While Furiosa is enjoying plenty of early hype, the spinoff faces a major problem thanks to Mad Max: Fury Road. When 2015’s critically-acclaimed Mad Max: Fury Road introduced viewers to Charlize Theron’s Furiosa, it was only a matter of time before the tough antiheroine gained a spinoff of her own. While the Mad Max franchise had never spawned a spinoff before, Furiosa’s popularity among fans and instantly-iconic status made her solo movie an inevitability.
Nevertheless, the Furiosa Mad Max spinoff still has one major issue to overcome. Since Furiosa is working for amoral warlord Immortan Joe at the start of Mad Max: Fury Road, viewers can already assume that her story ends badly in Furiosa. The moral fortitude of Charlize Theron’s Furiosa means the character has no obvious reason to align herself with the despotic, murderous leader of the War Boys. Thus, no matter how much pulse-pounding action director George Miller fits into the prequel, Furiosa is likely to leave audiences feeling hopeless when the movie’s ending duly sets up Fury Road’s beginning.
Why Mad Max: Fury Road Makes Furiosa Depressing
Like all Mad Max sequels after the 1979 original, Mad Max: Fury Road plunges its hero into a pre-existing conflict he never asked to take part in. Just as Feral Kid leads Mad Max to save his community in The Road Warrior, Furiosa’s decision to free Immortan Joe’s captive slaves forces Mad Max to join her quest. For Furiosa to end up working under Immortan Joe in the first place, viewers have to assume that her life took a dark turn years earlier. Furiosa has had enough of Immortan Joe’s crimes by the time Mad Max: Fury Road begins, but her status as an Imperator implies she worked alongside the villain for some time before betraying him.
Furiosa’s comic book backstory reaffirms this, but Mad Max: Fury Road‘s printed prequel never explains how or why Furiosa ended up on Joe’s payroll. Depending on when Furiosa takes place in the Mad Max timeline, this is one of the main questions the prequel movie must answer about its title character. Since Furiosa seems disgusted by Immortan Joe’s actions in Mad Max: Fury Road, it stands to reason that the circumstances that led her to work with him for so long must have been challenging and tragic.
Furiosa Should Lean Into Its Dark Story
While Furiosa could focus on fast-paced action and ignore how Furiosa ends up in Immortan Joe’s employ until its final act, the prequel would benefit from avoiding that approach. Furiosa should lean into the darkness that defines Furiosa’s past and use it to address the motives behind her allegiance with Immortan Joe. In the 1979 original Mad Max, the ostensible hero ends up driven to torture and cold-blooded murder by his circumstances, it becomes hard not to feel some cathartic glee when the protagonist evolves into an unhinged vigilante. If Furiosa delves into similarly dark territory, the Mad Max prequel can use tragedy to ground the character’s slide into amorality.
