The second Mad Max movie The Road Warrior cut a huge twist, but it is one that the upcoming Furiosa spinoff movie may well revisit. Released in 1979, director George Miller’s sparse, grounded revenge thriller Mad Max left viewers with little indication of the wild, over-the-top sci-fi territory that its sequels would eventually venture into as their budgets and ambition increased.
The original Mad Max, like the Australian cult thriller that inspired the movie, is a stripped-back story of murder and vengeance that features only a few cartoony characters and a couple of memorable sequences of fast-paced action. However, from the film’s first sequel The Road Warrior onwards, the tone of the series moved out of grounded thriller territory and into more ambitious post-apocalyptic sci-fi, a change many felt was for the better.
The Road Warrior’s success led to the release of two further Mad Max sequels, Beyond Thunderdome and Fury Road. The latter of these introduced viewers to Charlize Theron’s fearless antiheroine Furiosa, a tough Imperator who acted as the movie’s real protagonist. While Tom Hardy offered a solid turn as the title character, Max, Fury Road’s story centered around Theron’s character, and the part proved memorable enough for Furiosa to earn a Mad Max spinoff which will reportedly be the biggest movie in the franchise so far. It is unknown what part of the character's story Furiosa’s movie will dwell on, but revisiting an earlier sequel’s missing twist could be a good starting point. The Road Warrior originally revealed that the villainous Lord Humungus was actually Max’s former partner Goose, and Furiosa’s upcoming spinoff could revisit this idea of how maintaining law and order can give way to corruption and evil.
Road Warrior’s Missing Twist Explained
The origins of Lord Humungus are never explained in The Road Warrior, but originally, series creator George Miller intended to reveal that the villain was Max’s former police partner Goose. Thought dead since the first film, Goose was going to be revealed to be the badly-burned, mentally scarred man beneath the mask at the end of The Road Warrior. Corrupted by power, the once-virtuous cop now turned his skill for maintaining law and order into working as the despotic dictator of the sequel’s post-apocalyptic setting. It is a brutal twist, and one that the series has since revisited by revealing that Fury Road’s villain Immortan Joe was once a military general.
Immortan Joe allowed the filmmakers to touch on the idea that attempts to maintain control over chaos eventually give way to authoritarian control. However, the sequel didn’t have the same emotional impact as the twist missing from The Road Warrior, as viewers never saw Immortan Joe as a decent man before his descent into evil. Although Immortan Joe and the War Boys were influenced by Lord Humungus, they never received a sympathetic portrayal from the series the way that Goose did — and the way Furiosa still can.
Furiosa’s Missing Backstory
Although the Fury Road tie-in comics explain why Furiosa betrayed Immortan Joe, they never touch on how she came under his employ in the first place. For many who liked the character but found her barbaric employer monstrous, this question was one of the most compelling unanswered queries about her character. Before both the comics and Fury Road, Furiosa becomes an Imperator, but how did such a seemingly decent character end up in such a morally murky role? There is no canon answer to this, and rather than explaining how Furiosa lost her arm or wasting screen time on the gratuitous nastiness of the comic backstory, the spinoff movie should instead explore how Furiosa became entranced by the appeal of acting as a brutal authority — much like Goose was intended to when he eventually became Lord Humungus.
Furiosa’s Spinoff Could Use Road Warrior’s Cut Twist
Revealing that Furiosa was once a by-the-book cop like Max himself before the offscreen apocalypse occurred would allow the series to offer a more sympathetic look at why powerful people sometimes turn to corrupt leaders instead of following their own code as Max does. Depicting the gradual breakdown of society in the Mad Max universe and showing Furiosa’s fear of a country verging on precarity could explain why she opted to ally with such a brutal despot despite his evident misogyny. This approach would let the franchise show (as Beyond Thunderdome foreshadowed, and Miller later confirmed) that even a character as seemingly decent and virtuous as Furiosa could be tempted by the allure of fascism.
How This Twist Would Contrast Furiosa and Max
Currently, Max and Furiosa are pretty similar characters: both strong-willed antiheroes who are far from gentle or talkative, but who abide by a clear internal moral code even when it risks their life. One could even argue that the two are too similar and that Furiosa’s chances of emerging from the shadow of Miller’s most famous creation would be assisted greatly if her screen persona differed from Max’s in a few notable ways. One way to achieve this would be by showing Furiosa ending her prequel story not as a hero, but instead as a lackey to Immortan Joe, much like The Road Warrior’s loyal Wez was to Lord Humunugus. It is a position that Furiosa needs to be in by the events of Fury Road regardless, and this poignant twist could be the best way to ground her eventual redemption.
Illustrating the sad story of Furiosa being seduced into working for Immortan Joe with promises of power and authority could create a clear contrast between her and Max. Max instead abandoned any auspices of formal law and order after his work as a cop failed to save his family in the first film, and while the choice may have seemed honorable, it has led him to abandon every stable community he has encountered at the end of each movie as he is cursed to live alone outside of society. In contrast, Furiosa is set to become the leader of the Citadel at the close of Fury Road and has shown that she can mete out justice well. A Furiosa prequel that does justice to George Miller’s original Mad Max would now show her at her lowest ebb and illustrate how she came to be enamored with power in the first place. Taking The Road Warrior’s missing Mad Max twist and adding it to the character's backstory in the Furiosa spinoff movie could achieve just that.