Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga-All Revenge Narrative and World-Builidng

If Fury Road was all action with a story and world-building lying just under the surface, Furiosa is the complete opposite. Furiosa is all story and world-building, with light action here and there meant solely to drive the story forward. It works because the world-building is simply fascinating. Where Fury Road scratched the surface of this new Wasteland George Miller created, Furiosa meticulously explores all the facets that Fury Road didn't. The film shows all the bleakness and the extreme violence of the Wasteland. Through the character of Dementus, played with completely crazed, maniacal energy by Chris Hemsworth, the film shows how far people can go when it comes to extreme control over others and pure evil in this Wasteland world crafted by George Miller.

Through this world-building, the film crafts a riveting revenge tale and character study for the titular character. The film shows every step of Furiosa's journey. She goes from a weary child experiencing the horrors of the Wasteland firsthand to becoming a tool for others to exploit to becoming a person of pure vengeance by the end. The final confrontation between Dementus and Furosia is the film's shining moment, with Dementus showing Furiosa the tragic embodiment of revenge she's turned into.

While abundant in a captivating narrative and world-building, Furiosa doesn't hold back on the action. Throughout the film, there are several of the intensive, explosive car chases expected for a Mad Max movie. While some hit-or-miss VFX weakens some of it, when the visuals are at their best, the action here has a heightened sense of explosive brutality that kept me on the edge of my seat. There's also an added violent flare to the action here compared to Fury Road, with many more moments of headshots and dismemberments that make the action feel all the more visceral. Miller's trademark use of speed-ramping in the editing and camera pull-ins and pull-outs through vehicles continues to make his action feel incredibly stylish and fast-paced.

But as fascinating as the film's world-building is, its approach may be too meticulous. The film spends quite a lot of time, particularly in the second and parts of the third act, on the war between Dementus's and Immortan Joe's crew over resources. While much of it is interesting, it leads to many dry, exposition-heavy scenes of characters discussing battle and resource-reserving tactics that I found rather dull. At times, it distracted me from Furiosa's story, making the war the focus, not Furiosa's quest for revenge.

The film may focus too much on its world-building and occasionally be visually spotty. However, there's still an incredibly violent, visceral, and sometimes quite bleak tale of revenge at the center of Furiosa, making the film so captivating. Through Furiosa, it feels like George Miller allowed himself to take the world and characters he created in Fury Road and explore all the world and character-building lying just under the surface in that film in pure dramatic detail.

Now Showing in Theatres in the U.S.