What is the goal of this movie?

I like bad movies whose goal is to be entertaining and they succeed at it; I hate good movies whose goal is to elevate and they fail at it. Or maybe I think the first bucket of movie is good and the second is bad: the goal is to accomplish your goal, truistic as that might be. This is why I think I love bubblegum pop so much: it is worth admiring something that is being itself as much as it can be.

F9 is not a particularly entertaining movie. There are lots of entertaining moments, but it seems so much more interested in spectacle than entertainment. There are nice things about it — a cozy and understated multiculturalism, an implicit understanding of plot armor, John Cena being absolutely fucking ripped — but the movie seemed more interested in playing with magnets than actually entertaining me.

★★