FAST & FURIOUS 6, rather than lazily 3rd-gear coasting on fumes of yore (er, ‘yo’), instead powershifts into another level of bicep-flexing, bootie-ogling whooped gas, replete with ‘bro’-bonding, chick-fights (of the awesome variety), dude’ly put-downs, pyrotechnics, car carnage and enough incidental civilian casualties to pause Godzilla. Big-scale rumble defies anything like wimpish Real Life, yet brings the franchise fun full-on with unfettered furiositude.

TEJ: “It’s all between you and the car you build it’s a bond, it’s a commitment.”  HOBBS: “Sounds like a marriage.”  TEJ: “Yeah, but with cars when you trade up they don’t take half your shit.”

The Toretto team of thrill-racing criminal do-gooders are wrested from enjoying the spoils of their Rio ripoff when antagonist-turned-ally Hobbs makes a plea for help backed by an offer that can’t be refused: Dom’s wife ‘Letty’ (Michelle Rodriguez), offed by cartel killers in 2009’s entry Fast & Furious, isn’t dead after all, but is working with a gang of former soldiers turned renegade. Dom and his crew want Letty rescued, cured and back in ‘The Family’; Hobbs needs the gang and their threat to world peace stopped before they unleash cataclysm. Raised stakes. Highly pressurized coolness under pressure. Ruthless enemies (Luke Evans, Gina Carano). Car toys, nubile babes, lavishly designed action—bonkers insane—with stunts you really should not attempt on the drive back from Safeway. Over-the-top as can be, but exciting and entertaining spectacle of excess. They know how to put on a show, revving up the top-this quotient to brazenly challenge Mission’s Impossible and that Bond fellow.

Universal reported the budget at $160,000,000; other sources claim an even more astronomical $260,000,000. The titanic outlay was sponged up by becoming 2013’s #8 in the States, 6th globally, swooping up a staggering $788,700,000.

Justin Lin directed, Chris Morgan wrote. Shot in England, Scotland and the Canary Islands Back for the smash: Paul Walker, Jordana Brewster, Tyrese Gibson, Ludacris, Sung Kang, Gal Godot, Elsa Pataky.

130 minutes, with John Ortiz, Shea Whigham, Clara Paget, Kim Kold and Rita Ora. Jason Statham cameos at the finish, foreshadowing the next in the series. Scored by Lucas Vidal, marked by the number “We Own It”.