Roman Pearce is an essential part of the "Fast & Furious" family, and has undergone perhaps
the biggest character change in the franchise. This is his story, from his teen years growing up
alongside Brian O'Conner to his role as one of the most integral members of Dominic Toretto's crew.
Not much is known about Roman's youth, but it can be inferred that a life of crime was pretty much
always in the cards for him. Born and raised alongside Brian O'Conner in Barstow, California,
Roman and Brian were predisposed to getting into trouble. In high school,
their only wholesome activity seemed to be sports. However, it wasn't long before all that dried up,
and the duo found their way on the mean streets by being particularly good with cars.
However, somewhere along the line, the dynamic duo separated. While Brian decided to pursue a life in
law enforcement, Roman took the opposite path and got involved in a local car stealing operation.
One day, police raided his garage to find he was keeping stolen cars inside. He always
wondered if Brian ratted him out, and spent years behind bars and then under house arrest
asking himself that same question, over and over again. In the course of stewing
on whether his childhood friend betrayed him, he lost his trust in other people.
When the audience is introduced to Roman in "2 Fast 2 Furious," he's a very angry young man
who has a massive problem with authority, particularly the police,
and has no interest in reconnecting with Brian O'Conner.
After the events of "The Fast and the Furious," Brian O'Conner ends up on the run from the
law. He makes his way to Miami where he gets involved in the local street racing community,
but is eventually picked up by the FBI. Fortunately, his skills make him more
useful in the field than behind bars, and he is offered the job of posing undercover
as a driver for notorious drug kingpin Carter Verone — but he needs a partner.
It's unclear if his past with Roman weighs on his conscience, or if he just knows Roman is
the right man for the job. Regardless, Brian insists that his old buddy is the only one who
can assist him in his mission. He travels back to Barstow to find his friend under house arrest,
competing in a demolition derby. After three years behind bars,
Roman now lives in a trailer and supports himself with his derby winnings.
Brian offers him a chance to get off house arrest and have his criminal
record wiped clean by assisting the FBI. Roman ignores the deal at first,
but becomes enraged when Brian has the gall to call him by his nickname.
"Rome!"
"Only my homeboys call me Rome."
The two fight, and Brian is able to best his old friend,
who reluctantly agrees to take the deal. It isn't the last fight that Roman loses in the franchise,
and it certainly isn't the last thing he reluctantly agrees to do for Brian.
Although Roman is no stranger to the type of driving that this undercover mission requires,
he's definitely in over his head when it comes to the police work.
In his dealings with Verone, he's combative and even demands more money,
in a move that could absolutely sour the deal they've worked so hard to achieve.
Still, he manages to get hired alongside Brian for a job running cash for the criminal. However,
they both quickly realize things aren't what they seem. After discovering FBI trackers
in their cars and learning that officers are aware that Verone plans to kill his drivers as
soon as the job is done, they realize they have to take matters into their own hands.
The two boys from Barstow hatch a plan to get everyone in the Miami racing community to conduct
a big "scramble" of cars. Their intent is to cover their exit once the police start pursuing them and
the money. Their plan works, but it turns out that Verone gave them a dummy drop-off location.
Roman escapes clean, but he knows that Brian is caught in the hands of a madman with no backup.
This is when he makes the decision that changes his life forever: Roman goes back for his friend,
despite all the hard feelings he has about getting arrested, all those years ago.
Family never leaves a brother behind. Roman crashes his car into Brian's,
saving him from getting executed. The two then pursue Verone onto his yacht
by jumping their car directly onto it, causing Roman to break his arm.
Fortunately, they're able to take down Verone and make good on their deal with the FBI.
With their criminal records expunged,
Roman reveals that he hid some of Verone's money on his person,
rather than turning it in for evidence. With that, the reunited friends ride off into the sunset.
While the arc of "2 Fast 2 Furious" may look like a simple story of two friends reconciling,
their relationship ends up meaning more in the context of the larger franchise.
Brian reveals in the film that his decision to let Dom go rather than arrest him at the end of
"The Fast and the Furious" was motivated out of guilt over what happened to Roman years earlier.
Therefore, one could argue that the origin of the Fast family is rooted
in Roman and Brian's friendship, rather than Brian and Dom's. If Roman and Brian
hadn't had such a long history together, the group may well never have formed.
Roman doesn't return to the Fast franchise again until Brian and Dom are back together as criminal
partners on the wrong side of a wanted poster in "Fast Five." When a Brazilian crime lord pins
the murder of a DEA agent on them, they decide to rob him of $100 million. However, they need help.
Among the crack team members they bring in for the job is Roman Pearce,
the resident "talker." But Roman brings a lot more to the table than just his gift of gab.
He's proven he can fight, drive, and is up for the crazy stunts the group decides to pull off,
even if he is often the most reluctant to do so.
"This just went from Mission Impossible to Mission in-freaking-sanity."
That reluctance actually serves as an asset to the group, when Roman questions the real reason for
the score. Roman is unafraid to stand up to Dom, and suggests that while the money is definitely
tempting, it feels like Dom's motivation is personal. This forces Dom to get real with
the people he brought in, and to be completely open and transparent with them going forward.
It's also on this job that Roman's friendship with fellow Miami car enthusiast Tej becomes apparent.
Roman has everything he needs after the team's success in Brazil. He's fabulously rich,
owns a private jet, and even has access to rare and expensive cars. Moreover,
by this point, he's a full-fledged member of the family. So, even though he doesn't know Letty,
when Dom asks for his help, he travels to London to help rescue her. It helps that
Brian has worked out a deal for everyone to get full pardons in exchange for stopping
the criminal enterprise that Letty is working with. For Roman, this means fighting a tank.
The group eventually realizes that the leader of Letty's new gang, Owen Shaw, is trying to attack
a heavily armored convoy. Roman is out in front of everyone when a tank is revealed.
Although he's typically considered the reluctant and cowardly one in the group,
Roman steps up in a major way. In fact, he nearly sacrifices his life by getting out in front of the
tank and drawing its fire. He manages to dodge the blast, although his car is severely damaged. He
makes a daring escape by linking the dead-weight car to the tank and knocking it off a bridge.
In almost single-handedly taking out the tank,
Roman graduates to a whole new level of criminality and world-saving.
After narrowly avoiding being sucked into a jet engine while taking down Owen Shaw,
Roman and the rest of Dom's family are finally allowed to return to Los Angeles after helping
apprehend the terrorist. Life is grand ... until Owen Shaw's brother, Deckard, blows it up.
That's when Roman and the others are recruited by Mr. Nobody to help him find a piece of
revolutionary tracking technology, in exchange for revenge on Deckard. Always the skeptic,
Roman says that he's tired of taking orders and insists on revamping the government's plan.
However, the plan gets away from him, and Roman chickens out when tasked with parachuting out
of an airplane to attack an armored convoy. But Tej takes matters into his own hands and
manually ejects him. Although he drifts off course, causing him to show up a little late,
Roman arrives just in the nick of time to help their plan succeed.
Roman proves invaluable to the crew yet again in Abu Dhabi, when Brian,
Dominic, and Letty desperately need a distraction.
"Shine brightly, like only Roman Pearce can do.”
“HaHAA!”
With that, Roman picks up the microphone and successfully distracts the crowd with
an impromptu speech, before being accosted by security. Fortunately, by that time,
he's caused enough of a distraction for the rest of the team to pull off their mission,
and he and Letty are able to escape in the ensuing ruckus. Afterwards,
he rejoins the team as they head back to Los Angeles. There, his knowledge of the streets
he grew up on proves useful in outfoxing the terrorists using the tracking system.
At this point, Roman and the rest of the gang are a well-oiled, world-saving crime machine. That's
why he doesn't think twice about accepting a call from Dominic to get the band back together to
steal an EMP in Berlin in "Fate of the Furious." However, he is blindsided by Dominic betraying
them and running off to deliver the EMP to a new enemy named Cipher. Like the rest of the crew,
Roman is completely shocked by Dom's seemingly shifting allegiances. On top of that,
he feels insulted when he learns he just missed the Top 10 of Interpol's Most Wanted list.
"Top 10? That's all right."
"Well, not you, Roman."
"What do you mean?"
"You just missed the cut. You're number 11."
Still, despite Roman's personal feelings of disrespect,
he's all in for the mission. He suggests bringing in Brian, but he's reminded that
the group agreed at the end of "Furious 7" to leave him out of their dangerous lifestyle
from then on. Roman reluctantly agrees to let Mr. Nobody and Letty call the shots
as they chase Dominic to New York City, only for his vehicle to be incapacitated by Dom.
Even on the heels of yet another betrayal, Roman refuses to give up on family. He accompanies the
rest of the team to Russia to rescue Dominic from Cipher. Admittedly, the deal has been
sweetened a bit by the sleek Lamborghini that he's given to drive. In what are by far the most
daring conditions Roman has handled a vehicle in yet, he takes the bright orange sports car out
onto the ice as he attempts to outrun a moving submarine. Unfortunately, it doesn't work out,
and he loses yet another car. But he is able to take down a decent number of enemies before he's
rescued by Tej, and they're able to successfully save Dom and the rest of the world once again.
Just when it seems like there's nowhere else for Roman to go,
an old enemy from Dominc's past returns and forces the gang to new heights — literally. In
the trailers for 2021's "F9," we see Roman and Tej get even more experimental than they already have
by taking a car that has been attached to a rocket engine up into the atmosphere.
"Please tell me that's not a Pontiac Fiero strapped to a rocket engine?"
"Ahhh, I don't want to die!"
One wonders, as the movies continue, how much further Roman's story might go,
as the sky is clearly not the limit. Could the troubled young kid who was once busted
for stealing cars be headed on a world-saving mission to outer space? Only time will tell,
but if the past proves anything, it's that we should never underestimate Roman Pearce.
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