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LOS ANGELES — At the beginning of “Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga,” we are introduced to a kick-ass woman who rides a horse, then a motorbike, nails a few bad guys with sharpshooting finesse and fights off a mob. But it’s not Furiosa — it’s her mom. That's one of the oddities of this latest offering in the Mad Max Cinematic Universe: Creator and director George Miller has taken the coolest role of 2015's “Mad Max: Fury Road” and built a whole prequel around her yet has her overshadowed by everyone else.

The adult Furiosa — a coiled, clenched Anya Taylor-Joy — only appears after the first hour-mark — we get way too much preteen Furiosa — and she’s meek for another quarter of the film. We, frankly, wanted more. Charlize Theron as Furiosa promised a “Top Gun” swagger yet Taylor-Joy mostly does furious side eye.



What goes into making adult Furiosa is very unpleasant: She endures childhood kidnapping and torture, goes mute, passes herself as a boy, gets traded for gas, works her way up a madman's hierarchy and only in the final scenes does she have real agency. We do learn how her left hand was maimed and that she was sweet on a guy. But making her mute? In her own movie? Back are some familiar, scarred faces — Immortan Joe, The People Eater and a legion of half-naked War Boys.

The new mega villain is Chris Hemsworth's Dementus, who has a hunger for human blood sausage and a knack for spectacularly murdering people who Furiosa cares about. Miller has added.

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