Every Fast & Furious Villain Ranked

Fast X is now playing in theaters, and it features Jason Momoa as Dante Reyes, the latest villain to go up against Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel) and the rest of his “family.” The newest installment is currently up on Rotten Tomatoes with a 53% critics score, but even some of the harshest reviews are praising Momoa’s performance and comparing him to the Joker. ComicBook.com‘s own Spencer Perry gave the movie a 2.5 out of 5, saying “Jason Momoa steals this bloated sequel.” In honor of the love Momoa is getting for the new film, we’ve decided to rank all of the villains in the franchise from 2001’s The Fast and the Furious to 2023’s Fast X and everything in between, including the spin-off film, The Fast and the Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw. Check out our rankings below…

11. Otto (F9)

F9 comes in last place on our villain ranking, because we’re not even sure who to call the official villain of the movie. Dominic Toretto’s long, lost brother Jakob Toretto (John Cena) is the main antagonist for most of the film, but he ends up joining his family to take down the real villains. Cipher (Charlize Theron) eventually gets the upper hand against Jakob, but she spends most of the movie in a box talking about Star Wars, so that just leaves us with Otto (Thue Ersted Rasmussen). 

Originally, Otto is teamed up with Jakob, but he betrays him for Cipher, who accidentally kills him when a drone she sends after Dom hits Otto instead. Otto’s plans to activate Project Aries are solely motivated by his desire to become more powerful than his father. Ultimately, Otto is just a daddy’s boy who is blipped out of existence by a superior villain from a previous film. Sorry, Otto, you’re not missed and your parties looked lame.

10. Takashi Kamata AKA Drift King (The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift)

If Otto was all about living up to Daddy, DK (Brian Tee) exists to impress his Uncle Kamata (Sonny Chiba). DK is just a high schooler who is playing at Yakuza, and his only real talent is driving in circles. He also decides Sean (Lucas Black) is his mortal enemy after one little confrontation as if there aren’t countless more interesting people roaming around Tokyo. Also, when you put him up against Han (Sung Kang), any authority he claims to have is just laughable. 

Chiba’s Uncle Kamata would have made for an infinitely more interesting villain, but he was too busy cleaning up his nephew’s messes. In fact, he’s incredibly reasonable when it comes to Sean and all of the local teen’s drifting shenanigans. 

9. Carter Verone (2 Fast 2 Furious)

Carter Verone (Cole Hauser) is just a run-of-the-mill gangster who is all flash and no substance. He has some good moments, like sending Brian (Paul Walker) and Roman (Tyrese Gibson) on a wild goose chase to prove their driving skills. He also does a good job of making us fear for the safety of undercover U.S. Customs agent Monica Fuentes (Eve Mendes). Pros: He’s not an insufferable daddy’s boy. Cons: He wastes very expensive cigars AND throws them on the ground on his own property.

When it comes down to it, one of the main reasons Verone is so low on our list is because he’s an Agentine-American drug lord played by an actor of German, Irish, and Jewish descent. Hauser does a fine job, but the casting of this role did not age well. 

8. Johnny Tran (The Fast and the Furious)

Johnny Tran (Rick Yune) may be the original villain of the franchise, but he’s also one of the more forgettable characters. He’s definitely cool and knows how to drive, but when you think about The Fast and the Furious, it’s all about the relationship between Dom and Brian. The outside antagonistic forces like Tran and the cops only serve as catalysts who help bring the original Fast duo together. 

Tran does get some major villain bonus points for killing Jesse (Chad Lindberg). There have been so many over-the-top deaths in the Fast Saga, but Jesse’s was a realistic gut punch that plays way differently than most of the deaths that followed. While Tran isn’t as fun or powerful as some of the upcoming villains on our list, he’s one of the most grounded.  

7. Arturo Braga (Fast & Furious)

John Ortiz is a great actor, which is almost to Arturo Braga’s detriment. For most of Fast & Furious, Braga is pretending to be his own right-hand man, Ramon Campos. The movie really hinges on the build-up of Braga’s identity, so when it’s finally revealed that he was Campos the whole time, we’re left thinking he was just a little too believable as a number two man. 

Braga certainly does some damage, but despite being the leader of a drug cartel, he’s not exactly a man of action. In fact, when he returns in Fast & Furious 6, he brings a whole posse with him to threaten Brian in prison, but Brian takes them all down and gets the information he needs from Braga with very little effort. All of that being said, Braga would be a fun person to see again in the final film(s).

6. Owen Shaw (Fast & Furious 6)

In this house, we stan Luke Evans, but Owen Shaw is easily the least-interesting member of the Shaw family. It’s very obvious that Owen’s entire purpose in Fast & Furious 6 is to set up the debut of his brother, Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham). Owen did some interesting things like help Braga rise to power, and he’s a nasty boy for taking advantage of Letty Ortiz’s (Michelle Rodriguez) memory loss, but most of the movie’s badass villain moments were done by his crew. 

Fast & Furious 6 has some of the best hand-to-hand fighting scenes of the franchise, but Owen doesn’t get his hands dirty enough. Like most of the aforementioned villains on this list, Owen’s goals are mostly about making money, which just isn’t as interesting as motivations of revenge or cyberterrorism. However, we would love to see a full-blown Shaw family reunion before the franchise is done. 

5. Cipher (The Fate of the Furious)

Now, if we were ranking hairstyles in the Fast Saga, Cipher (Charlize Theron) would be dead last. While some fans might find her ranking on this list controversial, we can’t help but love everything Cipher is about. She is a literal tech genius who has her own submarine. That’s pretty darn cool. Also, she’s played by an Oscar winner who is clearly enjoying her time in the franchise.

Cipher is the smartest villain Dom’s crew has ever faced. She managed to get Dom to turn against his whole family, and she was pretty ruthless along the way. While Fast X made Cipher a bit of an anti-hero, we can’t imagine the “family” will ever fully let her in considering she ordered the killing of Elena (Elsa Pataky), the mother of Dom’s son. However, we’re here for her current alliance with Letty and look forward to seeing them team up with you-know-who. 

4. Hernan Reyes (Fast Five)

It’s a popular opinion that Fast Five is the best movie of the franchise, and Hernan Reyes (Joaquim de Almeida) is easily the most menacing drug lord of the bunch. As the kingpin of Rio’s criminal underworld, Reyes is also the most powerful man Dom and his family had gone up against at this point in the films. The stakes were high and certainly extreme, but Reyes was still the last villain to bring a sliver of realism to the Fast Saga before it went full ham (we’ll let you decide if that’s a positive or a negative). 

Reyes is one of the scariest villains on the roster, but there’s no way he could have taken on any of our heroes one-on-one and he’s not a lot of fun, which is why he didn’t make it into the top three. 

3. Brixton Lore (The Fast and the Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw)

Fast Saga fans have a lot of hate for Hobbs & Shaw, but there’s no denying Brixton (Idris Elba) is a top-notch villain. While some might find the addition of a superhuman to be a bit over the top, we don’t believe “over the top” is a term one can apply to this franchise. Brixton has mechanical implants, optical and physical enhancements, and prosthetic limbs, which makes him “Black Superman” and a mighty opponent for Shaw and Luke Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson). Not to mention his super cool, bendy motorbike. Brixton was modified by Eteon, who sends him off to retrieve “The Snowflake,” a virus that will be used to kill off half the population.

No matter how you feel about the spin-off film, it’s impossible to have a bad time watching Elba work. We loved seeing him go all out as a super soldier and we can’t be bothered to care how unbelievably goofy his motivations were. However, we are still waiting to find out about the mysterious voice who was pulling Brixton’s strings. Hobbs & Shaw deserves a sequel, sorry not sorry. 

2. Deckard Shaw (Furious 7)

Deckard Shaw is basically the Loki of the Fast Saga, which is why he didn’t quite make it to the number one spot on our list. He’s an absolute thrill as the villain of Furious 7, but he’s spent too much of his time in the franchise as a good guy to earn the top spot. However, if you just focus on the seventh installment, Deckard is easily one of the best villains Dom has ever faced. 

First, the opening scene where he crushes through a hospital is delightfully bonkers. The man just keeps showing up to wreak havoc and we love him for it. He’s a former British military officer and assassin turned mercenary, and his revenge motivation makes him especially threatening. He puts Hobbs in the hospital, blows up Dom’s house, kills Han (or so we thought at the time), and follows Dom all around the world trying to kill him… all because he loves his little brother. Deckard Shaw, you will always be famous. 

1. Dante Reyes (Fast X)

If you’ve seen Fast X, you know there was absolutely no way Jason Momoa’s Dante Reyes wasn’t going to be anything less than number one on this list. Just like Deckard, Dante comes onto the scene to get revenge on Dom. Dante is the son of Fast Five‘s Hernan Reyes, which means he blames Dom and his crew for the loss of his money and his father. Hobbs may have pulled the trigger in Fast Five, but Dante puts all of his efforts into making sure Dom is the one who suffers. 

While Deckard had a chance to redeem himself, we cannot imagine the next movie will let Dante be anything other than the villain. First of all, he’s absolutely insane. There’s a reason he keeps being compared to the Joker, and it’s not just because of his flamboyant outfits (although, those are amazing). This scrunchy-wearing, nail-painting, “enchanté”-spouting maniac is the best thing that could have happened to this franchise eleven movies in. There are rumors that the next movie will no longer be the last, and we’re 100% here for that plan as long as Momoa keeps coming back. 

Do you agree or disagree with our Fast Saga villains ranking? Tell us your thoughts and your own personal rankings in the comments!