Review: “Hobbs & Shaw” is a must-see for wrestling fans

A standout performance by Dwayne Johnson reminiscent of his time as The Rock leads “Fast and Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw” to greatness.

Spoiler Warning: The following review contains some light spoilers for “Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw”.

“Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw” is the first major spin-off for the always action-packed Fast franchise, and one that wastes no time in delivering the goods in a major way.

The film opens rather innocuously enough with a fairly textbook exposition that establishes why the movie’s titular stars must join forces.

The cybernetically enhanced Brixton Lore (Idris Elba) is bent on releasing a virus that will infect all of mankind in the name of forcing human evolution. The only thing stopping him is Hattie Shaw (Vanessa Kirby), the sister of now franchise mainstay Deckard (Jason Statham), who injects herself with the virus before Lore can get his hands on it.

What follows is your standard tale of international espionage, action, and adrenaline-pumping car chases that have led the Fast franchise to great success.

This time, however, all of those elements are brought to viewers in an immensely entertaining star-driven vehicle for Dwayne Johnson, Statham, and Kirby.

Johnson is clearly in his environment throughout the film, as he delivers a mile-a-minute quips and butt-kickings as Luke Hobbs which will virtually instantly bring back fond memories of his days as The Rock.

In fact, I would go as far as saying this is probably the closest Johnson has come to embracing that character fully for a studio role, something which I would argue we were nowhere near seeing when he initially made his debut in the franchise.

From his opening scene on, it’s clear that you’re going to be an equal amount amused and entertained by all the fisticuffs and one-liners that pepper the film’s best scenes featuring Johnson

For their parts, Statham and Kirby are similarly excellent in their none too different roles from Hobbs as the Shaw siblings. Statham’s constant back-and-forth with Johnson is arguably the film’s greatest asset, and one that provides no shortage of memorable moments starting virtually the moment the two first meet on screen.

Kirby had similarly excellent chemistry with Johnson, and also proved to be just as thrilling to watch in the movie’s most explosive scenes as her more well-acclimated counterparts. She clearly has a bright future for these kinds of roles, as it would be easy to envision her in her own solo-starring role in a movie similar to “Atomic Blonde” coming away from this picture.

Speaking of that somehow still underrated film, the result of all of the major stars of “Hobbs and Shaw” shining so brightly was that the movie quickly became one of the most thoroughly entertaining action flicks since the Charlize Theron-led release in 2017.

Now, that’s not to say there still wasn’t areas of improvement. As you might expect based off of the initial description of the opening scene, the movie doesn’t always maintain the strongest plot.

At times, some of the dialogue feels like it falls into the word soup territory that makes the film feel a tad too stereotypical and predictable. It just largely remains a non-issue when the movie reverts back to just watching the leads do what they do best.

When the film does drag the most, it’s because those elements of comedy and action brought by Johnson, Statham, and Kirby fall away, specifically in the build to the climatic battle near the film’s conclusion.

Perhaps it was in part due to my own growing anticipation over seeing Roman Reigns get his chance to shine up on the big screen, but that was really the only time I could feel “Hobbs & Shaw” actually stumble a bit.

While we’re on the topic of Reigns by the way, it’s probably worth mentioning that his role in “Hobbs & Shaw” could likely best be compared to that of someone like Boba Fett in “Star Wars”.

In other words, he stands out like a sore thumb when he’s onscreen, but doesn’t really get much in the way of character development. He does, however, get a much bigger action sequence than Fett ever received, as he gets several moments to shine near the film’s dramatic conclusion.

Going forward, it will be interesting to see if those moments were enough to land Reigns a more permanent role in the franchise, similar to that of his wrestling superstar counterparts Dwayne Johnson and John Cena.

Since we didn’t really get a chance to connect with Reigns’ character, who spent most of his screen time in a Shield-esque persona looking ready to throw hands at a moments notice and nothing else, it’s honestly hard to tell.

I would certainly welcome that development of Reigns into a more fully developed character in future films though, especially if this spin-off takes off in the same way that the mainline “Fast and Furious” movies did.

To be honest, I feel like there should be a fairly good chance of that happening too. This was one of the most legitimately fun movies I’ve seen in quite some times, regardless of any times in which the film seems to lag.

It simply delivered so many memorable zingers and almost WWE-style promos cut between the two title characters, that you couldn’t help but walk out with a massive smile on your face.

That alone should be more than enough to warrant “Hobbs & Shaw” receiving another ride together in theaters.