I wrote a while back that I wouldn’t be polluting my soul with a viewing of The Fate of the Furious. Because I like real fast-car movies (Bullitt, Drive, both versions of Gone in Sixty Seconds) and am therefore burdened with a sense of taste in this realm. And because I’ve suffered through three Fast & Furious films, and the only one I could half-stand was Rob Cohen’s 2001 original. Vomit bag.

Today’s news about Fate having topped $900 million worldwide is yet another indication of the coarsening of 21st Century culture. The people who paid to see this have done their part to ensure that hundreds of gallons of Vin Diesel sewage will be pumped into megaplexes for God knows how many more years. As a cultural omen this is almost as dark as the election of Donald Trump and the 9/11 attacks. The animals have taken over the asylum.

“If the fate of the Furious series is to grow somehow both wearier and dumber with age, then the eighth film is proof of a mission firmly accomplished.” — from a recent review by Globe & Mail‘s Barry Hertz.