I’m going to do something I never thought I’d do and that’s give Jason Friedberg & Aaron Seltzer a compliment: they’re improving. The “comedy” duo have gone from making agonizing, mind-numbingly stupid, and directionless parodies such as “Date Movie,” “Epic Movie,” and “Disaster Movie” to making parodies that are slightly less agonizing, not nearly as mind-numbingly stupid, and have somewhat of a direction. With “The Starving Games” and now “Superfast!,” Friedberg & Seltzer have done away with (most) of the random pop culture references to make more of a focused parody. Now, instead of having gags that center around the viewer going “Hey, I know that pop culture reference,” they have gags that poke fun at the clichés of the genre they’re parodying; most of these gags are lame and induce many groans, but at least they fit.
If the backhanded compliment that was the opening paragraph didn’t give it away, I didn’t like “Superfast!” Quite frankly, I found it to be tedious and, at times, downright painful to sit through. However, since I knew going in it was a Friedberg & Seltzer joint, my expectations were lowered so low that the simple fact that the film wasn’t a complete failure made me almost forgiving of the film’s flaws. I think I’m suffering from Stockholm syndrome.
“Superfast!” is a parody of the “Fast & Furious” franchise, focusing mostly on the plot of the first film. Lucas White (Alex Ashbaugh) is the undercover cop who infiltrates the street racing gang led by Vin Serento (Dale Pavinski, doing a solid Vin Diesel impersonation) in hopes of bringing down crime lord Juan Carlos de la Sol (Omar Chaparro). In the process, White actually befriends Vin, falls in love with Vin’s sister, and sides with them over the police force.To allow a parody of The Rock, Friedberg & Seltzer simply combine elements from the fifth film to have Detective Rock Johnson (Dio Johnson) and his partner, Julie Canaro (Shantel Wislawski) hot on the trails of Vin and his crew.
All of the gags center on the stereotypes of each character. Lucas White is portrayed as a spoiled white kid whose IQ is lower than his shoe size (he’s introduced driving a car decked out in unicorns and Justin Bieber stickers, then can’t figure out how to actually drive the car); Vin Serento is so macho that his every action borders on being homoerotic; Vin’s girlfriend, Michelle (Andrea Navedo), is secretly a lesbian because she acts tough; Vin’s sister, Jordana (Lili Mirojnick), is the nice one (there’s rarely any gags at her expense); Detective Rock Johnson is a simpleton that takes things too literally and needs his partner, Canaro, to spell everything out for him; Juan Carlos de la Sol is your typical villain with dimwitted henchman; there are even gags centered around the rapper cameo, token cool Asian guy, and model turned actress (with those characters going by those names).
Where the film fails is that all of the gags are too obvious. Every single gag in this film is predictable, with the ones that do work having been done better elsewhere. For example, Friedberg & Seltzer parody the action trope of cars exploding on any impact, with a cop car exploding after lightly tapping a dumpster and a bike exploding after crashing into a tree. While slightly amusing, the gag just reminded me of “21 Jump Street,” where it was done much more effectively. The only joke in the film to genuinely make me laugh hard was Vin laying out an intricate plan to break into Sol’s safe, only to choose plan B because it makes for a cooler action set piece.
Friedberg & Seltzer resort to breaking the fourth wall constantly in order to hammer home a joke. While this can work, it doesn’t here because they don’t just break the fourth wall, but dismantle it in the process. There’s actually a line in the film where Vin, in reference to why there’s a rapper cameo, model turned actress, and cool Asian guy in the film, states “It’s in every “Fast & Furious” movie!” It may have been slightly amusing for him to mention the ominous score playing in the background to denote something serious is about to go down, but flat-out acknowledging he’s in a “Fast & Furious” type of film is overkill. Hell, he even cracks wise at the expense of his girlfriend secretly being a lesbian, completely destroying that running gag!
Speaking of Michelle, her being a lesbian simply because she’s tough is incredibly offensive. I’ll give Friedberg & Seltzer the benefit of the doubt in that the gag is supposed to be innocent, but it doesn’t change the fact that it’s cheap. The fact that it elicits no humor is the most offensive aspect of it! They actually build a joke regarding Sol’s guards and employees working in the nude just so they can have Michelle get excited over the fact that she gets to infiltrate his taco stand cover and be surrounded by naked women; all of the nudity is pixelated to attain the PG-13 rating, proving that the meaningless gag only exists for a joke that isn’t funny. Ugh!
I may have gone light on this film, but that’s only because I’ve been through the ringer with Friedberg & Seltzer. The fact that “Superfast!” didn’t make me want to gauge my eyes out made me a little less harsh on the film. With that being said, this is still a terrible film. Friedberg & Seltzer have proven here that, once they get rid of random pop culture references, they have very little in the way of actual jokes. One of their jokes in the film is about Sol’s taco stand cover, “Big Ass Tacos,” literally selling big ass tacos that are nearly the size of a human; the joke’s not funny, nor does it make sense, but it’s the best they’ve got.
Since I started this review off with a backhanded compliment, I’m going to end it with one; while I have no hope for Friedberg & Seltzer, the fact that they’ve been able to ascend from agonizing, mind-numbingly stupid parodies to just plain terrible ones makes me think that maybe, just maybe, their next film can be just below average.
Final Rating: D+