Fast X Ending Explained: Family Matters

Over the course of 22 years, the "Fast & Furious" films have resembled a great many different things: a sports movie, a crime drama, a martial arts action film, a globe-spanning spy saga, a high-tech sci-fi yarn, and even a role-playing game campaign. Yet the franchise's main theme has remained stalwart — the movies are all about the power and resilience of family, a 10-film franchise that seeks to prove the ancient adage, "blood is thicker than water."

Yet, as the series' continual instances of betrayal, side-switching, and tragic death followed by improbable resurrection make the saga seem borderline Biblical or Shakespearean, its exploration of the concept of family has not been entirely one-note. The Fast Saga has openly acknowledged that misunderstandings and deep-seated resentment can occur between family members, just as it's explored how rivalries can form between separate family units: witness the family of Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) crossing paths with the likes of the Shaw brood, most famously former British military and MI6 agent turned mercenary Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham).

Among the many abilities Dom and his crew possess is that of forgiveness, a superpower that's allowed them to not only survive for so long but to add to their lengthy list of friends and allies. Some rivalries, however, are so toxic that no impasse can be reached; witness the infamous history of the Hatfields and McCoys, for instance. In "Fast X," the latest installment of the series that is the first of a two- (or possibly three-) part finale, Dom and company face their most dangerous foe yet, a man with his own ideas of family and revenge, someone who just might have finally found the Toretto crew's Achilles heel.

"Fast X" begins with an extended flashback to the events of 2011's "Fast Five," in which Dom and his crew stole a fortune from drug lord Hernan Reyes (Joaquim de Almeida). It turns out that Hernan had a son, Dante (Jason Momoa), whom he was in the process of integrating into his criminal kingdom when the Toretto team took the kingpin's vault for a ride. Although Dante was part of the battle that occurred on the bridge at the end of that film, he was violently thrown into the water during the fight, leaving him unable to prevent his father's death.

Twelve years later (roughly — the exact timeline of the series is its own separate headache), Dom and friends are having a barbecue at their ancestral Los Angeles home with Dom's heretofore-unseen-by-the-audience Abuelita (Rita Moreno) as Roman (Tyrese Gibson) brags about finally becoming a mission leader, having gotten a hot tip on some shady business going down in Rome. After he, Tej (Chris "Ludacris" Bridges), and Ramsey (Nathalie Emmanuel) head to Italy to investigate, an unexpected visitor shows up on Dom and Letty's doorstep: a wounded Cipher (Charlize Theron), who reveals her recent encounter with Dante caused her to lose her crew and barely escape with her life.

As the Agency takes Cipher away to a Black Site, Dom and Letty go to Rome with Little Nobody (Scott Eastwood) in tow to try and save their friends. They do so, but barely, as Dante, swearing to make Dom and the family suffer for their actions, manipulates events to cause a boulder-sized bomb (which eventually catches on fire) to roll through the streets of the city. The bomb detonates just outside the Vatican as Dom crashes it into a nearby river with just seconds to spare, saving some but not all possible lives from the blast.

The bomb incident isn't only devastating for the citizens of Rome — it effectively splits up Dom and his family, which is exactly Dante's plan. Roman, Tej, Han and Ramsey are left to their own devices to smuggle themselves out of Italy, eventually ending up in London. Letty is captured by authorities and taken off to the same Antarctica Black Site as Cipher, thanks to the Agency's newest man in charge, Aimes (Alan Ritchson), who refuses to hear the protests of Tess (Brie Larson) that Letty and the crew were framed for the bombing, citing the long outlaw history of Dom Toretto and company. Tess, the daughter of the still-missing Mr. Nobody (played by Kurt Russell in prior "Fast" films), strikes out on her own to find Dom, who travels to Brazil to track down Dante after being tipped off by "Queenie" Shaw (Helen Mirren).

Once in Rio de Janiero, Dom encounters Dante at a street race and accepts the villain's challenge to race only to discover that Dante only wants to continue to make Dom suffer, forcing him to lose the race after planting bombs on the other opponents and making Dom choose who to save. Dom's choice is that of Isabel (Daniela Melchior), the previously-unseen sister of Dom's ex Elena (played by Elsa Pataky in prior entries). After saving her life, Isabel gives Dom her sister's old police files on Dante, leading Dom to a location where Dante arranges for him to be captured by Aimes.

Meanwhile, Mia (Jordana Brewster) finds herself and Dom's son, Brian aka Little B (Leo Abelo Perry), under attack at the Toretto home. The duo are rescued by Mia's other brother, Jakob (John Cena), who concocts a plan where he'll take Little B to safety while Mia rushes to the aid of her own son and husband.

As the film progresses, it becomes clear that Dante is essentially the Fast Saga's Joker, in more ways than one. Not only does his camp nature combined with a sick sense of humor recall the likes of the 1966 "Batman" TV series' Cesar Romero and Jack Nicholson's turn as the character in 1989's "Batman," but his devious, multi-step plan is reminiscent of Heath Ledger's insidious criminal mastermind in 2008's "The Dark Knight." Just like Ledger's Joker, Dante's plan involves not only separating the various Toretto family members, but backing them up against a metaphorical wall, which allows old grievances and other deep-seated issues to hinder them.

To wit: at the Black Site, Tess attempts to put into motion a plan to get Letty free, involving a newly-injured Letty being taken to a lab where the Agency uses its secret tech to heal her wound — a lab that Cipher is also in. Cipher manages to hack herself and Letty out of the lab, but Letty can't pass up the opportunity to beat the untrustworthy hacker to a pulp, thereby slowing their joint escape down considerably.

In London, Roman and Tej come to blows (however comedic) due to Roman's role in bringing the team to Rome, and Ramsey finds she can't even trust an old black market contact of hers (Pete Davidson in a cameo role) given that the price on their heads is too high. Han leads the trio to Deckard Shaw as a backup plan, but Shaw instantly starts fighting Han, believing the latter is there for revenge for Shaw's attempted murder back in "Fast & Furious 6." Even though an attacking Agency force causes Shaw to see the light, he quickly leaves the foursome upon learning that his mother Queenie has become a target of Dante's.

After Dante attacks Dom, Aimes, and Isabel in Rio on the same bridge where his father died, Tess helps save the day but not before being wounded herself, just as Dom discovers that Little B is Dante's next victim. Soon, most everyone is converging on Jakob's secret hideout location in Portugal: Jacob and Little B, Roman, Tej, Han, and Ramsey on a plane that Shaw helped them acquire, and Dom, who's personally flown there by a now-on-the-side-of-good Aimes, the Agency man's mind changed after Dante's bridge attack.

Dom and his Charger arrive just as Jakob and Little B are under attack, fleeing in Jakob's missile-firing vehicle from Dante's mercs. Dom literally drops onto the highway, managing to take out two attack choppers in the process and rescuing Little B. Jakob, out of fuel, decides to sacrifice himself to allow his brother and nephew to escape, plowing into the final few enemy cars.

Dom pulls onto a road crossing a giant dam only to find his path blocked by a couple of remote-controlled tanker trucks that Dante has loaded with explosives. Pulling off yet another improbable super move with his driving skills, Dom escapes the tanker explosion by careening down the face of the dam itself. Unfortunately, he can't defeat all the forces of nature and has to abandon his Charger after it sinks to the bottom of the river below, pulling himself and Little B to safety.

This all turns out to be yet another trap set by Dante, however, as the villain reveals that he'd also wired the entire dam to explode, knowing that a vehicle-less and helpless Dom and Little B would be at the bottom of it. He also reveals that Aimes has been working for him all along, a partnership begun all the way back during the events of "Fast Five" in a meeting orchestrated by his father.

Aimes fires a critical missile at the approaching plane carrying Roman, Tej, Ramsey, and Han, causing it to crash into the side of a mountain. Dante presses the trigger on the bombs wired to the dam, declaring that his father's credo of "Never accept death when suffering is owed" has finally been fulfilled and that Dom can now finally die.

While the fates of Dom, Little B, Roman, Tej, Ramsey, and Han are left up in the air until the next installment, "Fast X" doesn't fully end on a bleak note. Letty and Cipher finally put their differences aside long enough to escape the Black Site together, and Cipher then reveals a key element of her grand escape plan: a giant submarine lurking under the Antarctic ice, much like the one she attempted to steal during "The Fate of the Furious" that was subsequently destroyed. The submarine isn't the only thing back from the dead, however — the pilot of the craft turns out to be none other than Gisele Yashar (Gal Gadot), who was thought to be killed during the final battle of "Fast & Furious 6."

Elsewhere, a mysterious tactical force invades an abandoned theater, clearly on some sort of tip that Dante Reyes is hiding out there. It turns out it was another elaborate hoax on Dante's part (similar to the way he trapped Dom in Rio earlier) as a way of luring another key potential victim of his out into the open. That target is none other than former DSS agent Luke Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson), last seen taking on a mysterious tech cult in the spin-off "Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw." As Dante reminds Hobbs, it was the DSS agent who put the final bullet into his father that fateful day in 2011. Hobbs, ever unintimidated, declares that he's after Dante himself, underlining that despite Dom and company currently being in peril, the battle is far from being won yet.

Keeping in mind the aforementioned numerous changes of tones and subgenres within the Fast Saga, "Fast X" can be seen to most closely resemble a superhero film — after all, the downbeat cliffhanger ending of the movie heavily recalls the finale of 2018's "Avengers: Infinity War." The comparisons go deeper than that, however. Even though it's become the subject of numerous memes and discussions surrounding the franchise, the series' main theme of family continues to be explored and resonate through each installment. Where the theme once applied to the ability Dom and company have to rely on each other for support, love, and assistance through any tough times, that idea has now expanded to be treated as almost a type of superpower. "Fast X" tackles this notion at face value, having Aimes discuss the crew's prowess at making unlikely allies out of enemies and incredible luck with old, supposedly departed friends turning up alive. Aimes even compares the crew to a sort of cult, where everyone is eventually invited to the Toretto barbecue.

Just as Roman and Tej's space adventure in "F9" both commented on and proved that movie's theme of near-indestructibility, Aimes' arc in "Fast X" is this film's commentary on the Toretto superpower of family. Dom lets his guard down after Aimes' apparent conversion to his side, expecting a new ally as has happened so many times before. Dante and Aimes exploit that weak spot, leaving Dom's core beliefs shaken, his belief in friendship and giving others a second chance coming back to hurt him. Similar to how certain forms of Kryptonite makes Superman act irrationally, Dante's mind games and manipulation cause fights between characters who should be working together to solve their problems instead of fighting each other: Han and Shaw, Cipher and Letty, and Roman and Tej.

As has been widely reported, "Fast X" is intended as the first part of a multi-part finale. To that end, its cliffhanger climax feels wholly appropriate, as it's the first time in the franchise where an honest-to-gosh cliffhanger has occurred (as opposed to mere post-credit teases of characters or plot threads). Yet star Vin Diesel has exclaimed that the finale may involve three films and not the previously mentioned two. Additionally, co-writer and co-producer Justin Lin, during his commentary track for "F9," explained that during his long association with the franchise, he and Diesel have had numerous conversations regarding as-yet-untold backstories and character secrets that could be explored in future installments. For instance, there is a meaning and origin story about Han's postcard of a Mexican church as seen in "F9," which happens to feature a cross that heavily resembles the Toretto family cross that Dom and Jakob wear around their necks. There's also the mystery of the Toretto family tree itself, a thread raised once again by the appearance of Abuelita in "X."

Those are minor mysteries when compared to the larger questions still left up in the air by "Fast X" and the rest of the franchise. For one, the origins and operation of the shadowy Agency are still unexplained, as are the exact identity, actions, and whereabouts of Mr. Nobody himself. While "F9" provided the broad strokes answers for things like Han faking his death (with Nobody's help) and Jakob's shadowy history as an Agency operative, there are still a lot of vague open-ended questions there. Who knows if the series wants to address the concepts raised by "Hobbs & Shaw," but given the Agency's obsession with next-level tech and that film's tech-terrorism organization Eteon, it would seem a natural development to find out what's going on with those folks, too.

Perhaps the biggest blind spot the "Fast" series has right now is a character who used to be one of its bright spots: Brian O'Conner. After Paul Walker tragically died during the making of "Furious 7," it seemed a touching and fitting tribute to allow the character to literally drive off into the sunset with his family intact. Yet as the series has continued far past that entry, it's had to find increasingly goofy ways to keep Brian off the playing field and on the sidelines. This has not only weakened Brian's character — seriously, is there any way he'd be this uninvolved if the actor playing him had lived? — but it's become an exponential issue that the franchise seems to know there's a catch-22 problem with.

That problem being: does a future entry simply recast Brian with a new actor? Do they arrange some sort of deepfake CGI performance? Or do they continue to keep the character off-screen and have him do things that the audience never sees and just hears about? The first two possibilities would seem to dishonor Walker's memory, and the last possibility sounds incredibly dissatisfying. So far, the love and power of family have kept Brian alive, but let's hope that his survival actually amounts to something, even if we can't easily say what that might be.

So far, the continual joy of the Fast Saga has been its longevity combined with its commitment to increasing the stakes and the unlikely nature of its heroes' exploits. It's operated not unlike a high-speed chase or an F1/NASCAR race, with a "can-you-believe-they're-still-going" thrill applying to each successive film. Now that an actual limitation has been self-imposed on the saga with the impending grand finale, the series may not be able to weather such a demand. After all, the only ending to either a chase or a race that feels as grand as the preceding spectacle is a crash and burn, something the Fast Saga probably wants to avoid.

Now that the series has reached outer space and has achieved the sensation of feeling like a superhero saga while involving ostensibly human characters with no extraordinary powers, it remains to be seen how the series' largesse can fully pay off. In comparison to "Fast X," 2001's original "The Fast and the Furious," while still clearly a visually aggressive action film, feels far more character-based. As Dom learns the hard way during "Fast X," it's all about the people in the end, and you don't know what you have until it's gone. Hopefully, Dom, the numerous family units surrounding him, and the Fast Saga itself can find a way to gain it all back before the gas runs out.