What Happened To Brian In The Forgotten 2 Fast 2 Furious Prequel Short?
What was Brian O'Conner doing between The Fast and the Furious and 2 Fast 2 Furious? This question was answered by a promotional short film titled The Turbo Charged Prelude for 2 Fast 2 Furious. It was released to select theaters as a special tie-in to the film and featured Paul Walker as Brian in the immediate aftermath of the first movie. It's since been included in many of the home releases for 2 Fast 2 Furious, though it has been largely forgotten by all but die-hard fans of the franchise.
The Fast and the Furious was a solid and entertaining riff on Point Break, and a big hit in its own right. The studio fast-tracked a sequel, but Vin Diesel, who plays Dominic Toretto, wasn't interested in coming back after reading the script. Instead the story focused entirely on Paul Walker's character, Brian O'Conner, and the studio brought in the late great John Singleton to direct it. While it was a considerable hit, it was also critically panned. Despite this, in recent years it's been reappraised by fans of the series as an important entry in the franchise, especially following Singleton's tragic death in 2019.
Though some fans have embraced 2 Fast 2 Furious, very few even know about the six-minute prequel film used to bridge the gap between the two entries. In it, Brian is seen thinking back on the ending of the first movie when he let Dominic Toretto escape the authorities. Doing this made O'Conner a wanted man, and he's seen fleeing his home as the police move in. He flees across the country, winning street races in a red Dodge Stealth as a means of making money. In Texas the cops get close to catching him, seizing his Dodge Stealth in the process. Thankfully a helpful stranger (Minka Kelly) lets him hitchhike with her to a used car lot, even though she knows he's a fugitive. There he buys a green Nissan Skyline, fixes it up, paints it silver, and makes his way to Miami where the short ends with him seeing some of the cars in the opening race of 2 Fast 2 Furious.
The short is, unfortunately, not very good. It's clear that it was done on the cheap and likely as an afterthought. Part of the problem with it is that it wasn't directed by Singleton, but rather by Philip G. Atwell, so it lacks the energy style that Singleton was able to bring to 2 Fast. It doesn't help that everything that's explained by the short are things that either could've been inferred by the audience (why was Brian in Miami?) or don't really need an answer (how did Brian get his Skyline?). The biggest fault of the short is that it is largely forgettable.
This period of time was interesting for the soon-to-end Fast Saga, as the studio didn't quite know what they had yet and were figuring out what the series should be. 2 Fast 2 Furious tried to shift the focus entirely onto Paul Walker to mixed results, but even so, Brian O'Conner was able to remain an important element of the series up until and even after Walker's tragic passing.