Mad Max 'Furiosa' review: New prequel is a snazzy action movie, but no 'Fury Road'

Anyone who’s seen “Mad Max: Fury Road” doesn’t forget it. The movie is a unicorn of sorts, a pure and perfect action flick with post-apocalyptic hot rods, gorgeous demolition-derby carnage and demented confidence.

That’s a sky-high bar most movies fail to reach, including its inspired prequel “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga” (★★★ out of four; rated R; in theaters Friday).

Director George Miller fleshes out the busy backstory of Charlize Theron’s “Fury Road” heroine, with the title role now played by Anya Taylor-Joy, for a decent origin tale that works better as a revenge thriller. Miller crafts an explosive, world-building epic charting new parts of the dystopian Wasteland he created with Mel Gibson in 1979’s “Mad Max,” this time letting Taylor-Joy and a charismatically evil Chris Hemsworth loose in a gnarly landscape full of revving engines and bizarre personalities.

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Nine years ago, the last “Mad Max” introduced Furiosa as a weary soldier helping the imperious Immortan Joe’s runaway wives alongside Tom Hardy’s hard-luck antihero Max during a three-day odyssey of sandstorms and chaos. “Furiosa” leads right up to that movie by going way back, following its title character over 15 years from a traumatized young girl to an independent warrior queen.

Little Furiosa (Alyla Browne) lives in Green Place, a “land of abundance” with forests, fruit and nature. An act of kid mischief angers some motorcycle-riding goons, who capture Furiosa and take her to their ruthless and mercurial leader, Dementus (Hemsworth). Furiosa’s sharpshooting mom Mary (Charlee Fraser) rescues her daughter from this nomadic biker horde, but their escape is foiled and Dementus tortures and kills Mary, taking Furiosa as a prisoner.

Dementus is an ambitious creep as well, and he envies the expansive Citadel of warlord Immortan Joe (Lachy Hulme). An invasion goes badly, yet Dementus becomes a power player in the Wasteland political system, using Furiosa as a trading chip in a deal with Joe. Things aren’t any better for her under the Immortan's guardianship, so Furiosa disguises herself and hides for years as a hardworking mute boy.

Taylor-Joy doesn’t even show up until an hour into “Furiosa,” and that’s when the plot, which starts in a meandering episodic fashion, kicks into overdrive. Furiosa proves herself a capable crew member on a War Rig driven by ace supply runner Praetorian Jack (Tom Burke), who becomes a trusted confidante (with definite Mad Max vibes). Her blood still boils when it comes to Dementus, and the struggle between him and Joe sets a violent, painful path for Furiosa to become the woman with a buzzcut and mechanical arm we know and love.

Few put together an action scene with jaw-dropping gunfights and white-knuckle crashes that energize all the senses like Miller. In “Furiosa,” foes fly in on parachutes and gliders to wage battle on endlessly cool vehicles, and the 79-year-old director creates breathtaking sequences out of Taylor-Joy taking cover from overwhelming flames and driving like a bat out of hell.

Well-suited for Miller’s signature brand of metal mayhem, she sports a laconic gumption matched only by Hemsworth’s scuzzy antagonism: Dementus is a buff, motormouthed weasel and, thanks to Hemsworth (plus a fake nose with its own area code), strangely magnetic and likable, tossing bon mots like "When things go bonkers, you have to adapt."

“Furiosa” weaves in some familiar faces, too, most of them ones only a mother could love. The “Fury Road” faithful get a return engagement seeing the pale War Boys and old pals like the Organic Mechanic and Doof Warrior are back, alongside new weirdos like Toe Jam and the History Man. (A couple of biker dudes even get their names from a popular motorcycle manufacturer.)

But the prequel is a conventionally structured, overlong 2½-hour movie and “Fury Road” was so special because it wasn’t: The last “Mad Max” essentially existed as a two-hour chase scene that threw us into the stressful lives of its protagonists, and we got to know them through their conflict rather than a bunch of exposition.

So “Furiosa” is no “Fury Road.” That’s OK. With Taylor-Joy behind the wheel and Hemsworth riding shotgun, it’s a groovy enough ride.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Furiosa' review: New 'Mad Max Saga' movie satisfies but doesn't wow