It is not clear whether Furiosa will explain how the offscreen apocalypse occurred in the Mad Max universe, but the spinoff is an exciting opportunity for the series to answer this mystery. 1979’s original Mad Max does not have a lot in common with its more cartoony sequels. Set in the future solely to save on location costs, the dark original Mad Max was a bleak revenge thriller that barely featured any sci-fi elements.
In contrast, Mad Max’s sequels were increasingly over-the-top, larger-than-life sci-fi action extravaganzas. From the second movie onwards, the Mad Max movies are set in a post-apocalyptic future, but the franchise never went back and explained how the world became a deserted wasteland in between the first and second movies. The upcoming spinoff Furiosa seemed like a perfect opportunity for the franchise to depict its unseen apocalypse, but its synopsis might imply otherwise.
It is not yet clear exactly what story Furiosa will tell, with the Mad Max spinoff’s synopsis detailing a battle between warlords while also hinting at scenes set in the title character’s pre-Citadel life. However, at no point in the synopsis is the apocalypse of the Mad Max franchise mentioned, meaning there is a chance that Furiosa might once again refuse to explain just what happened to turn the crime-ridden but recognizable world of Mad Max into the arid, deserted setting of the sequels. Furiosa might still inform viewers whether it was a nuclear war, fuel shortages, or a combination of the two that caused this wholesale environmental destruction, but the synopsis doesn’t promise much clarity on this front.
Why Furiosa Might Not Explain Mad Max’s Apocalypse
According to the synopsis, Furiosa is snatched away from the Vuvalini of Many Mothers at the start of Furiosa’s story. This introduces her to Chis Hemsworth’s Furiosa character Dementus, a warlord who gets Furiosa embroiled in the Citadel’s power struggles which eventually lead to her working for Immortan Joe by the time Fury Road takes place. However, this doesn’t account for the Mad Max universe’s apocalypse since, if the Vuvalini of Many Mothers already exists, then it stands to reason that the apocalypse occurred long before the story starts. After all, the Vuvalini of Many Mothers is a desert-based commune, the sort of small self-governed community that cropped up throughout the Mad Max universe after the world ended.
Admittedly, there is a possibility that the existence of the Vuvalini of Many Mothers predates the Mad Max universe’s apocalypse. Furiosa does call their home “the Green Place” in Fury Road and is horrified to find this oasis destroyed in the 2015 sequel, so there is a chance that the Vuvalini of Many Mothers lived together in a sustainable community even before the world of the Mad Max franchise ended. As such, Mad Max’s first spinoff Furiosa could still explain how the apocalypse occurred in the universe of the series if the Vuvalini of Many Mothers turn out to have deeper roots than the commune seemed to boast in Fury Road.