Crew, I’m glad you could all make it to my barbecue. Now that I’ve said grace and we’ve all chugged eight Coronas, I can finally share my big, car-related news.
Effective today, I, Dominic Toretto, will only be driving this certified pre-owned 2019 Honda Odyssey minivan.
Quit laughing, Tej, this ain’t a joke. The dealer told me the prior owner was some old lady who kept this thing mint. Yeah, I’ll be losing a couple hundred horsepower and a little street cred, but hear me out. We’ve evolved over the past twenty years, and our vehicles should too. We used to just illegally street race with mid-tier rappers, but now we’re masters of international espionage. Hell, you and Roman even went to space for some reason in F9. Is a Honda Odyssey really as ludicrous as that?
Plus, I’ve always said nothing ain’t more important than family. So why the hell would I zip around in a two-seater Supra when I can tow the whole Toretto-O’Connor clan around in this big-ass van? This bitch has third-row seating.
Yeah, the Odyssey might not be as sexy as the Dodge Charger I drove out of an exploding plane in Furious 6. Who cares? Think of all the cargo space! Don’t you guys think our heists would go smoother if we had a vehicle with more utility?
Oh, and it has an integrated vacuum unit for the next time Han spills Goldfish crackers all over the front seat while drifting in a Tokyo parking garage. Bet you wish you’d had HondaVAC then, huh, Han?
I mean, I know I used to go on and on about a ten-second car, but ever since I became a parent, I’d kill for more than ten seconds to myself. The slow acceleration on this thing is actually a blessing—next time I need to run to Walmart and get a pack of apple slices for little Brian to take to karate, I got more me-time.
Also, did I mention the sweet entertainment system? Mia and Letty—when we’re hauling all the kids around, we can throw in that Paw Patrol DVD to shut them up.
Let’s face it, fam, it’s not 2001 anymore. Christ, I’m pushing sixty. Remember when we hijacked a Hummer full of heroin in Fast and Furious? The only drug in my car these days is the bottle of extra strength Aleve in the glovebox. Don’t get me wrong, I’m still a take-no-shit badass. Frankly, you need bulging muscles like mine to get those rear seats in and out. But I’m man enough to admit that if I have to drive directly down a thousand-foot cliffside, my lower back is happier with the smooth ride of the Odyssey than the painful jostling of a Chevy Stingray.
This van also has so many safety features. “Ride or die” doesn’t have to be literal with all the airbags in here. Maybe with Honda’s Collision Mitigation Braking System, I’ll finally own a car that will last more than the length of a ninety-minute movie.
I wish I had done this years ago. Remember when I was driving around the Arctic, and rammed into a truck full of missiles? Imagine if I’d had these heated leather seats for my frozen ass. Or when I defied gravity and physics and drove at full speed through the glass window of a skyscraper into the glass window of another adjacent skyscraper? The lane departure alert would have been a godsend!
Some things aren’t going to change. I’m still going to drive so recklessly that I cause a multi-car pileup just going to the Dairy Queen drive-thru. I’m going to sauce it up with nitrous, and I plan on installing a puke-green underglow and an obnoxious hood scoop the size of a capybara. In fact, I’m going to drive this motherfucker out of an exploding plane as soon as Honda’s seven-year/hundred-thousand-mile limited powertrain warranty has lapsed.
Fam, I’ve always said I live my life a quarter-mile at a time, and now it’s time to do that with comfort and practicality in my new-to-me Honda Odyssey.
