Fuirosa: A Mad Max Saga
Year: 2024
Rating: R
Length: 148 minutes / 2.46 hours
Having seen most of the original Mad Max films, Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) was such a shocking visual smorgasbord that it only made sense to capitalize on its success. Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (2024) attempts to give us more of the setting, characters, and aesthetic from Fury Road, but with less of the tight octane-fueled pacing of its predecessor. It’s not bad by itself, but its premise certainly rides on Fury Road’s coattails for much of its runtime.
While it’s crazy that it’s almost been a decade since Fury Road came out, I can accept that Anya Taylor-Joy was a passable version of a younger Charlize Theron. The real surprise was how much Chris Hemsworth stole the show, leaning heavily into his Australian roots to give some amazingly authentic craziness to Dementus. That there were so many common elements to Fury Road here meant that it was entertaining to visit this post-apocalyptic world again and soak in the spectacle of it all. Oddly enough, I’d almost like seeing remakes of the first three Mad Max films in this newer style.
Of course, prequels always come with baggage. There’s an understanding of where the characters end up to make the original movie work, and there are necessary story beats that need to happen to get there. Does this mean the explanations Furiosa gives for things like her missing arm are satisfying? Not necessarily. I think it would have been more meaningful if she sacrificed the arm to protect her family instead of what actually happens in the film. As it stands, there’s still enough of the cat-and-mouse chase throughout the film to justify turning your brain off and having a good time.
A prequel for those who want more of Fury Road, I give Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga 4.0 stars out of 5.
