# A Preview: FAST & FURIOUS 6 (Blu-ray; Universal/Original Film)



## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

[img]http://www.google.com/url?source=imglanding&ct=img&q=http://www.filmoria.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/Fast-6.jpg&sa=X&ei=mX2mUqz_PKGYyAGk_YGYCA&ved=0CAkQ8wc&usg=AFQjCNFzkCnZoDufi1duwXGpoknGQ8aIrg[/img]*Releasing/Participating Studio(s): Universal/Original Film
Disc/Transfer Information: Region A; 1080p High-Definition 2.39:1 (Original Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1) 50GB Blu-ray Disc
Video Codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Rating: "Unrated"/PG-13
Running Time: 130 Minutes
Tested Audio Track: English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
Director: Justin Lin
Starring Cast: Vin Diesel, Paul Walker (RIP), Dwayne Johnson, Michelle Rodriguez, Jordana Brewster, Tyrese Gibson


ALL ROADS LEAD TO THIS.


PLOT ANALYSIS:*

*In the interest of saving time, this will merely represent a preview to the complete Blu-ray review of Fast & Furious 6  to which I will add audio and video analysis points once I obtain the disc and view it tomorrow evening. For the moment, below were my thoughts after seeing the film theatrically which I will add to in a “Postviewing Sentiments” section concluding the thread; we can discuss anything having to do with the story and then afterwards talk about the audio and video presentation from Universal – who released this in the wake of Paul Walker’s shocking and untimely death – which I’m suspecting will exhibit rock-solid video and uber-active DTS-HD MA audio…

Additionally, the specific version I picked up is the Target Exclusive Steel Book edition, which is what I'll be reviewing, and which looks like this:*










*Here were my thoughts after seeing the film theatrically:*

_This was, I am excited to announce, easily the best action flick of the summer thus far – and it far outdid pure duds like Iron Man 3 and A Good Day to Die Hard; in retrospect, I thought this franchise was getting a bit long in the tooth and way out of hand already as a fan of the original Rob Cohen customized car/hot girls/cheesy action and dialogue hybrid that came out in ’01, but this latest one surprised and entertained both me and my wife as we saw it as an early screening last night (the film officially opens in U.S. theaters today, Friday, the 24th). It contained a solid, rather frightening adversary/villain, incredibly orchestrated and choreographed hand to hand fight sequences and great humor from a lot of the cast, notably Tyrese Gibson’s “Roman Pearce” character. Before I delve into this sixth – and not last (you have to stay around until after a good deal of the end credits roll) – entry into this cash cow of a franchise for Universal, let me talk about some backstory and how all roads led to this, as the marketing materials suggest…

Rob Cohen’s 2001 The Fast and the Furious came as a result of the raging “import car tuning” scene that was sweeping not only America but the world at that time, based on a newspaper article Cohen read about this phenomenon spreading like wildfire; kids with tons of disposable cash wouldn’t buy Benzes or Beemers but rather take their $14,000 base Honda Civics and soup them up to the point they would be carrying hundreds of extra horsepower via modifications like NOS (nitrous oxide) systems and engine/drivetrain overhauls – these cars could outrace Porsches and Corvettes, and the street racing scene was never the same. Cohen’s film opened the public’s eyes to the phenomenon, much to the delight of the youth-oriented public involved in these mostly illegal car races, and mixed in a rather cheesy plot dealing with an undercover cop (Paul Walker) in L.A. who attempts to infiltrate one of these “race crews” whom the FBI and police believe are hijacking trucks loaded with electronics like DVD players and VCRs (presumably to sell them on the black market). While on the surface, this sounded like a ridiculous antic and something nowhere worthy of a motion picture plot, the film just worked – Vin Diesel as “Dominic Toretto” tore up the screen and became a household action figure name from that point on (though many people don’t realize he had many other solid performances aside from Fast and the Furious including Boiler Room, Saving Private Ryan and Knockaround Guys) as the leader of this truck-robbing crew who race their ridiculously souped-up cars at night and hijack the electronics on their time off. The first film was uber-cheesy, riddled with horrific, laughable dialogue and every cliché in the book – but it worked. It still stays in my heart as the only film in this franchise that kind of stands on its own if not for the hot women in scantily-clad form cheering on their boyfriends and lovers in the car races, then for the cars themselves.

Enter the sequel that followed, John Singleton’s 2Fast2Furious. This film was from what I like to call the “school of Exorcist II” – what do I mean by that? Well, besides being one of the most awful films ever put to celluloid, this was a matter of the first film being so successful, the studio (in this case Universal; in the case of The Exorcist it was Warner Brothers) figured the public would accept ANYTHING as a sequel. Singleton, who had directed awesome, moving inner-city youth films like Boyz N The Hood and Poetic Justice, just didn’t have a grip on this material as Cohen had, and the film bombed because of it; the plot finds Paul Walker reprising the role of cop Brian O’Connor again, but because he let a known fugitive go free at the end of the first film (Diesel’s character), his badge has been suspended and his dream of getting into the FBI has been thwarted. A situation develops in which the FBI needs to bust a high-ranking drug kingpin in Miami (the most clichéd plot ever created) and while they have a gorgeous, sultry undercover agent already in place posing as the drug dealer’s jaw-dropping girlfriend (the luscious Eva Mendes), they need O’Connor and his buddy Roman Pearce (Tyrese Gibson) to go undercover as expert racers to bust this guy (Cole Hauser). The film was laughable and ridiculous, with horrific acting and action sequences that were better suited for a Lego commercial set; even worse, Gibson’s comedy and repoire with Walker’s character, as evolutionary as it had become up to the point of this latest film, was embarrassing and offputting with no heart behind it (the moment Gibson says to one of the rival drug dealer drivers ”Nice car, Fonzie!” when the two are exchanging insults about import and muscle cars, I knew this film was finished). However, the film did introduce two characters that remained for the rest of the series: Gibson’s “Pearce” and the role that rapper "Ludacris" plays. Who was missing from this magical equation? Yup, Vin Diesel. The biggest problem was that this just didn’t feel like a Fast and the Furious film without him.

An attempt at yet another film in the series came when director Justin Lin was tapped by Universal to change the aspect of the plots and bring the action to the Orient where street racing had a totally new element – what was known as “drifting.” Lin released Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift with a totally new cast, plot line and feel – but the attempt was utterly unsuccessful, as Universal quickly found out that without Diesel and at least Walker, these films had no legs to stand on. Much like the Halloween debacle in which after the franchise changed themes with Halloween III: Season of the Witch and fans realized they wanted Michael Myers back in these, the Fast and the Furious franchise was either going to stop, or a drastic change had to be made. In a decision backed by co-producing studio “Original Film,” Universal decided to take one last chance and let Lin resurrect the feel, characters and pacing of Cohen’s 2001 original and so the oddly-named Fast and Furious was released. Walker was reunited with Diesel and though the plot was goofy, the chemistry between the characters was somewhat back and on the right course – Walker’s O’Connor character is now officially working for the FBI, while Diesel’s Toretto is back doing what he does best…well, almost…in that he, girlfriend Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) and a couple of new recruits for a new “team” are now heisting gasoline in the Dominican Republic. This was far-fetched and stupid, especially when almost-naked but stunningly gorgeous girls are dancing with drinks atop gas tankers while their idiot racer boyfriends are pumping the gas into their cars; be that as it may, the overall feel of the first film was back, and eventually O’Connor teams up with Toretto once more to try and bust – yet again – a crime lord from Mexico who moves his drugs and money through street racing types. In an interesting twist, Dominic (Diesel) gets word from his gorgeous sister and girlfriend of O’Connor’s, Mia (the lovely Jordana Brewster) that Letty, Dom’s girlfriend, has been murdered while he’s hiding out in Panama. However, everything is not what it seems and Letty’s involvement in this drug cartel and her supposed murder are exposed and explored in Fast and the Furious 6.

In believing they had a cash cow on their hands with this reinvented franchise – which they did – Universal gambled again on Justin Lin to do a fifth entry into the series, the rather quickly-released and titled Fast Five; in this one, O’Connor has gone renegade cop, turning his back on the force and becoming an outlaw with the rest of Dom’s crew for the love of Mia and his friendship with Dom. I always thought this was a bit ridiculous and offputting; this element of Walker’s O’Connor so willing to become a renegade cop who has turned his back on the police force and the FBI…but it gets even wilder when he’s involved in the very beginning of Fast Five in “breaking” Dom out of the prison bus he’s on being transported to a California maximum security penitentiary. With all of them now on the run, O’Connor and Mia find refuge in Brazil, where another character from the first film (Matt Schulze) takes them in and gets them again involved in a scheme to steal cars off a train. Dom eventually joins them in the scheme, meeting up with them at the train, but O’Connor discovers the cars they’re stealing have been seized by the DEA and actually belong to some cutthroat murderous thug in South America. Lin and his team turn up the action quota to 11 on this one, with O’Connor getting a team together that consists of much of the cast from the last three films, even Tyrese Gibson and Ludacris, to pull off a heist that will rob their adversary of all his millions of dollars, allowing all of them to escape to safe retreats and finally disappear. However, things get complicated when Mia announces to Dom and Brian that she’s pregnant with Brian’s baby and at the very end learn that Dom’s girlfriend Letty (Rodriguez) is not really dead. Also of note is that Fast Five announced the addition of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson to the cast, an exciting WWF/WWE wrestling star with a stature that packs more muscle than Diesel’s Toretto character ever could; with Johnson playing the special forces agent searching for Toretto’s crew as well as the renegade O’Connor now, the action setpieces got livelier and even more violent, setting up the inevitable hand to hand fight sequence between Diesel and him about halfway through the film. While exciting and taut, this scene was a bit disappointing in that Johnson’s character is just so massive in physical appearance and strength – as his real-life appearance really IS – it didn’t make sense he was so manhandled by Diesel’s Dom through most of the fight; this really bothered me. While at the end, each of them takes a tail whippin’ from the other, the scene sets up even more exciting fight sequences in this new film. At the conclusion of Fast Five, we learn from the delicious Eva Mendes – who reprises her role as the undercover agent just for this after-credits clip in which she hops herself up on Johnson’s character’s desk, crosses her legs in her ridiculously tight, short skirt and leans suggestively over to the brooding wrestling star – that Letty, who was also part of Dom’s crew and his girlfriend, is not actually dead based on spy photos she shows him.

Thus, let us enter with Fast and the Furious 6 – while I don’t care for this title and think the films have been given goofy names ever since 2Fast2Furious, I didn’t actually think this franchise had any life left in it…I mean, how many times can you keep going with this plot? Brian and Mia have a baby…Dom is still on the run and STILL wearing white wife-beaters and the silver crucifix…yadda yadda yadda…still, coming out of the theater last night, my wife and I were completely surprised and utterly satisfied by this high-octane action film which could have easily stood on its own without the franchise name. Lin turns up the action heat here tenfold compared to his previous films, giving us an awesomely frightening and dangerous villain (mysteriously named “Shaw”), great comedic glue between the cast and fight sequences that rival Dark Knight Rises. Okay, so Brian O’Connor (Walker) learns that girlfriend Mia (Brewster) is pregnant in the last film, and the picture ends with him and Dom (Diesel) once again challenging each other to a race to prove who is the better driver. This new film picks right up where that one left off (an effective technique in my opinion) and opens with Dom and Brian racing each other through the canyons and one-lane ocean-hugging cliffs of Spain; of course, Brian is behind the wheel of an awesome Nissan Skyline while Toretto has his hands on the wheel of some Detroit muscle in the form of a Dodge Challenger (souped up with NOS bottles and the like, of course). This introduced yet another issue I had with this franchise: In the first film, Diesel’s character is smitten with the “import tuner” scene, driving a ridiculously modified and fast Mazda sports car. Suddenly, he’s a muscle car enthusiast in the remainder of the franchise entries, driving customized Chevys with SS badges attached to them, wanting nothing to do with import “ricers” as they’re known. Likewise, I just will never understand the utter evolution of this series – in Rob Cohen’s first film, it was all about the candy-colored paint jobs on body-kitted Hondas and Nissans; as the films progressed, the notion of the “import tuners” kind of took a back seat and the cars looked more and more ridiculous to the point that in the fourth film, Fast and Furious, we see souped-up desert buggies with NOS bottles and all sorts of stupid-looking old beaters with special modifications in them…what? Where was the seriousness of the cars in the first film? Sure, the women kissing other women in micro miniskirts were all over the rest of the films (supposedly, the custom car circuit attracts adult film star-looking chicks who make out with each other while guys are revving their engines beside them, but I will NEVER understand the connection here) but where was the focus on what made Cohen’s film so engaging…the CARS? It has been argued that the “import tuner” scene has kind of died since 2001’s Fast and the Furious, but what has the franchise become in its wake?

At any rate, a rather long-winded plot develops in Fast and the Furious 6 in which Agent Hobbs (Johnson) learns of a dangerous rogue missionary named “Shaw” who took out a bunch of government goons in Moscow and who plans to put into play some kind of weapon that would disable law enforcement agencies from tracking him for good (or some such variant of this; the plot is a bit hazy and didn’t make much sense to me). He decides his only answer to catch this guy is to turn to Toretto and his crew – this brings into play another “con” about this film in that why would a top-ranking agent like Hobbs need to bring in a bunch of ex-criminals now on the run in another country to stop this terrorist? If you just go with it, Hobbs shows up on the doorstep of Toretto’s hideout to make him an offer: Assemble his team of ghetto techies (rapper Ludacris once again), master smooth talkers (Tyrese Gibson), ace counter-surveillance experts and technical drivers (Toretto and O’Connor) to help him bring down Shaw, or he won’t let them live as fugitives any longer. What gets Dom is when Hobbs shows him pictures of Letty presumably still alive and now working for this Shaw. Going to O’Connor and Mia, who are spending time with their new baby named “Jack,” Dom informs Brian of the offer Hobbs made to him. The team, of course, is assembled and the group finds itself this time up against not Columbian drug lords or some car-robbing clique but a dangerous master assassin and terrorist, hell-bent on staying out of Hobbs’ clutches forever and accomplishing his mission. Furthermore, O'Connor makes Hobbs a counter-offer: If they help him bring down Shaw, they all get full pardons for their crimes. Hesitant at first and claiming he has no such power to grant this, Hobbs' lie is quickly foiled and exposed by O'Connor who knows the rules of the cops...because he was one. It appears Hobbs has his manhood between a rock and a hard place. 

Toretto and crew find the job not to be so easy, as Shaw and his team have the latest in the line of technical gadgets, rendering the souped-up BMWs Toretto, O’Connor and the team drive to chase Shaw in their first encounter useless, making the cars crash with small devices launched onto them from Shaw’s brigade. The confrontations between Toretto, Brian and the rest of the team and Shaw’s men have them splintering into different fights and encounters all over London at one point, with even Shaw and Toretto meeting face to face in what seems like is going to be a sick fight scene. In between, Toretto runs into Letty, who is indeed alive and is now working with Shaw’s crew; it seems she has suffered some kind of amnesia by which she has no idea who Dom is or what kind of life she had with him previously. Also, mysteriously, she has developed butt-kicking martial arts skills, showcased in a hand to hand fight sequence between her and the female special agent put into place by Hobbs (but who exposes a wild plot twist with regard to her character). Suddenly, the events of Fast and Furious start to tie in here, as we learn the crime lord Arturo Braga (played by the same actor here) originally had Letty working for him but who was undercover by way of O’Connor who was trying to infiltrate his organization; apparently, the “Phoenix” character didn’t kill Letty as we’re lead to believe but rather blew her car up during one of the runs in that flashback sequence, sending her flying down a mountain and left with a severe head trauma, thus why she doesn’t know who Dominic is. In comes this Shaw, who finds her at the hospital some time later and “recruits” her for his organization, and while a bit hokey and hard to believe essentially, it does explain how Letty could have had a funeral in Fast and Furious yet was still alive…and why Brian looked like he knew it.

It is also revealed that Braga was in business with this Shaw, and so O’Connor decides to go undercover back to the L.A. jail system to pose as a reclaimed rogue cop prisoner to get to Braga and find out what Shaw is up to. Indeed, Brian meets Braga yet again face to face from within his jail cell, and ends up taking out all of Braga’s bodyguards before beating Braga himself nearly to death, demanding information on Shaw. In the final sequence of the film, the action really heats up as Hobbs, O’Connor, Toretto and the rest of the team attempt to stop Shaw from taking off in a massive plane loaded with weapons and all sorts of plans for destruction; once Toretto, Hobbs and O’Connor get aboard the plane, all hell breaks loose with wild, expertly-choreographed fight sequences pitting first O’Connor against Shaw and then one of Shaw’s massive, muscle-bound henchmen against both Diesel and Hobbs. This was probably one of the most exciting parts of the whole film, in which we watch this muscle-bound grotesque – who could have easily given Bane from Dark Knight Rises a run for his money – manhandle Diesel like he’s a rag doll (something we’ve never seen before in one of these) and even beats up on Dwayne Johnson’s Hobbs character like no one else ever has. Though, in a really awesome part that’s hinted at in the film’s trailers, one of the two pumped-up musclemen get Shaw’s henchman into a position where the other one comes flying from on top and simply breaks his neck – utterly cool. We also, during this final action setpiece, witness Toretto trading punches with the highly skilled Shaw, eventually getting to the point everyone in the film is just a bloody mess. Meanwhile, outside, some of Turetto’s crew – now including Mia who had been kidnapped by Shaw’s men but now freed by the boys – are struggling to stay inside cars that are attached by cables to Shaw’s plane before it can take off while fist-fighting with more of Shaw’s henchmen; this is a good half-hour of non-stop mayhem, edge-of-your-seat excitement and great action setpieces rivaling anything that has come out this year save for perhaps Olympus Has Fallen. Of additional note is that with the group finally free from being fugitives after, of course, saving the day and taking Shaw down, they return to their old house in L.A. where Dom and his original crew hung out, now being overrun with weeds and out-of-control foliage...a fitting end comes when everyone is sitting around in the backyard for a barbecue -- just like they did in Cohen's The Fast and the Furious. I thought it was a clever idea by Lin to bring the series full circle by returning to L.A. and the original house it all started in. Curiously, the whole "Letty" amnesia thing is never explained, as she just seems to "feel at home" at the L.A. hangout, just "going" with the notion that she was once Dom's girlfriend -- in my opinion, it would have been more effective for Lin to have had her hit her head in one of the fight scenes she's in and "come out" of the amnesia, finally remembering Dom and everyone else. 

There’s a (rather disappointing) development involving one of Dominic’s crew at the end of this film, which I won’t explore any further, as well as a very interesting hint at what is coming next in this franchise after some of the end credits roll – all I will say is DON’T leave the theater when the initial credits come on screen and be prepared to be wowed by the introduction of a cool action star that has headlined in many films before but never really got the credit he deserved. Hopefully, with the seventh Fast and the Furious, he may actually have some good material to work with and finally be able to show off his unique fighting skills – something that will not be a good thing for Vin Diesel’s “Toretto” character whom he threatens in this post-credits sequence. You know, at this point, this franchise is beginning to feel like a comic book adaptation, what with honest-to-goodness villains and adversaries going after Turetto and his crew, making it feel like a hero vs. villain setup…and, I must say, while I didn’t care for the “expansion” of this franchise beyond the first film initially, I kind of like the way this is all heading. And while the opening credits sequence of F&F 6 depicts shots from all the films to come before it, suggesting this one was going to wrap up the series and finally end it, it was kind of surprising to see a hint at yet another one. We’ll have to see where Justin Lin – or perhaps another daring director – takes this._

[img]http://www.google.com/url?source=imglanding&ct=img&q=http://www.digitaltrends.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/fast-furious-6-vin-diesel-the-rock-walker.jpg&sa=X&ei=noCmUoTUE-m0yAHw6IHoAQ&ved=0CAkQ8wc4FQ&usg=AFQjCNGSCuZ-TeCSIcX_Q-GP_8aoPjsFLg[/img]*VIDEO QUALITY ANALYSIS: HOW DID THE DISC LOOK?*

Okay. After running _Fast & Furious 6_ through its paces last night (and which was preceded by a viewing by my wife and I of a “sneak peak” special feature accessible via the setup menu of the Blu-ray of _Fast & Furious 7_ which was cool), I came to the conclusion that the 1080p encode Universal prepared for the film’s Blu-ray release was what I expected it to be. That is to say for the most part, the visuals were crisp, devoid of noise or grain (or high ISO camera noise) and punchy-looking. The opening sequence in which Dom (Diesel) and Brian (Walker) are racing each other along the seaside cliff edge (reminiscent of the opening scene of _Quantum of Solace_ and which picks up where _Fast Five_ left off in the midst of the two friends challenging each other to yet another high-speed race) before they arrive at a hospital so that Mia (Brewster) can show Brian their new baby was highlighted with a high-contrast look that made characters, their facial hair (in the case of the men), the whites of bed sheets and other elements appear overtly bright. As the transfer went on and the film progressed, the colors got richer and darker and the overall look of the film took on, well, a more “film-like” appearance what with the arrival of some very, very fine film grain running in the background. This grain merely showed off the clarity of the film’s stock in certain places and was not what I’d call distracting or ugly in any sense of the terms, especially if you’ve dialed your display’s sharpness control in properly.

The remainder of the Blu-ray transfer was typical high-definition, 1080p eye candy from Universal’s home video release department – bright, vibrant visuals when the shots were of outdoor, sunlit sets; foliage and greenery that exhibited dimensionality and snappy detail; facial features on characters that showed every single skin imperfection in addition to every bead of sweat (such as on Johnson’s character’s Hobbs’ face) and stable black level/shadow detail. I did note some darker sequences which collapsed into DVD-like softness and I also made a mental note of how I thought _Fast Five_, the last film in the franchise, actually looked slightly better and more detailed in terms of Blu-ray video quality (the amount of detail on Dwayne Johnson’s face in that transfer was astonishing, especially when he’s “rescued” by Dom and his team during that ambush sequence in Brazil towards the end; I just didn’t see that level of eye-popping realism here)…but for the most part, _Fast & Furious 6_ looked like a new high-definition release should. 


[img]http://www.google.com/url?source=imglanding&ct=img&q=http://www.digitaltrends.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/fast-furious-6-vin-diesel.jpg&sa=X&ei=CIGmUoLVHKGSyAG_goCQCA&ved=0CAkQ8wc4FQ&usg=AFQjCNH4M083iavfmvOlHSmAZty5pDqWRA[/img]*AUDIO QUALITY ANALYSIS: HOW DID THE DISC SOUND?*

What struck me the hardest when analyzing the Region A’s English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track accompanying _Fast & Furious 6_ was its sheer lack of surround activity in certain places as well as a distinct lack of deep LFE. The opening race sequence between Dom and Brian was appropriately mixed, throwing the sound cues of their cars all over the soundstage including through the surrounds, but as the track progressed I noticed how some scenes were devoid of kinetic surround activity that should have otherwise accompanied a certain sequence. One scene that left me particularly unimpressed was when Dom’s team is attempting to go after Shaw and they’re “ambushed” by Shaw’s men and the technological gadgets that render the BMWs the boys are driving useless – during this high-octane, nail-biting action setpiece the surrounds didn’t roar to life like I thought they would to support the directional activity going on up there on the screen. The overall heft of the scene’s volume was also a bit disappointing; I expected a no-holds-barred, smash-you-over-your-head audio experience during sequences such as this one but it was on the rather quiet side.

As aforementioned, deep bass was also a problem on this track – there were only moments, I detected, that exhibited wallops of momentary LFE that shook my wall and its accompanying decorations through my room’s resonance points. And these scenes were few and far between and weren’t where I thought they’d be – for example: When Dom jumps out of his car and saves Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) during that highway battle and they land with a THUD on the windshield of a car, this was accompanied by a sustained boom which shook my sub and my walls…but it was a momentary bliss-of-bass sensation that didn’t really impress me. I’ve experienced much more perfectly executed LFE drops on other tracks before and this was one area that _Fast & Furious 6_ came up short, unfortunately. During none of the big action setpieces were there rumbling, bombastic wallops of deep bass – not even during the segmented music interludes like during the London race with Dom and Letty which was accompanied by electronica-esque dance music, which blasted the club track from the main left and right channels and through the center but didn’t really dig deep and make you _feel_ it. What happened here?

As the film progressed the audio took on different characteristics, eventually getting pretty aggressive by the time the end giant action setpiece takes place on that Russian cargo plane and Dom and Hobbs face Shaw and his grotesque muscle-bound henchman. At this point, sound cues are being thrown this way and that through the whole soundstage and you’re surrounded by pretty heady, aggressive audio. 

Still, this wasn’t the barn-burner I thought it would be in terms of audio quality. Perhaps I need to look into my subwoofer’s plate amp to make sure it isn’t fried but I swear this track was missing good, deep LFE. Perhaps I need to check my calibration levels with regard to my surrounds, but I swear this track wasn’t that forceful in the back channel activity for most of the film’s run time. All the usual audio cue standbys were here – helicopter and plane flyovers that resonated in the appropriate surround channels, directionality cohesiveness when cars are depicted racing around streets, etc. – but they weren’t utilized so aggressively especially in the first Shaw/Hobbs/Dom confrontation scene during that big chase when Shaw escapes from the European cops. How do I conclude? This, unfortunately, wasn’t reference grade audio. 

[img]http://tribwdcw.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/fastfurious6universalfordc50tv.jpg[/img]*POSTVIEWING SENTIMENTS:*

What a great ride this last _Fast & Furious_ was. Coming from a person that was a diehard fan of Rob Cohen’s 2001 original and giving up on the sequels that followed thinking the storyline was getting dumb and tired, I can honestly say I like the direction Justin Lin has since taken the franchise and specifically where it’s going with the seventh one – we’re going to be treated to quite the villain in the next one with Jason Statham. While many issues plague the production of that seventh film – Paul Walker’s untimely death, Lin stepping out of the director’s chair – it will be interesting to see how the events play out and how they “explain away” Walker’s O’Connor character from the plot. My sentiments regarding _Fast & Furious 6_ when I saw it in theaters remain – this was probably the best action film of the past summer especially considering we had duds like _A Good Day to Die Hard_ and _Iron Man 3_.

The essential gist is this: Brian, Dom and Mia (Walker, Diesel and Brewster, respectively) have welcomed the arrival of the latest member of their family once Brian and Mia’s baby is born. They want to remain in the shadows in some non-extraditions country, Mia and Brian staying together and Dom and his new girl (the pretty cop he hooks up with in _Fast Five_) exploring their new relationship under the comfort of palm trees and warm days. However, when Agent Hobbs (Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson) can’t seem to apprehend one of the most wanted fugitives in the world (a calculating thief-terrorist-renegade type named “Shaw” played by Luke Evans) after he realizes Shaw’s team coordinated getaways in street racing fashion, he feels he has no choice but to turn to the best street racer renegade he’s ever known, Dom Toretto. Approaching Dom with an offer he can’t refuse after showing him Letty Ortiz’s picture (proving she’s alive and well), Hobbs demands Dom and his team help him bring down Shaw. Once Brian is let in on the job, the ex-Federal Agent is suspicious of Hobbs’ motives but makes a counter-offer to the muscle-bound Hobbs: They get Shaw for him in exchange for full pardons all around so they don’t have to live on the run anymore.

Toretto and O’Connor’s team are scattered – in Avengers-like style – all over the world, enjoying the riches from their last heist in which they took multiple millions from a Brazilian drug lord in _Fast Five_. They’re reassembled by Dom and Brian and are warned by the team leaders that this job is unlike any they have tackled before – these aren’t drug dealers or cartels they’re going after, or some street-level race thugs…this is Shaw, one of the world’s foremost masterminds in crime, thievery and violence and an individual super agent Hobbs can’t even catch. Their job begins by tracking Shaw after he breaks out of a police barricade in an attempt to apprehend the mastermind, but this proves harder than the team prepared for as Shaw’s men utilize advanced weaponry that disables the souped-up BMW sedans Dom, Brian and the crew are chasing Shaw and his men in. Some difference in goals are exposed here; it seems Dom only wants to use Hobbs and Shaw to get to Letty because he knows she’s still alive (and now working for Shaw) while Brian accuses Hobbs of using the team to protect the European Interpol police division (it’s a bit cloudy). 

Dom’s first encounter with Letty ends in an end-of-race confrontation that has Dom’s fiery ex-girlfriend shooting him in the shoulder. Apparently, Letty has no recollection of who Dom is or what kind of life she had before getting into Shaw’s crew – and how exactly did that happen? Director Lin explains it to us, via the essence of the plot, like this: Apparently, Letty was put into Braga’s (the guy they were after in _Fast & Furious_) organization undercover by Brian when he was working for the FBI. When Braga discovered she was an informant, he had one of his henchmen (Phoenix) attempt to kill Letty…but she wasn’t shot directly by Phoenix, instead her car was blown up and she was thrown down a mountain where she supposedly hit her head and sustained amnesia. Where does Shaw come in? Well, it seems Shaw and Braga had been working together this whole time, Braga running drugs and other stuff for the mastermind – so when Shaw finds out the informant in Braga’s organization isn’t really dead, he goes to the hospital and recruits Letty into his own gang. 

There are still parts of Letty that remember Dom and her previous life, but they’re cloudy and not reappearing so easily. Meanwhile, in a desperate attempt to uncover the truth about what Shaw is after and what he wants, Brian risks life in prison as a wanted ex-Federal Agent by going back into the U.S. and pretending to be a new convict at Victorville prison where Braga is serving his sentence after Brian put him away. In an exciting scene where Brian single-handedly takes out Braga and his henchmen in a tiny cell and pretty much beats the information out of a badly bleeding Braga, we learn everything there is to know about the two criminals’ relationship (Braga and Shaw). What Shaw wants is still a bit unclear – but apparently it has something to do with a special weapon which he wants to heist from a military base somewhere in Europe. Dom, Brian, Roman, Han and Gisele, along with Hobbs and his really attractive new sidekick (who turns out to be not who we have been lead to believe she is), eventually capture Shaw but the criminal has the upper hand: In a sequence in which Dom and Shaw are face to face earlier in the film and Shaw quasi-threatens Dom about his family and how it’s what “makes him weak,” we learn that Shaw has taken the threat to the next level and has had his men kidnap Mia (the baby she just had with O’Connor has been supposedly taken to safety by Dom’s new ex-cop fling). So now if the authorities, Shaw threatens, don’t let him and his men go free, he won’t reveal where Mia is.

The final huge action setpiece of the film takes place on a massive Russian cargo plane that Shaw and his people are attempting to escape on – now with Mia in tow. The most exciting part of the film, this scene breaks into multiple action setpieces with Dom, Brian and Hobbs aboard the plane to face, in hand to hand combat, Shaw and his horrifically muscular henchman (who is six times Dwayne Johnson’s size) while Roman, Gisele, Ludacris' character, Han and more of Shaw’s men battle outside the plane inside cars, trucks and other conveyances…all while this massive cargo plane races down a runway that never seems to end. The fight scene between Dom, Hobbs and Shaw’s muscle-bound grotesque is as exciting as they come, recalling everything that made the end fight sequence between Batman and Bane so nail-biting in _The Dark Knight Rises_ – indeed, this guy proves to be too tough even for Toretto and Hobbs to handle, as strong as _they_ are, leading to the men needing to team up in order to take this monstrosity out. Unfortunately, along the way, the team loses one member in Gisele (Gal Gadot, who has just been signed to play Wonder Woman) when she sacrifices her own life to save Han’s. We also learn, in a mid-end credits sequence, that Han too is killed when he returns to Tokyo to enter the street racing scene there, by a mysterious figure that gets out of an older Mercedes after smashing his car into Han’s race-ready coupe: One Jason Statham! Statham’s character, after careening into Han, dials what appears to be Dom Toretto’s cell number and threatens him with: _“Dominic Toretto. You don’t know me…you’re about to.”_ Awesome. 

Apparently, Statham is going to play, perhaps, Shaw’s brother or a family member of some kind, taking revenge for Dom and his team killing Shaw and his men. Some argue that this is already going down the _Die Hard_ plot rabbit hole – like Bruce Willis’ character meeting up with Alan Rickman’s Hans Gruber character’s brother in the third film – but we’ll have to see where the seventh film is headed, like I said earlier. Much of the production of that film was already complete and Universal has said that a major sequence in the film was set to be shot and that included Paul Walker in a key moment of the plot – so now everything has been put on hold.

At any rate, let’s discuss everything about _Fast & Furious 6_ on Blu-ray, friends, and as always…thank you for reading!


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## tripplej (Oct 23, 2011)

Thanks Osage for the review. The only Fast and Furious movie I saw was the first one. I just never had the time to see the rest and was surprised to see that there are now six available. wow. Glad to hear you enjoyed this one in the theater. Will wait for your blu ray review.


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

tripplej said:


> Thanks Osage for the review. The only Fast and Furious movie I saw was the first one. I just never had the time to see the rest and was surprised to see that there are now six available. wow. Glad to hear you enjoyed this one in the theater. Will wait for your blu ray review.


Hey Joe,

As always my friend thank you for your kind words and thoughts; yeah, they're up to SIX of these already in this franchise...can you believe that? What started out as an experimental type of exploration of the import car racing scene in L.A. back in '01 has become a long running series that has almost branched out into a soap opera-esque story...you have the late Paul Walker's character as the undercover L.A. cop who wants to become a federal agent but who gets blindsided by a friendship to Vin Diesel's character as well as a romance with his sister (the gorgeous Jordana Brewster) and which spirals into the couple having a baby together and keeping Walker's character on the run as a once-law-enforcement-now-fugitive turncoat. As the series evolved, director Justin Lin took the films in a different direction from Rob Cohen's original _Fast and the Furious_ and began to de-focus on the cars and scantily clad girls themselves which this scene is all about (though there's still plenty of skin in the Lin films :blink; instead, he created more action-blockbuster-type pictures and began introducing new characters to the mix while reintroducing old ones (forget the sequel and third film in this franchise, which were total bombs compared to the others). Also, in the plus column, Lin has steered the series towards a classic "hero vs. adversary" setup in which Diesel's character meets bigger and badder enemies with each passing film (in _Fast Five_ it was Dwayne Johnson's special agent character who deals Diesel's character his first real quasi-asswhipping in quite awhile, while in this sixth one he actually teams up with Johnson's muscle-bound character to take on a ridiculously monstrous tough guy working for the head honcho enemy in the film during the exciting closing action sequence aboard the plane that's about to take off). For the seventh installment, which was in production when Paul Walker was killed in that accident involving the Porsche, Lin was stepping away from the franchise and Universal was testing someone else's filmmaking to give the series a different flavor -- and, best of all, they had set up the sixth one to introduce Diesel's character's next adversary, which was coming in the form of Jason Statham. I don't know how that seventh film is gonna play out.

I'm going to check back in with my thoughts on the audio/video of the Blu-ray once I view it, and I hope to continue discussing with you everything about this release! :T


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## tripplej (Oct 23, 2011)

Looking forward to your thoughts. With the loss of Paul Walker, it will be interesting to see how the story goes for part 7. Maybe in that movie, he is kidnapped or something and everybody tries to find him?? I don't think they will put that he died in a car accident so most likely something that allows him to be "away" from the movie..


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

Yeah, I'm thinking that if it even goes forward -- I think Universal has temporarily pulled the plug on it though studio execs have expressed interest in finishing it in conjunction with Original Film -- they can either explain that he's been, as you said, kidnapped or perhaps decided to go back on the run and think about becoming a cop again...after all, this is Hollywood so you can pretty much "explain away" anything you want with regard to characters being killed, disappearing, etc.


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

UPDATE: Okay, the version I just picked up is the *Target Limited Edition Steel Book* edition which looks like this:










Also interesting: I noticed on the DVDs of _Fast & Furious 6_ my Target was selling there were labels that read "Also Available on BLU-RAY to Maximize Your HDTV..." or some such rhetoric...:sneeky: :rofl:


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

*Note: Review updated to include audio and video quality analysis.*


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## tripplej (Oct 23, 2011)

Thanks Osage. I was surprised to read audio was not reference material. Still will check it out. I will get the final box set since I don't have any right now. Can wait for it.


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

Many nips and tucks made to review; thank you...


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

tripplej said:


> Thanks Osage. I was surprised to read audio was not reference material. Still will check it out. I will get the final box set since I don't have any right now. Can wait for it.


Hey Joe,

As always, thanks for checkin' in -- I don't know about "holding out" for a "final box set" because I don't know how many of these are actually planned to be made at this point. There will (at this moment) definitely be a seventh, but if you hold out for ALL of them that are possibly planned, well, you may be holding out for a long time unless Universal does that bait-and-switch thing with the public in which they'll keep re-releasing these in "box package stages" like Paramount did with Star Trek on Blu-ray...in other words, they may wait for, say, the seventh film to come out and THEN release a box set but then release yet another one when the eighth film (if it's made) comes out etc etc...:rolleyesno: :rolleyesno:


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## tripplej (Oct 23, 2011)

That is true. I was thinking with the death of a main star they would end the ride. But obviously if the franchise can move on and make money the movies will keep coming out!

Something to ponder!


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

Yeah, that's something we're going to have to wait and see on in terms of whether Universal wants to move forward with the series or not based on Walker's death...


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

*A few other tidbits I wanted to add and mention:

- The Region A Blu-ray (and, apparently based on reports, the released-in-September European region release) claims to feature an "Extended Cut" of the film as the sole option to watch, with the included DVD getting the Theatrical Version. However, if you look at the specs on the back of the packaging that surrounds the steelcase box (of the Target version I reviewed here) you'll notice there is NO time difference between the two cuts. BOTH versions of the film have the same run time -- so where was the Blu-ray version "extended" exactly?

From what I could tell, there is a bit more cursing from Tyrese Gibson's character at a certain point (giving the Extended Cut, apparently, its "Unrated" moniker which is a joke) and there are, presumably, some added seconds in certain sequences including the fight scene in the subway between Letty and Hobbs' new sidekick chick, the confrontation scene with Gisele and Hobbs' sidekick chick and the mechanic working for Shaw and maybe some added elements during the final cargo plane scene. From what I could tell, they all added up to nothing additionally exciting compared to what we experienced in theaters.

- I also forgot to mention that proceeds of the Blu-ray and DVD sales of Fast & Furious 6 will be going to a charity Paul Walker was supporting.

- I didn't get a chance to view any of the supplemental material yet so I can't comment about the extras accompanying the Blu-ray release; but there is a noteworthy sneak peek at the next film which was in production, as I mentioned, when the disc's main setup menu hits the screen in typical Universal fashion. This short clip doesn't contain any narration by filmmakers or studio execs but it does depict -- in a touch of sad irony -- Dom, Brian and the rest of the team attending what appears to be Han and Gisele's funeral while a car slowly rolls in the distance, apparently watching Dom standing graveside...we see Tyrese Gibson's character mention the fact that the team is being "hunted" by someone, taken out one by one, and Walker makes some kind of comment with regard to that as we see Dom slowly looking towards the direction of the "stalking" car. The whole clip is kind of scary given Walker's recent death (they're all at a funeral) but it does hint at the fact that the team is going to be aware of Jason Statham's character's intentions for them...* :T


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## B- one (Jan 13, 2013)

Thanks for the informative review O. I cannot remember that much about a movie if I watch it ten times. Can't wait to watch this to see all the nice cars get destroyed.


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

B- one said:


> Thanks for the informative review O. I cannot remember that much about a movie if I watch it ten times. Can't wait to watch this to see all the nice cars get destroyed.


Thank you, Brandon; it's nice to actually be _recognized_ from time to time when all this work goes into analyzing a piece of cinema...:sad:


You missed this in theaters? Did you see the others? You plan on buying this or renting it (if you can still find a venue that rents outside of Netflix)?


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

Some more nips and tucks made to review; thank you.


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## asere (Dec 7, 2011)

Excellent review!! How many songs are on the sound track? I might but it from Target.


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

Thank you, asere!

It's funny you mentioned the soundtrack because my wife wants to get the CD too -- the songs are pretty kickin' on this soundtrack but I'm not sure how many there are in answer to your question...


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

*UPDATE:

After playing with the menu of the disc over the past couple of nights, I came to discover that there is indeed an UNRATED EXTENDED CUT of the film on the Blu-ray along with the theatrical version -- when you access the main setup menu's "EXTRAS" section, the option to watch the EXTENDED CUT pops up but, curiously, without options for selecting language track, subtitles, etc. The version merely defaults to the English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track, which is fine, but it seemed odd that there were no options offered. 

So, apparently what happens is, when you simply watch the film from the disc's main menu settings, it defaults to the THEATRICAL CUT and when you select "EXTRAS" via the menu, you have the option of watching the EXTENDED version. At any rate, after watching the EXTENDED CUT as the second time we watched this (the first time defaulted to the THEATRICAL version which I didn't realize we were watching and seemingly is the reason why I didn't think anything looked "different" or "added") I came to the conclusion that, again, nothing seems like it's been dramatically added to -- the packaging claims BOTH versions have the same running time lengths so I don't know where anything was actually "extended" in this cut to be honest...*

If anyone has any additional input about this after viewing both versions I'd love to hear from you.


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## moparz10 (Sep 21, 2010)

i forgot where i read it,but in a couple of the reviews it was mentioned that the extended version was 70 seconds in total longer than the theatrical version,if this is true i think it would be pretty hard to tell in which parts it was extened.


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## B- one (Jan 13, 2013)

Osage_Winter said:


> Thank you, Brandon; it's nice to actually be recognized from time to time when all this work goes into analyzing a piece of cinema...:sad:
> 
> You missed this in theaters? Did you see the others? You plan on buying this or renting it (if you can still find a venue that rents outside of Netflix)?


I'm to cheap to go to the theater. I think we own all of them, maybe not Tokyo Drift. My wife bought it I think she likes The Rock and Vin D or something. You don't have any rental stores buy you? We have Family Video and you can get used blurays for $9.95,usually 3 week wait but worth the savings usually.


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

moparz10 said:


> i forgot where i read it,but in a couple of the reviews it was mentioned that the extended version was 70 seconds in total longer than the theatrical version,if this is true i think it would be pretty hard to tell in which parts it was extened.


Thanks for the info, mop; it's curious because the box claims BOTH versions are the SAME exact length in run time, not even 70 seconds longer on the Extended Cut...either way, I didn't detect much of anything going on that's worth getting the "extended" moniker attached to it...

I hate when studios release these so-called UNRATED variants of these films when they hit Blu-ray and DVD when there's really no substance to them at all that warrants this; many times, such as what Universal and Zack Snyder did with his _Dawn of the Dead_ remake when it first hit DVD, what they'll do is add "more gore" or some more foul language dialogue delivery from one or more of the characters and slap an "unrated" label on the box. In the case of "extended" editions, such as the film we're discussing, nothing's really "extended" at all.


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

B- one said:


> I'm to cheap to go to the theater. I think we own all of them, maybe not Tokyo Drift. My wife bought it I think she likes The Rock and Vin D or something. You don't have any rental stores buy you? We have Family Video and you can get used blurays for $9.95,usually 3 week wait but worth the savings usually.


Yeah, my wife too has a "thing" for Diesel, Johnson and Chris Hemsworth...must be the muscles...:sarcastic: :sarcastic:

The last of the rental stores -- a Blockbuster -- just closed on us in terms of local rental places. All that's left for us is Netflix or Red Box (which never has anything)...:rolleyesno: :R

Yeah, _Tokyo Drift_ was the worst of the series and it's where Universal finally asked Justin Lin to get the franchise back on track by including characters from the first film (the sequel was a bomb too, _2Fast2Furious_, directed by John Singleton who needs to stick to making thug-life-esque films like _Boyz N The Hood_ and _Poetic Justice_). Thus why we saw _Fast and Furious_ reuniting Diesel, Walker, Rodriguez and Brewster so it connected better to the 2001 original...


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## moparz10 (Sep 21, 2010)

Osage_Winter said:


> I hate when studios release these so-called UNRATED variants of these films when they hit Blu-ray and DVD when there's really no substance to them at all that warrants this; many times, such as what Universal and Zack Snyder did with his _Dawn of the Dead_ remake when it first hit DVD, what they'll do is add "more gore" or some more foul language dialogue delivery from one or more of the characters and slap an "unrated" label on the box. In the case of "extended" editions, such as the film we're discussing, nothing's really "extended" at all.


well said!
the only variants i like are by mondo


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

moparz10 said:


> the only variants i like are by mondo


Huh? :scratch:


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## moparz10 (Sep 21, 2010)

mondo sells posters by different artists which are very hard to get,they tend to pick a type of social media to let people know when they will be up on the website for sale,now a variant is the same poster but more limmited quantities and different in color,i've seen some outrageous prices for a mondo poster as high as $1200.00 for a star wars variant by tyler stout.i only got one as a gift from one of my sons last year.(not a 1200.00 one) but certainly a collectors one.sorry to go off topic


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

Oh, no worries -- I just didn't know what you were referring to. :T


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

*Additional Note:

It seems my comments regarding Jason Statham smashing his "older" model Mercedes into "Han"'s souped-up Mazda during the mid-end credits sequence was a bit inaccurate -- he actually gets out of what appears to be a more late-model S-Class Benz (I believe); just wanted to clarify this since I mentioned it in the POSTVIEWING SENTIMENTS section...*


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## ericzim (Jun 24, 2012)

Hi Osage, just watched it last night with the wife. She bought it for me along with a new Pioneer Blu-ray burner for my birthday. http://www.movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=795069 lists the 53.68 seconds total 24 differences, 
consisting of 
13 extended scenes 
9 scenes with alternate material 
2 extended scenes with alternate material


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

ericzim said:


> Hi Osage, just watched it last night with the wife. She bought it for me along with a new Pioneer Blu-ray burner for my birthday. http://www.movie-censorship.com/report.php?ID=795069 lists the 53.68 seconds total 24 differences,
> consisting of
> 13 extended scenes
> 9 scenes with alternate material
> 2 extended scenes with alternate material


Hi Eric,

Thanks for joining the thread. Yeah, I just didn't dig deep and look for stats that would have mentioned the differences and my contact at Universal mentioned, casually, they were "nothing worth talking about" sarcastic so I just let the matter go. From my perspective, nothing changed the narrative of the film itself in any which way based on these "extensions" and so forth...

That said, what did you think of the audio and video of the disc? Did you run it through your Denon?


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## ericzim (Jun 24, 2012)

Osage_Winter said:


> Hi Eric,
> 
> Thanks for joining the thread. Yeah, I just didn't dig deep and look for stats that would have mentioned the differences and my contact at Universal mentioned, casually, they were "nothing worth talking about" sarcastic so I just let the matter go. From my perspective, nothing changed the narrative of the film itself in any which way based on these "extensions" and so forth...
> 
> That said, what did you think of the audio and video of the disc? Did you run it through your Denon?


The audio and video were great through the Denon and Panasonic. I agree about the extended scenes; less than a full minute of extra footage doesn't amount to much more to talk about.


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

ericzim said:


> The audio and video were great through the Denon and Panasonic. I agree about the extended scenes; less than a full minute of extra footage doesn't amount to much more to talk about.


Did you agree with my findings regarding the more "subtle" use of the surround channels during certain key action sequences such as the first chase with Dom's team and Shaw?


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## ericzim (Jun 24, 2012)

Osage_Winter said:


> Did you agree with my findings regarding the more "subtle" use of the surround channels during certain key action sequences such as the first chase with Dom's team and Shaw?


I thought the usage of surrounds throughout the entire movie was well mixed actually. If there were any flaws in the audio at all I didn't notice them. In fact if there was one flaw in the movie it is the extra, extra, extra long runway scene but being as with all the action both in the plane and outside the plane, time is relative to the action and can be forgiven.


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

Oh, well, yeah, I mentioned that "never ending" runway sequence a few times; quite ridiculous. But as you pointed out, with the nail-biting fight sequences going on in that last part of the film you kind of look past the issues of suspending disbelief...


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## Savjac (Apr 17, 2008)

What an excellent movie, far far out and fun from the beginning to end. Usually I balk a bit at some over the top movies but this one not so much and I feel a bit bad in that I may not be judging all movies by the same criteria or different movies allow me different tolerances, not sure which. None the less, a must see for fans.

As for the audio, man OW I have to disagree a bit, I thought the sound track was on fire all the way through. Loud and low and directional as all get out. I know that none of the sounds are most likely from the filming and were put in later, but the sound of those big block engines were spot on right down to the slap you in the head sonic boom of the Dodge Daytona. I have not heard a car exhaust that realistic in a long time. My room shook all the while the movie was going...what it was supposed to that is and I could find no fault or nothing that caused me to think something was amiss. Sorry buddy, but this is a sonic spectacular. IMO of course.


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

Savjac said:


> What an excellent movie, far far out and fun from the beginning to end. Usually I balk a bit at some over the top movies but this one not so much and I feel a bit bad in that I may not be judging all movies by the same criteria or different movies allow me different tolerances, not sure which. None the less, a must see for fans.
> 
> As for the audio, man OW I have to disagree a bit, I thought the sound track was on fire all the way through. Loud and low and directional as all get out. I know that none of the sounds are most likely from the filming and were put in later, but the sound of those big block engines were spot on right down to the slap you in the head sonic boom of the Dodge Daytona. I have not heard a car exhaust that realistic in a long time. My room shook all the while the movie was going...what it was supposed to that is and I could find no fault or nothing that caused me to think something was amiss. Sorry buddy, but this is a sonic spectacular. IMO of course.


Don't get me wrong -- I didn't think this was a "poor" track at all. As a reviewer, I must point out even incredibly subtle elements I find that may make a presentation not EXACTLY, positively 100-percent perfect (if that's even achievable). In this case, I found some lack of surround actitivity during some of the key action setpieces to be notable as well as the perceived sensation that there was some lack of deep, walloping LFE...now, I know we're in a bit of a stalemate here because, yes, I DO HAVE to upgrade my sub at some point and so yes, indeed, those of you with incredibly better bass modules are going to experience tones I don't in certain instances. However, take into consideration that the level I was watching this disc's soundtrack at is what I watch every film at, which is a calibrated level that allows real deep, plumbing LFE to come through with authority when the system is cranked up (and sometimes when it isn't). At this steadfast calibrated level, I didn't experience any real gut-busting, droning, ULTRA low LFE (which happens; I mean, EVERY release can't be _War of the Worlds_). There may have been good accompanying low tones for explosion sequences and such, but I didn't detect bass that would _move your pant leg_ if you know what I mean. 

At any rate, I appreciate your opinions and input within the discussion and agree that this was a great action flick even if it were to stand on its own outside the franchise; no doubt serious fans of the series already feel that way. :T


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## Savjac (Apr 17, 2008)

Osage_Winter said:


> Don't get me wrong -- I didn't think this was a "poor" track at all. As a reviewer, I must point out even incredibly subtle elements I find that may make a presentation not EXACTLY, positively 100-percent perfect (if that's even achievable). In this case, I found some lack of surround actitivity during some of the key action setpieces to be notable as well as the perceived sensation that there was some lack of deep, walloping LFE...now, I know we're in a bit of a stalemate here because, yes, I DO HAVE to upgrade my sub at some point and so yes, indeed, those of you with incredibly better bass modules are going to experience tones I don't in certain instances. However, take into consideration that the level I was watching this disc's soundtrack at is what I watch every film at, which is a calibrated level that allows real deep, plumbing LFE to come through with authority when the system is cranked up (and sometimes when it isn't). At this steadfast calibrated level, I didn't experience any real gut-busting, droning, ULTRA low LFE (which happens; I mean, EVERY release can't be War of the Worlds). There may have been good accompanying low tones for explosion sequences and such, but I didn't detect bass that would move your pant leg if you know what I mean. At any rate, I appreciate your opinions and input within the discussion and agree that this was a great action flick even if it were to stand on its own outside the franchise; no doubt serious fans of the series already feel that way. :T


Understood OW. you have to call it as you see/hear it.


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

Indeed, Jack; but it's always great to discuss these elements with other film fans! :T

We watched _We're the Millers_ last night and though we're not permitted to officially review it here (it is most definitely rated R with some very raunchy moments and a ton of cussing) I must say it was pretty funny...not sure it is a must-buy, but there were hysterical moments throughout. And Jennifer Aniston as a "professional pole entertainer"? Wow. Just wow. That's all I can say. :blink:

Anyone else catch _We're the Millers_ yet?


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## Savjac (Apr 17, 2008)

That movie will be here tomorrow


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

From Netflix?


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## Savjac (Apr 17, 2008)

Yes O, why do you ask ?


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## Osage_Winter (Apr 8, 2010)

Savjac said:


> Yes O, why do you ask ?


No, was just curious when you said "will be here tomorrow," that's all...


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