Furiosa doesn’t just revisit established characters—it introduces some fantastic new faces. One of those new characters is Praetorian Jack (Tom Burke), Furiosa’s mentor and friend. Unfortunately, Jack isn’t in a great place by the end of the movie.
Warning: spoilers for Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga ahead!
Jack isn’t just a great character. He’s a great man. He’s smart, kind, and compassionate. He’s the kind of gentle hottie who, if you were living in the Wasteland, you would hold onto as tightly as you could and never let go. Which is precisely what Furiosa (Anya Taylor-Joy) does—or tries to, anyway.
However, although Furiosa promises to take Jack with her when she escapes and returns to the Green Land of Many Mothers, the two never make it there. Instead, they’re caught by Dementus (Chris Hemsworth), who sets out to punish them for interfering in his plans to take over Immortan Joe’s empire. While Furiosa is strung up by her injured arm (yeah, that arm), Jack is tied to the back of a motorcycle, whose driver starts riding in circles. While Jack is able to run behind the motorcycle at first, he eventually falls to the ground and gets dragged. That’s the last time we see him.
But … he could still make it, right? After all, “no body, no death” is a cardinal rule of action movies. Except we’ve already seen the movie that takes place after this one, and Jack ain’t in it.
As if that knowledge weren’t disheartening enough, Burke himself confirmed Jack’s death in an interview with GQ:
I actually never read the words, “He’s dead and she sees his dead lifeless corpse.” And eventually, it was about a week, I said, “George, I’m dead, aren’t I?” He’s like, “Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.” Because I thought, You never know, I could come back. He might not have any face left, but a lot of people in the Wasteland are like that.
Ouch, my heart! Jack without a face would have been better than nothing!
But hey, maybe we could get a prequel to the prequel. Anyone up for a Praetorian Jack origin story? I wouldn’t say no.
