Who Is Rictus Erectus in ‘Furiosa’?

Furiosa has landed! The latest installment in the Mad Max series revisits some unforgettable characters, like Immortan Joe’s sons: Scabrous Scrotus, Corpus Colossus, and Rictus Erectus. Those are their actual names! Isn’t Mad Max great?

So who are these fine young fellows? Let’s focus on the youngest of Immortan Joe’s adult sons, Rictus Erectus (Nathan Jones).

Warning: this article contains spoilers for Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.

Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga is a prequel to Mad Max: Fury Road, focusing on the abduction and early years of Furiosa (Anya Taylor-Joy). As Furiosa grows up in the Wasteland, she’s buffeted between the feuding warlords Immortan Joe (Lachy Hulme) and Dementus (Chris Hemsworth).

Rictus Erectus is identifiable in Furiosa and Mad Max: Fury Road by his imposing height and shaved head. He’s also the least smart of Joe’s sons. In Fury Road, his main duty is chasing down Furiosa and Joe’s stolen war rig in order to get his father’s wives back. One of those wives is pregnant, and Rictus is devastated when, dying, she delivers a stillborn baby boy.

Rictus Erectus isn’t a nice guy in Fury Road. In Furiosa, though, he reveals a newer, more revolting side of his character.

In Furiosa, Furiosa is taken to Immortan Joe’s citadel as a child, where she lives at first among Joe’s wives. Furiosa doesn’t even have time to worry about the day when Joe himself will inevitably start using her as a breeder. Rictus takes a liking to her first. Knowing he’s going to come after her, Furiosa shaves her head and turns her hair into a wig. When Rictus takes her and starts to play with the bells in her hair, she uses the wig to slip out of his grasp and run away. From then on, she disguises herself as a mute boy, and grows up as a mechanic in Joe’s empire.

As for Rictus? He eventually gets his comeuppance in Fury Road, going out in a blaze of glory, when Furiosa (Charlize Theron), Max (Tom Hardy), and the war boy Nux (Nicholas Hoult) defeat Joe’s forces once and for all.