ said Dom, shooting his gun bad-assly. ‘Damn.’” Closing the book angrily, he added, “You can’t convey that sort of rich imagery with moving pictures.”
Many fans of the series believe the books only play a small part in the storylines of the motion pictures.
“I know this isn’t a popular opinion, but I just think the movies are better,” said self-proclaimed cinephile Brian Seymour. “Have you ever read those things? Several chapters are just the lyrics to ‘Click Click Boom’ by Saliva, followed by something like, ‘… said the car stereo as The Rock drove thru [sic] another explosion.’ And each book is, like, 1,500 pages. I’m sorry, but it just works better on screen.”
Noted Fast and Furious scholar Sara Pelmont believes the movies and books live in different universes, best enjoyed separately. “The stories are similar, but they go in different directions. Victarion ‘Bubba’ O’Hannigan is one of my favorite characters from the FF novels, and he’s not even in the movies,” said Pelmont in front of her signed Tokyo Drift poster.
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F. Gary Gray, director of The Fate of the Furious, maintains that the film, despite being the first in the series to not have a book to directly draw from, is still true to author Trav Mendez’s vision.
“Trav’s always worked closely with us, and recently gave us a plot outline to finish the series in case he dies soon… which, let’s face it, is a possibility given his age and lifestyle,” said Gray. “The guy is a mad genius.”
Mendez is rumored to be a prolific user of the popular drug cocaine, which many fans hypothesize led to his drop off in production.
“People need to be layin’ off me about finishin’ these books on time, yo,” said an irritated Mendez via phone. “I got a lot on my plate between these fucking books, supervising the movies, and opening my own dance club in Miami, and right now, I have this crazy hangover, so I’ll start writing the next book when it goes away, OK?”
Photo by Shelby Kettrick @ShelbyShootsStuff.