The start of the Mad Max franchise was as wacky as Max in the movies. George Miller and his producing partner Byron Kennedy did everything, from David Miller working as a doctor to pay for the film to bribing the cast and crew with beer and enlisting genuine Melbourne street riding gangs as adversaries.
They turned things around by using whatever resources they had to develop a film on a minimal budget that grossed nearly a hundred million dollars. Director Miller affected not only the way action films were made and watched, but also live-action films, animated shows, and other forms of entertainment. For example, Mad Max was the idea for the famous chase scene in the 2016 Disney film Moana.
With four films in the works and a spinoff in the works, the Mad Max franchise has gone from cult classic to popular classic, beloved and appreciated by millions across the world. In this video, we will take a deep dive into the four Mad Max films and present the most up-to-date facts on the impending Mad Max spinoff, Furiosa.
Mad Max (1979)
In a futuristic and dystopian Australia, a biking gang member by the name of Nightrider kills a cop of Australia’s highway patrol unit called the Main Force Patrol. Although he escapes with his girlfriend, he dies in a crash when MFP’s top pursuit man Max Rockatansky chased after him.
Later, Max gets a supercharged Pursuit Special as a bribe to remain on the force. Meanwhile, Nightrider’s biking gang vandalizes property, steals fuel, and terrorizes the people of a town. It was led by Bubba Zanetti and Toecutter. They go as far as sexually assaulting a couple, but Max and his partner Jim Goose arrest a young member of the gang named Johnny the Boy.
Alas! Neither anyone from the town nor the victims of the assault show up at the trial, and naturally, the court releases Johnny into Bubba’s custody, despite furious objections from Goose. Later that night, Goose visited a local nightclub, and Johnny took this window of opportunity to sabotage Goose’s bike.
Goose’s bike locks up at high speed and crashes the following morning, but Goose evades the accident unhurt. He borrows another vehicle to haul his bike to MFP, but Johnny and Toecutter show up and burn Goose alive. Witnessing Goose’s charred body, Max informs his superior officer Fifi that he would resign, but Fifi instead asks him to take a vacation.
Max takes his wife Jessie and their infant child on vacation, but when they stop to fix a tire, Jessie gets attacked by the Toecutter and his gang, who try to molest Jessie. She manages to escape with her infant son and reaches an elderly friend named May for help, but the biking gang was on a hot pursuit and followed Jessie to May’s farm. However, with May’s help, Jessie flees once again, but her van overheated. Jessie was now forced to travel on foot, but the gang killed her and her son. Max couldn’t believe his eyes when he reached the spot.
His son died on the spot, and Jessie succumbed to her injuries a little later. It was now time for the gang to face Max’s wrath, who dressed in his MFP uniform, took his Pursuit Special, and went after the gang. He first killed several members by ramming them at high speed before slaying Bubba and pushing Toecutter in front of a truck. Lastly, he handcuffed Johnny to a wrecked car from which petrol was leaking and was about to explode. Max gave Johnny a hacksaw and the choice of dying by the explosion or sawing his ankle to save himself, and Max drove away, knowing he had exacted his revenge.
Mel Gibson, who starred as the titular Mad Max in the film, was accompanying one of his friends to the Mad Max auditions and wasn’t even supposed to take the audition. However, the crew took his pictures, and he later got the lead role for $15,000. The film is one of the greatest success stories because it was made on a shoestring budget of $400,000 and went on to earn almost $100 million. Because of the lack of money, director George Miller chose to set the film in a dystopian world filmed in deserted locations, as shooting in the city was going to be expensive. Furthermore, they used real biking gangs for the shoots because stunt performers were expensive. These things turned out to be a blessing in disguise because they only added to the originality and realism of the film. It can be said without a shadow of a doubt that the original Mad Max film is nothing short of a savior of the post-apocalyptic sub-genre of films.
Mad Max 2 (1981)
After the civilization collapsed owing to a global war, the oil supplies got exhausted, and the people who remained adopted barbarianism as a way of life. Former policeman Max Rockatansky couldn’t shield himself from this growing order and now roams the Australian wilderness scavenging for food and petrol. He lost his family and friend to a biking gang, and now his only friend is an Australian Cattle Dog. Max soon gets confronted by Wez and his biking gang, but he drives the thugs off and takes their petrol. He then notices a gyrocopter and attempts to take its fuel, but the pilot confronts Max and reveals to him about an oil refinery.
Max spares the pilot’s life, and together, they go to the oil refinery that was under the control of the Marauders, a gang of drivers and riders of which Wez was also a member. Their leader was a huge man wearing a mask and was aptly named Lord Humungous. Max saw a window of opportunity when several settlers attempted to break free from the compound. Max brings back an injured settler who later succumbed to his injuries and died. The others and their leader Papagallo did not extend a warm welcome to Max instead they were rather hostile, but just as they were about to kill him, the Marauders returned. Humungous offered the settlers a safe passage in return for a constant supply of fuel. But Max offered another deal to the settlers and went after the Marauders to retrieve the settlers’ fuel tanker.
After much high-octane action, Max manages to keep his part of the deal. Although the settlers wanted him to come along, he chose to collect his share of fuel and carry on alone. However, Wez and his companion heavily injured Max and killed Max’s dog. Max was left for dead, but the Gyrocopter’s captain saved him. Despite his heavy injuries, Max decided to drive an armored truck carrying the fuel tanker. Several other settlers offered to come along for protection. Naturally, Lord Humungous and his men followed the armored vehicles, allowing the other settlers to escape.
Papahallo and Max’s protectors die, and Max finds himself and a Feral Kid against a bunch of Marauders. However, a car collision kills both Lord Humungous and Wez, and the other Marauders fled the scene. Many years later, the Feral Kid became the leader of the settlers and was also the film’s narrator, who was reminiscing about this strange road warrior, who left for more unchartered territories, but lives in the minds of people as a legend.
The original Mad Max ended with an iconic and equally violent conclusion; lucky for us that director Miller followed the film with a sequel in which he took all things good from the first film and dialed them up quite a bit. This second film was not just grittier but creatively and graciously violent and was set in an absolutely post-apocalyptic world. As far as Max was concerned, he was quite mad in this film, having been scarred deeply by the trauma that he sustained from the loss of his wife and child. In the film, there’s a scene where a biker flies over the hood, slams into the car, and summersaults towards the camera. However, in a freak accident, the biker lost control of his body and met with a terrible accident that broke his leg and almost took his life. George Miller found the scene to be authentic and chose to keep the shot in the film.
Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985)
In this film, Max Rockatansky gets attacked by a man named Jedidiah and his son and is forced to continue his journey on foot. Max follows their trail to Bartertown, where a survivor community built for itself shreds of civilization, including electric supply. Max was denied entry because he had nothing to barter, but Bartertown’s ruthless leader Aunty Entity offered him his belongings back if he completed one of her tasks.
Aunty Entity coerced Max into killing a gigantic man with Down’s Syndrome. Max refused to kill a man with a child’s mind and was banished from Bartertown grounds. He then came across a group of children who were survivors of a flight crash and had settled near an oasis forming a community. When a few of the kids escape the safety of the community and leave in search of a place called Tomorrow Morrow Land, Max is tasked with getting them back. However, they went too far, and their supplies had run off by the time Max found them.
Naturally, they were forced to head to Bartertown. At Bartertown, Max confronts Aunty Entity and her Imperial guards. Furthermore, he convinces Jedidiah to carry the group of children away from Bartertown to safety. Years later, it is revealed that the group of children formed a small society and lived in relative harmony. Their leader Savannah was reciting a story about Max, the man who saved the group from calamity and who still wanders the depths of the deserts.
The third and final installment of the Mad Max series starring Mel Gibson revolves around children and how Max helps them. The Nobel Prize-winning British author William Golding wrote the novel Lord of the Flies in 1954. However, the film sacrificed its indie aesthetics and grindhouse feels in favor of bigger sets and famous stars to give the film a proper Hollywood status. It slightly drifted away from the dark theme and imageries that the franchise had begun with in the first place. Although the action sequences were commendable and the film looked aesthetically rich, it is considered by many as a weak point of the franchise. Having said that, it is a commendable piece of work if one doesn’t compare it with the other Mad Max films.
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
Since the first scene of the film, Max Rockatansky is shown to be living in a crude state, thriving on lizards. He gets attacked by the War Boys, who work for Immortan Joe, a ruthless cult leader and warlord, who the War Boys hailed as just next to God. At Immortan Joe’s Citadel, he is used as a blood bag for a sickly War Boy named Nux. Meanwhile, one of Joe’s lieutenants named Furiosa was tasked with hauling ammunition and fuel in her War Rig, but she instead helped Joe’s five wives escape from the Citadel. Learning about this, Immortan Joe sends an army of brutes to pursue Furiosa and bring his wife back. To make things easier, Joe calls in the help from neighboring Bullet Farm and Gas Town. Nux also joined the chase and Max was strapped to his car, still serving as a blood bag.
A battle ensued between Joe’s forces and Furiosa’s War Rig. To evade her pursuers, Furiosa drives into a sand storm, with no one but Nux following. Max used the opportunity to free himself from his clutches and restrain Nux. Later, Max finds the War Rig and carjacks it but allows the five wives and Furiosa to accompany him. Meanwhile, Joe’s army is in hot pursuit. As they continue their journey, they come across a canyon.
One of Joe’s pregnant wives dies as his car runs over her. Nevertheless, they manage to escape Joe one more time, and Furiosa explains that she is heading to Green Place, an idyllic land that she remembers from her childhood. After an overnight journey, they come across a swampland where Furiosa meets a mysterious woman and her clan, who reveals that Furiosa was one of their own who was kidnapped as a child. Furiosa learns that the swampland was, in fact, the Green Place she remembered, and it was now uninhabitable.
Furiosa decides to drive further in search of a new home, but Max convinces her to return to the now undefended Citadel, which had ample water and greenery, and take control, meanwhile trapping Joe and his army in the canyons. They head towards the Citadel, and on the way, they are met with Joe’s forces. But they manage to trap Joe’s army with the help of Nux, and Furiosa kills Joe, despite sustaining heavy injuries. The group ultimately goes to the Citadel and all things end happily, while Max leaves after sharing a glance with Furiosa.
Very few films exist that go through development hell for a decade and come out from the other side as a masterpiece. The pre-production started in 1997 but stretched to early 2000. And then, the tragic events of 9/11 and the Iraq war happened. When things finally seemed to come back on track, more tragedies followed. Miller considered the legendary Heath Ledger, but his sad, sudden and untimely demise made a hole in the filming process, and this hole would later be filled by another veteran in the form of Tom Hardy. Nevertheless, the final film turned out to be such that it received ten Academy Award nominations. Director Miller’s vision and his ‘don’t tell, show’ form of filmmaking made Fury Road a remarkable piece of art that’s both critically and popularly acclaimed.
Furiosa (2023)
Imperator Furiosa was clearly one of the best and definitive action heroines in the past two or more decades. Some even compare her with the likes of Ellen Ripley and Sarah Connor, but with a unique amount of swag and skills. She can easily be considered as the hero of Fury Road with her relentless toughness, intelligence, grit, and some serious behind-the-wheel skills. Mad Max Fury Road ended on a bright note and gave hopes for a sequel, but director Miller has decided to go back in time and grace us with a prequel about our favorite Imperator. Well, no complaints there! The film will largely focus on the idyllic Green Place, how and why she was abducted from the all-female Vuvalini warrior clan, and how she hardened like a rock to become what she became in Fury Road.
Anya Taylor Joy would play the younger Furiosa. She gained stardom through Robert Eggers’ The Witch and went on to star in films like M. Night Shyamalan’s psychological horror-thriller Split. And, of course, who doesn’t know Beth Harmon from The Queen’s Gambit. Along with Anya Taylor Joy, veterans like Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and Chris Hemsworth would star in the 2023 film.
Director George Miller is not spilling any beans about the plot, but there are speculations that it would take place over the course of several years, and many of the unanswered questions from Fury Road would be taken care of. The initial release date has been set for June 23rd, 2023, and if things go as planned, we shall get Furiosa exclusively on theatres instead of the recently-adopted hybrid model of launching films simultaneously on OTT platforms and theatres.
Mad Max The Wasteland (To Be Announced)
But if you’re disheartened about the lack of another Mad Max film, then don’t be because both Miller and Tom Hardy have confirmed another film with the working title Mad Mad The Wasteland. However, apart from this, no substantial information about the release date, cast, storyline, etc., is available as of now.
Video games
The 1990 game Mad Max is largely a driving game in which the objective is to survive in a post-apocalyptic world while battling others and salvaging valuables like money, gas, water, and food, without which racing would become impossible. You start playing in Max’s Pursuit Special and encounter roadblocks, enemy vehicles, bunkers that hurl dynamite, etc.
There was another visually rich game that was released in 2015. In this game, players controlled Max Rockatansky in a vehicle named Magnum Opus as he progressed through wastelands. He would battle raiders and their leader Scabrous Scrotus. His ultimate goal is to reach a place called the Plains of Silence in order to achieve peace and solace from years of wandering. Mad Max focuses on vehicular combat, but the better half of the game is based on driving only. Players can make use of armor upgrades and weapons to fight enemies. The game looks great with beautiful scenes of deserts, canyons, etc.
The anthology has had a heavy influence on pop culture, but what makes Mad Max a better anthology than other similar films is the fact that it has risen from being a cult classic to a popular classic. As far as the character of Mad Max Rockatansky is concerned, he works alone but helps others. Mad Max’s stories are never really about him, maybe with the exception of the first film. He is like that classic western hero on the lines of Clint Eastwood, who comes to a group’s help when they most need it and then disappears to continue his journey as a lone ranger.