Welcome to another edition of Movie Review Monday!

This week's film is the recent fourth entry in the venerable Mad Max franchise, Mad Max: Fury Road, starring Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron.

This movie serves as a spiritual reboot and successor to the original three films, which starred Mel Gibson in the title role. It isn't retelling anything anything we've seen before but has the same character (Max) in the same setting (futuristic, dystopic Australia) simply just treading new thematic territory.

The plot surrounds Max (Hardy) once again a reluctant hero as he encounters a small group of females escaping their camp and being led by Imperator Furiosa (Theron). Furiosa's group is being chased across the desert by the camp's leader, Immortan Joe, and his crazed band of henchmen.

I really enjoyed this movie. It got a lot of positive buzz over the summer and I'm bummed I missed it in theaters. The visuals are amazing, the action is intense, and the story is great. Hardy and Theron carry the film well and the weird, wild universe they're put within is intriguing to explore. You really get invested by the end of the film, and the ending is very cathartic and well done.

You also don't need to watch any of the other Mad Max films to fully enjoy Fury Road, but if you do, you'll catch some nods to the past movies. I watched the original and the second in the series, and both were moderately enjoyable but Fury Road blows both of them away. It's unique, original, and entertaining, which is of course the most important thing.

While Mad Max: Fury Road isn't available on Netflix or Hulu, you can rent it now from whichever On Demand service you choose or you can get it at Redbox (which is what I did). It's well worth the rental!

Thanks for stopping by!