On Friday,Mad Max: Fury RoaddirectorGeorge Milleropened up about his 2015Mad Maxsequel during a recent in-depth interview. Miller devoted some time during the hour-long chat to discussing the true hero ofFury Road,Charlize Theron’s Furiosa, and what fate he envisioned for the character after the final showdown against Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne). Never one to play it safe, Miller’s answers about the fates he’s thought of for Furiosa will surprise you.
Miller shared his Furiosa future ideas with his interviewer, MTV and Happy Sad Confused podcast hostJosh Horowitz, during aFury Roadanniversary interview for ReedPop’s Metaverse at this year’s virtual New York Comic-Con. After a far-reaching discussion aboutFury Road’s intense production, the casting, and beyond, Horowitz asked Miller for his thoughts on what the director believes happens to Furiosa after the credits roll. Miller offered up two interesting options.
“There’s two ways to go. One is utopian. I imagined the first thing she’d do in line with that is go up and release the water,” Miller offered, likening it to something likeMad Max’s version of the New Deal. The director also shared a second and likelier option in his opinion, citing authorJoseph Campbellto explain how Furiosa would likely devolve into tyranny: “Campbell said that the usual story is that today’s hero becomes tomorrow’s tyrant. The hero is the agent of change. They basically relinquish self-interest in order for some common good. [Campbell] basically says … you love what you’ve built, or saved, too much. You become holdfast. You become the orthodoxy. You develop the dogma and basically then you have to protect it. That tends to be the rhythm of these things.”
Thankfully, though, Miller doesn’t seem to have completely convinced himself Furiosa would really go full-on tyrant. As he told Horowitz, “I think she’s too smart to fall into that trap. She’s already seen it with the Immortan Joe. I believe he went through the same process. He was probably a heroic character in his own time.”
The idea of Furiosa completely devolving into tyranny after proving herself a hero inFury Roadis most definitely an interesting idea and one that would add some nice layers onto an already complex, compelling action hero. Chances are slim we’ll see what Furiosa’s future holds because, if things come together, we’ll likelyget a prequelfor the character first. That project is still very much in development, so keep your fingers crossed.
You can check out Josh Horowitz’s full New York Comic-Con interview with George Miller below. For more, check out ourranking of Charlize Theron’s best moviesandTheron’s own reflections on Furiosashared in an interview from earlier this year.
Allie Gemmill is the Weekend Contributing Editor for Collider. You can follow them on Twitter@_matineeidle.
