Line #20 Film/FastAndFurious


1	! Spoilers for all ''Franchise/TheFastAndTheFurious'' movies preceding this one, including ''Film/TwoFastTwoFurious'' will be left unmarked. Administrivia/YouHaveBeenWarned!
2	[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/fast_and_furious_ver2_3.jpg]]
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4	->''"You asked me why I let Dom go. I did it, because at that moment, I respected him more than I did myself. One thing I've learned from Dom is that nothing really matters unless you have a code."''
5	-->-- '''Brian O'Conner'''
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7	''Fast & Furious'', also known as ''F&F 4'' to avoid confusion with the first movie and [[Franchise/TheFastAndTheFurious the franchise as a whole]], is the fourth film in ''The Fast Saga''. Acting as something of a SoftReboot of the franchise after ''Film/TheFastAndTheFuriousTokyoDrift'' under preformed. Released in Spring 2009 with Creator/VinDiesel, Creator/PaulWalker, Creator/MichelleRodriguez, Creator/JordanaBrewster and Creator/SungKang reprising their previous roles.
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9	It's been five years and Brian has returned to Los Angeles law enforcement, this time as an FBI agent hunting another drug dealer. Meanwhile, Dom has left his crew, only to get thrust into the world of racing once again when his girlfriend, Letty, is killed while working undercover for the same drug dealer. Brian reunites with Dom, offering him a pardon in exchange for help catching the drug dealer. However, tension heats up when their personal motivations are revealed as Brian, Dom, and Mia struggle to work through the residual complications of their last encounter with each other.
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11	Chronologically it's set after ''Film/TwoFastTwoFurious'' with ''Film/FastFive'' immediately following it.
12	----
13	!!Tropes
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15	* ActionFilmQuietDramaScene: Brian explaining himself after it emerges that Letty was his informant.
16	* ArmourPiercingQuestion: Mia to Brian when they're talking in the cafe.
17	--> ''"Maybe you're lying to yourself. Maybe you're not the good guy pretending to be a bad guy. Maybe you're the bad guy pretending to be the good guy. You ever think about that?"''
18	* AssholeVictim: While Fenix does suffer a horrendous death at the end of the film, he's a cartel lieutenant who antagonizes Brian and Dom and personally executed Braga's last batch of drug runners.
19	** Dwight is a cocky drug runner for Braga's cartel who is constantly antagonizing Brian for driving a Nissan and taunts him after Dom spins him out in the audition race. It's hard to feel sorry for him when Brian brings the DEA into his house ([[CaughtWithYourPantsDown while he's filming amateur softcore pornography]]) and has him arrested to take his place in Braga's organization.
20	* AuthorAppeal: Although he isn't a big car guy, director Justin Lin expressed his appreciation for the Buick GNX, and urged the car coordinators to have Dom drive one at the start of the movie as it fit his character and because it had barely been used in movies.
21	* ArcVillain: Arturo Braga, though ItsPersonalWithTheDragon, Fenix Calderon, for [[spoiler:seemingly]] killing Letty.
22	* AwesomenessByAnalysis: Dom shows incredible detective prowess, instantly knowing not only exactly what went down at [[spoiler:Letty's crash site]], but walked out with a vital clue apparently even the FBI missed.
23	* BackhandedApology: Mia gives one to Brian while they're talking in the cafe, "apologising" for the fact that Brian had to come to their house and pretend to love her.
24	* BackFromTheDead: You know that 1970 Dodge Charger (which was wrecked by his father and rebuilt before the first film's events) that Dom wrecks in the first film? It's back in this film. [[spoiler: [[RunningGag And it gets wrecked and rebuilt again.]]]]
25	* BookEnds:
26	** The movie begins with Dom and his gang hijacking a gasoline truck [[spoiler: and ends with him getting rescued from a prison bus by Brian, Mia and his gang from the beginning. Also counts as a BolivianArmyEnding]].
27	** Also invoked with Fenix. Earlier in the movie [[spoiler: Dom sees Fenix standing over Letty before killing her in some sort of guilt induced hallucination]]. At the end, Fenix stands over Brian in much the same way before Dom swoops in for the rescue.
28	* BoomHeadshot: Fenix kills the drug runners this way after they're finished doing the job.
29	* CallBack: A pretty grim one. [[spoiler:When Dom is arrested and sentenced in the final act, the judge sends him to Lompoc prison. All the way back in ''Film/TheFastAndTheFurious2001'', Dominic told Brian that he did two years in that prison and "[[NeverGoingBackToPrison (He'd) die before going back]]". The look on Dominic's face shows exactly what he feels.]]
30	* ChekhovsGun: During the initial U.S. - Mexico border run, Dom notices several propane tanks in the tunnels. Later on, he uses this to [[StuffBlowingUp kill one of Braga's henchmen and collapse the tunnels]]
31	* ConvenientlyEmptyRoads: Played straight. When Brian and the crew break Dom out of the prison transport, there are no other vehicles around. The same is true during the opening gas truck heist.
32	* CurbStompCushion: Dom attacking Brian. Brian is obviously not as strong as Dom and gets knocked around, but he manages to fight off Dom even when he is downed, blocking most of his punches, and even manages to get his legs around Dom's head to hold him back, with Dom having to put in real effort to get out of it. While he didn't fight Dom head-on unlike the likes of Hobbs, Jakob, Deckard, and Owen, he still does a lot better than anyone else apart from those four when pitted against Dom's wrath, and he ''did'' held back, as he acknowledged he deserved to be beaten down and just tried to calm Dom down without actually trying to fight back.
33	* DarkerAndEdgier: ''Fast & Furious'' compared to the other films. It has a much grimmer atmosphere with both Brian and Dom investigating who was behind [[spoiler: Letty's (apparent) death]] and Dom personally seeking revenge.
34	* {{Dropped A Bridge On H\|im}}er: [[spoiler:Letty has all of five minutes of screentime, and the next thing we know, Mia calls up Dom to tell him that Letty has been killed by Fenix. We get to see what happens later, at least, but it's still awkward, especially since Michelle Rodriguez [[BillingDisplacement has her name on the posters]]]].
35	* ExtremeSportsPlot: Explanation is same as ''2Fast 2Furious'' (undercover cop and an ex-convict become street racers in order to get hired as drivers for a drug lord so they can infiltrate his operation) and the added twist that Dom is also going undercover on his own initiative to get revenge on the man who killed his girlfriend.
36	* {{Fanservice}}: The film has moments of hot girls kissing during club scenes.
37	* FemmeFatale: Zigzagged with Gisele, a mysterious woman who serves Braga and makes advances on Dom but ultimately sides with Brian and Dom.
38	* FirstGirlWins: Mia for Brian.
39	* FriendlessnessInsult: Dom is interrogating a man named David Park who has a connection to the murder of Dom's girlfriend Letty. Brian arrives and offers to help Dom solve Letty's murder, stating that Letty was his friend too. Dom cynically responds that Brian "isn't anyone's friend".
40	* GPSEvidence: Dom examines the crash scene where [[spoiler:Letty apparently died]], found evidence of a certain kind of nitro booster, and knew exactly who installed it. Not only are there likely to be several garages in a city the size of Los Angeles that would do that particular mod, the fact that Dom hasn't been there in five years means that his knowledge of local garages is rather out of date. He still gets the right garage on the first try.
41	* HeroKiller: [[spoiler: Fenix supposedly to Letty, subverted since he didn't quite finish the job.]]
42	* HiddenInPlainSight: Where does Brian hide a car containing [[spoiler:$60 million in smuggled drugs]] where the cops and gangs won't find it? The police impound lot.
43	* HighAltitudeInterrogation: Dom does this to one of Braga's informants.
44	* IncrediblyObviousBug: Brian's superiors plant a beeping tracking device with a bright red light in the center console of Brian's Skyline. He rips it out and destroys it before the cartel can search his car.
45	* ItsPersonalWithTheDragon: Braga might be the BigBad, but Fenix is the one who Dom and Brian really ''hate'' throughout the film.
46	* TheManInFrontOfTheMan: The front man for the drug running ring appears to be working for an unseen boss. The boss turns out to be a decoy and the front man is the actual boss and BigBad.
47	* MassOhCrap: Every at the exchange (including Dom and Brian) all react this way when the FBI attack the area where the exchange is happening in an attempt to apprahend Braga.
48	* MisplacedRetribution: Brian gets put on suspension for the raid to grab Braga going bad, despite the fact that he wasn't responsible - one of his colleagues jumped the gun and launched the raid before Brian gave the go signal, and told them to grab the wrong man.
49	* TheMole: Letty went undercover for the DEA in Braga's organization, mainly in order to try and get a pardon for Dom.
50	* NearVillainVictory: Fenix manages to catch up to Brian's car and overturn it, allowing him to recover Braga. Just as he's about to finish him off, Dom comes busting out of the tunnels [[spoiler: and guns straight for him. Fenix tries to shoot him but Brian grabs his leg, distracting him long enough for Dom to crush him against Brian's totaled car.]]
51	* NonActionBigBad: Braga is good at planning and scheming, not so much on the action side.
52	* NotSoDifferentRemark: Braga gives one to Dom, claiming that neither of them are "heroes".
53	* OhCrap
54	** Dom has this reaction during the truck heist at the start when he notices that they've been spotted by the truck's driver. The truck driver, himself, also has one when he realizes that he's driving towards a cliff, and decides to [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere jump out of the truck with his pet iguana]].
55	** Brian after hearing his phone ringing and seeing Letty's name on the screen, realising that Dom just figured out that the former was the one who [[spoiler: put Letty undercover]], and is clearly pissed.
56	** Agent Trihn has this reaction when she finds that [[spoiler: Ramone Campos is actually Arturo Braga]].
57	* OnlyAFleshWound: A mook shoots Dom directly in his shoulder. The look on Dom's face made it clear he was more worried about his nice jacket than any damage done to his actual person. Oh, and Dom proceeds to beat the mook damn near to death, with both hands. And doesn't so much as flinch while Mia patches up the wound.
58	* TheOnlyOneAllowedToDefeatYou: Dom with Fenix Calderon.
59	* OutrunTheFireball: Dom when the propane tanks in the tunnel explode. Also inverted at the beginning, where Dom runs ''towards'' the fireball.
60	* ProductPlacement: Subaru donated the Impreza WRX [=STIs=].
61	* RealMenWearPink: Subverted. [[spoiler: The fact that Braga, a man who supposedly clawed his way up from "varrio enforcer" to "ruthless drug kingpin", came to a drug deal wearing a salmon pink silk tie is immediately taken by Dom and Brian as evidence that the man is not the real Braga]].
62	* SecretUndergroundPassage: Braga's men use a hidden tunnel wide enough to drive through to smuggle drugs across the US Mexico border.
63	* SequelHook: [[spoiler: Dom's escape from the prison bus, revealed at the beginning of ''Fast Five'']].
64	* SmugSnake:
65	** In the climax, Braga constantly keeps mocking Brian as Dom and he are trying to outrun Braga's men, so much so Brian finally gets fed up and punches him to shut him up. And again In the sixth movie, since he has muscle by his side, he thinks he can take Brian while he's in prison. Brian easily handles them and get the information needed out of him.
66	** Fenix taunts Dom about killing Letty, and instead of killing Brian outright at the end, kicks him around a few times before pointing his gun at him. This eventually became his undoing.
67	* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome:
68	** Dom and Mia don't trust Brian for betraying their trust in the first film and it takes almost half the movie for them to forgive him and start trusting him again.
69	** Despite helping to arrest a wanted drug lord and aiding a federal agent, [[spoiler: Dom is arrested and sentenced to 25 years to life for his previous crimes]]. Thankfully, [[spoiler: Mia, Leo and Santos, and Brian get ready to break him out]]...
70	* TemptingFate: Brian and Dom kidnap Braga in order to forcibly take him back to the United States.
71	-->'''Brian:''' Where your boys at? Huh? They gonna show up, or what?
72	-->''(Braga's men come swarming in from everywhere)''
73	-->'''Braga:''' [[BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor Careful what you ask for!]]
74	* ThatsWhatIWouldDo: Brian tries to narrow down a list of suspects with the same name to figure out which one is involved with street racing. He has his FBI partner read off a list of the suspects' cars. After hearing about a Nissan 240SX with an illegal modification, he remarks that he's the one. His partner asks how he knows this and he replies "Because that's what I'd drive."
75	* ThirdPersonPerson: Dwight.
76	--> '''Dwight''': Dwight likes [[ConvenientlyCommonKink this foot]] a lot.
77	* TrailersAlwaysLie: Mia driving in the trailer. [[spoiler: She only drives at the very end, a minute before the credits]].
78	* TranquilFury: When Dom gets the maximum sentence (a life sentence of which he must serve at least 25 years), Brian doesn't say anything, but you can tell that he is ''pissed''.
79	* UnresolvedSexualTension: When Brian and Mia see each other again, Mia hadn't yet forgiven him for his role as an undercover cop five years earlier. Naturally, this is followed by a RelationshipUpgrade.
80	* WhatTheHellHero:
81	** Mia gives one to Brian while talking in the Cafe for lying to her and her family during the events of the first movie.
82	** Dom, after discovering that [[spoiler: Brian put Letty undercover]] is understandably pissed, asking why he never told him about Letty.
83	* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: Braga has all his drivers for the border crossing run executed after completing a single run.

Context Film / FastAndFurious