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Fast & Furious’ Lowest-Grossing Movie Explains Why The Saga Hasn’t Been About Cars For 15 Years
Summary
The Fast & Furious series has shifted focus from car racing to action, with Tokyo Drift being the lowest-grossing installment.
Tokyo Drift’s failure prompted the franchise to move away from street racing and towards more traditional action film elements.
Fast & Furious successfully shifted the franchise’s direction away from racing, towards bigger budgets and grander scales.
The Fast & Furious saga has not exactly been about cars for quite some time, and the franchise’s lowest-grossing installment seems to explain why. Every time the Fast & Furious franchise pops up, it is hard not to think about car racing, exotic supercars, and Vin Diesel’s signature quotes about family. While Vin Diesel’s quotes and overall hard-as-nails leader persona have not changed much as the movie franchise has progressed, Fast & Furious has seemingly shifted its focus from thrilling races to sensational action set pieces in recent years.
Given the franchise’s worldwide popularity, many factors may have contributed to these changes. Owing to this, one may not be able to pinpoint the precise reason why the Fast & Furious franchise changed its narrative direction. However, the lowest-grossing film in the Fast & Furious series might provide some answers to why the films are now less about racing and more about heists and across-the-globe action.
Tokyo Drift Is Fast & Furious’ Lowest-Grossing Movie
The Fast & the Furious: Tokyo Drift grossed $158.9 million worldwide
Since it has been around for over two decades, it is not surprising that the Fast & Furious franchise has had a fair share of ups and downs, highs and lows at the box office. Although the franchise is still fairly profitable, its recent installments have offered diminishing returns. However, despite the franchise’s dwindling box office numbers, none of its installments have had a box office as low as The Fast & the Furious: Tokyo Drift. The first movie in the franchise, The Fast & the Furious, was a success after it raked in $207.5 million at the worldwide box office against a budget of $38 million.
Even the second film in the franchise, 2 Fast 2 Furious, proved profitable after it grossed $236.3 million globally on a budget of $76 million. The third installment was expected to continue this trend, with its relatively higher budget of $85 million. However, despite having a bigger budget than its predecessors, Tokyo Drift could not continue the franchise’s trend of getting higher returns with each new installment. Eight new Fast & Furious movies have come out since Tokyo Drift’s release, and none of them even come close to matching its low box office scores.
Fast & Furious Movie Budget Worldwide Box Office The Fast & the Furious $38 million $207,517,509 2 Fast 2 Furious $76 million $236,350,661 The Fast & the Furious: Tokyo Drift $85 million $158,964,610 Fast & Furious $85 million $360,366,870 Fast Five $125 million $626,137,675 Fast & Furious 6 $160 million $788,680,968 Furious 7 $190 million $1,515,341,399 The Fate of the Furious $250 million $1,236,005,118 Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw $200 million $760,732,926 F9 $200 million $726,229,501 Fast X $340 million $714,555,549 Total $1.749 billion $7,476,903,108
Tokyo Drift Is The Street Racing-Focused Movie Many Want Fast & Furious To Be
Tokyo Drift is the most “Fast & Furious” movie in the franchise
Even to this day, theFast & Furiousfranchise is associated with fancy cars and white-knuckling street races. However, one look at the recent movies in the franchise will reveal that its focus has drifted away from what it used to be about. While it still features high-octane car chases and expensive cars, the “racing” element seems missing. Given how street car races in the early installments of the film franchise played a crucial role in drawing audiences to it,Tokyo Driftarguably is amongFast & Furious’ better installments because it offers everything from drift competitions to intense underground racing scenes.
Christopher Nolan once said (via
Collider
) that he has a “soft spot” for Tokyo Drift.
Storytelling has never been the Fast & Furious franchise’s strongest suit. However, in some ways, Tokyo Drift also has a more relatable storyline than other films because its narrative primarily revolves around an underdog street racer who beats the bad guy in the film’s climax. The recent Fast & Furious movies are far superior when it comes to having an ensemble cast and high production value. However, they often prioritize spectacle over substance, sacrificing the simpler elements that made the first few films successful.
Related Vin Diesel’s Fast & Furious Ending Promise Means The Franchise Must Avoid 1 Major Temptation Fast 11 will be the last installment in the main Fast & Furious franchise, and in order to end it properly, one huge temptation must be avoided.
Tokyo Drift’s Box Office Performance Prompted Fast & Furious To Change
Tokyo Drift’s failures triggered the franchise to move away from street racing
After Tokyo Drift’s inability to top or even match its predecessors’ success, the fourth installment in the film franchise, Fast & Furious, marked the return of the original cast. Since Tokyo Drift’s underwhelming box office numbers established that the film franchise worked better when it did not primarily focus on underground car racing, 2009’s Fast & Furious focused less on those elements and presented itself as a regular action film. Although Fast & Furious did not entirely shed the franchise’s roots in car culture, it paved the way for a new narrative direction for the movie series.
Fast & Furious proved that even though Tokyo Drift’s grounded storyline and underground street races had their charm, they did not have the blockbuster pull the franchise needed to maintain momentum.
Fast & Furious’s formula even worked wonders for the franchise, given how it earned almost twice as much as Tokyo Drift at the global box office despite having the same budget. With this, Fast & Furious proved that even though Tokyo Drift’s grounded storyline and underground street races had their charm, they did not have the blockbuster pull the franchise needed to maintain momentum. As a result, Fast & Furious became the blueprint for the franchise, resulting in Fast Five and the subsequent films repeating its formula with bigger budgets and even grander scale.
Related Every Fast & Furious Movie Ranked From Worst to Best From B-movie roots to Fast X, here is every Fast and the Furious movie ranked from worst to best, through ridiculous stunts and family themes.
Fast & Furious Was Never The Same After Fast Five
Fast Five marked the inception of a new era for the franchise
After adopting everything that made 2009’s Fast & Furious successful and becoming the first film in the franchise to cross the $500 million box office mark, Fast Five proved that the franchise had to rinse and repeat the 2009 film’s winning recipe. Owing to this, with each installment, the Fast & Furious franchise only drifted further away from its core identity, which revolved around racing and car culture. Although recent movies in the Fast & Furious franchise have not been performing as well as expected, it seems like it is too late for the 11th movie to take a U-turn and experiment with a return to its roots.
The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift is the third installment in the Fast and Furious franchise. Tokyo Drift follows Sean Boswell, a car-loving teenager shipped off to live with his Navy lieutenant father in Tokyo when his racing antics find him running foul of the law. When Sean discovers Tokyo’s nightlife, he embraces the dangerous underground world of drift racing.Release Date June 4, 2006 Studio(s) Universal Pictures , Relativity Media Distributor(s) Universal Pictures Writers Chris Morgan Cast Lucas Black , Bow Wow , Sung Kang , Brian Tee , Nathalie Kelley , Sonny Chiba , Leonardo Nam , Brian Goodman Runtime 104 Minutes Budget $85 Million
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Fast & Furious 11 Release Delay & Filming Start Date Confirmed By Director
Summary
Fast and Furious 11
is facing a release date delay to Summer 2026 due to strikes, with director Louis Leterrier confirming the sequel will not be hitting its April 4, 2025 date.
Leterrier also confirms that filming starts in Fall 2025 after finishing a horror movie in September.
The final installment in the
Fast Saga
reunites Vin Diesel’s Dominic Toretto for one last ride, while also leaving the door open for other spinoffs.
After facing multiple delays due to the 2023 SAG-AFTRA and Writers Guild of America strikes, Fast and Furious 11 is seeing its release date delayed. The next installment in the Vin Diesel-fronted franchise is expected to be the last mainline sequel, while development continues on the Dwayne Johnson-led spinoff Hobbs & Reyes, a mysterious standalone movie penned by Fast X’s Zach Dean and a potential female-led spinoff. While a filming start date was never confirmed, Universal had previously set the movie for an April 2025 release date.
During a recent interview with Collider at a CCXP MX panel, Louis Leterrier was asked for an update on Fast and Furious 11. The director went on to confirm that the final mainline installment in the action franchise will no longer be making its April 4, 2025 release date, instead now aiming for a Summer 2026 release window with the filming start date being set for this fall. Check out what Leterrier said below:
It’s happening. It’s happening very, very soon. I’m able to shoot a little horror movie this summer. I’m finishing my horror movie on September 15th, and I start Fast on September 16th.
Will Fast 11’s Multiple Delays Help Or Hurt The Sequel?
Much like the tenth film before it, Fast and Furious 11 has faced a few behind-the-scenes hardships in its road to getting off the ground, namely the delays stemming from the 2023 strikes. While the latest movie seems to have retained its core creative team in comparison to the shift in directors from franchise vet Justin Lin to Leterrier on Fast X after reported creative differences between the former and Diesel, this change didn’t seem to help much with the continued downward trend recent sequels have seen from critics. Check out how the franchise’s Rotten Tomatoes scores compare below:
Title RT Critical Score RT Audience Score The Fast and the Furious 54% 74% 2 Fast 2 Furious 37% 50% The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift 37% 69% Fast & Furious 28% 67% Fast Five 78% 83% Fast & Furious 6 71% 84% Furious 7 81% 82% The Fate of the Furious 67% 72% Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw 67% 88% F9: The Fast Saga 59% 82% Fast X 56% 84%
Even looking outside the Fast and Furious franchise, many movie sequels have found themselves hurt by various delays, be they from creative changes, general release shifts or other factors. The action genre in particular is one in which lengthier development periods can lead to diminishing returns, be it A Good Day to Die Hard, Rambo: Last Blood or Diesel’s own xXx: The Return of Xander Cage. While Fast and Furious 11 may only be getting pushed back by a year, the delay is nonetheless a concern that the final installment could find itself in trouble.
On the other hand, the longer wait for Fast and Furious 11 to close out the mainline series of movies could actually prove beneficial for the sequel. Though Leterrier may be busy with another project in the lead-up to filming the next installment, writers Oren Uziel and Christina Hodson should now have more than enough time to really look back at the script and ensure it learns from the critical missteps of recent installments to deliver a satisfying conclusion to the Dominic Toretto saga.
Source: Collider
Fast and Furious 11 Fast and Furious 11 is the final movie in the Fast Saga. It reunites Vin Diesel’s Dominic Toretto with the rest of the cast for one last ride. However, the franchise is open for spinoff films like Hobbs & Shaw afterward.Director Louis Leterrier Release Date April 4, 2025 Distributor(s) Universal Pictures Writers Christina Hodson , Oren Uziel
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Vin Diesel Already Has His Perfect Fast & Furious Replacement Franchise With 51-Year-Old Remake
Summary
Vin Diesel’s dominance in Fast & Furious is ending, but Kojak could kick off a new action franchise for him.
Kojak’s reboot faces an uncertain future, but its similarity to Fast & Furious makes it a worthy project for Diesel.
Diesel’s potential shift from criminal racer to cop signifies a fresh start in a possible Fast & Furious-like series.
Vin Diesel’s days of playing Dominic Toretto are numbered, but the actor has already found his perfect Fast & Furious replacement. Diesel found a major breakout role in the early 2000s thanks to participating in The Fast and the Furious. The original 2001 street racing crime movie became the springboard for a sprawling franchise that has lasted for over two decades. The success of the Fast & Furious movies transformed Vin Diesel’s career, turning him into an even bigger star, especially in the action movie genre. But, Fast & Furious 11 is planned as the final chapter for him and the franchise.
The Fast & Furious franchise’s end will put Vin Diesel in an unfamiliar position of not having a major franchise to lean back on. This presents the actor with various options, such as changing the course of his career to pursue non-franchise roles. However, the more likely outcome is that Diesel will attempt to find a new IP that can replace Fast & Furious. He has had trouble in that regard recently, with franchises like xXx or Riddick running cold and Bloodshot and The Last Witch Hunter failing to launch franchises. There is another option for Diesel, though.
2:03 
Kojak Can Be Vin Diesel’s New Action Crime Franchise After Fast & Furious
Diesel Has Been Developing The Reboot Since 2015
The impending conclusion of the Fast & Furious franchise means it is finally time for Vin Diesel’s Kojak reboot to get off the ground. The project was announced back in 2015 with Diesel re-teaming with Universal Pictures, the studio behind Fast & Furious, to develop a movie based on Kojak. The original TV series starred Telly Savalas as Theo Kokaj and ran for three seasons after debuting in 1973. The series revolves around Kojak, a New York detective known for being willing to go beyond the law and a love for cars and lollipops, and follows him as he investigates different cases.
Kojak was rebooted in 2005 as a TV show starring Ving Rhames, but it only ran for six episodes
Development on Vin Diesel’s Kojak movie has not been very active in the nine years since it was announced. However, it still maintains the base similarities to Fast & Furious, which makes the project a worthwhile endeavor for Diesel in terms of finding a new action franchise. He would now have another big action series about cars and crime, essentially making Kojak into a newer version of Fast & Furious. The irony here is that Diesel takes on the role of a cop after playing criminal racer Dominic Toretto.
Vin Diesel’s Involvement Can Morph Kojak Into A Major Action Franchise
Kojak Could Be A Fast & Furious Clone
Looking at the original TV show, Kojak might not necessarily project to be a major blockbuster action franchise akin to Fast & Furious. The TV series was relatively grounded and small due to the nature of its production. However, the fact that Diesel and Universal pinpointed this property as something they wanted to revive together is telling. The announcement of Kojak’s reboot came months after Furious 7 debuted in theaters and took the franchise to new heights at the box office and in terms of how ridiculously big the action and story could get.
It’s sometimes difficult to remember that Fast & Furious started off with a story about DVD thieves who were also street racers before Diesel helped turn it into something much bigger. With that experience and success already behind him, it would be understandable if a similar path was envisioned for Kojak. The series could then morph into a Fast & Furious clone, one that gives Vin Diesel a new franchise to headline and Universal a “fresh” action franchise to grow.
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The Rock’s WWE Run Means Fast & Furious 11 Must Make 1 Major Hobbs Change
Summary
Hobbs from Fast & Furious 11 needs a gritty edge like The Rock’s WWE character to keep the franchise fresh and exciting.
The Rock’s time away from the Fast & Furious universe provides the perfect reason for Hobbs to return with a personal vendetta and a more savage attitude.
While Hobbs shouldn’t become a full-fledged villain in Fast & Furious 11, adding some edginess and dirty tricks could make his character more intriguing and dynamic.
Fast & Furious 11 must make one major Hobbs change after The Rock’s incredible WWE run. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s WWE return surpassed his recent movies, with the actor creating some of the best work of his career. Having returned to a thunderous reception, The Rock was able to flip the crowd’s reception by becoming a heel and playing a major part in WrestleMania’s main events. The Rock hasn’t played a villain on screen for years, as even his depiction of Black Adam lent more into the character’s anti-hero side, which made his wrestling run all the more refreshing.
While his wrestling character may not perfectly translate into the Fast & Furious universe, there is one aspect of The Rock’s WWE run that the franchise should attempt to implement. After debuting in Fast Five, The Rock’s best Fast & Furious scenes helped contribute to the movie series becoming so popular, with Luke Hobbs becoming an instrumental part of the story. He was even given his own spinoff alongside Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham) and is set to get a solo movie in the future. Despite this, Hobbs would still benefit from adding one key aspect of The Rock’s WWE run.
The Rock’s WWE Run Proves Fast & Furious 11 Needs To Give Hobbs More Of An Edge
Fast & Furious Would Benefit From Hobbs Adopting Some Of The Rock’s WWE Tendancies
Given how electrifying The Rock’s recent WWE run was, there is no doubt Fast & Furious 11 needs to give Hobbs more of an edge. Although the character has had his more serious moments, like most of the Fast & Furious cast, Hobbs tends to mix action with comedy. Hobbs and Shaw are supposed to be two of the more stoic heroes, yet they are constantly at each other’s throats and cracking jokes to help maintain the franchise’s lighthearted core. However, giving Hobbs a grittier side would help the character thrive upon his return.
The Rock’s Fast & Furious return may redeem Fast X’s box office, but the character needs to come back stronger than ever. By allowing him to be more ruthless, he can still maintain some elements of comedy but also become more interesting in the process. Johnson proved that despite being a detestable heel, he was still as hilarious as ever during his recent WWE tenure. This proves that he can maintain Fast & Furious’ tone and humorous style while being more layered; therefore, Hobbs adopting some of The Rock’s WWE characteristics could make him even more entertaining.
Fast & Furious Already Has A Reason For Hobbs To Be More Savage
Hobbs Has Been Away From The Franchise For Several Years
Making a major change to Hobbs’ character could be tough to explain, but Fast & Furious 11 already has a great reason to make him more savage. His four-year absence from the franchise gives him a perfect excuse to come back with a vengeance and potentially have a personal attachment to Fast & Furious 11’s villains. Hobbs’ time away from the main story could be explained through a connection to Fast X’s secondary villain, Aimes. Aimes’ villain twist in Fast X was well executed and suggests he’ll be around for the sequel, which is the perfect reason to bring back Hobbs.
Having a more personal story with one of the villains could allow Hobbs to continue his great quips and one-liners, but it would also give him more of an edge.
Fast X never explained why he’s back, but having a personal vendetta against Aimes could be an intriguing reason. Given Dom and Dante are the focal point of the franchise’s conclusion, Hobbs returning to take down Aimes would avoid overshadowing the main story while still giving him an interesting role. Having a personal story with one of the villains could allow Hobbs to continue his great quips and one-liners, while also giving him more of an edge. This provides The Rock with the perfect reason to implement some of his heel traits while still portraying a morally good hero.
2:34 
Related Predicting The Ending Of All 13 Fast & Furious Characters In Fast 11 The Fast Saga is set to conclude with Fast & Furious 11 – or Fast X 2 – but how will Dom Toretto and his family’s stories come to a definitive end?
Why Fast & Furious Can’t Bring The Rock Back As A Villain
Hobbs Already Appeared As An Antagonist In Fast Five
Custom image by Debanjana Chowdhury
Although The Rock’s villainous tendencies worked well in the WWE, Fast & Furious can’t bring him back as an antagonist. Johnson already played the main villain of Fast Five, as Hobbs was originally an enemy of Dom and his crew before becoming an ally. Hobbs’ role in Fast Five was one of his best, but despite being the main antagonist, he always had a level of integrity. Dropping all of this to make him a villain in the final movie would be completely unnecessary, especially as the franchise needs him to remain a hero for his spinoff.
Fast & Furious 11 may end the main story, but The Rock will be part of the franchise beyond this, and altering his character so drastically wouldn’t make any sense. Instead, adding some extra edge to his character would have the same effect and would avoid stealing the thunder from Dante and Aimes. Although Fast & Furious 11 shouldn’t make him a villain, the film can still allow Hobbs to play dirty and pull some cheap tricks in order to show a grittier side, while letting him taunt his enemies when he inevitably helps save the day.
Fast & Furious 11
is scheduled to be released in theaters on April 4, 2025.
Fast and Furious 11 Fast and Furious 11 is the final movie in the Fast Saga. It reunites Vin Diesel’s Dominic Toretto with the rest of the cast for one last ride. However, the franchise is open for spinoff films like Hobbs & Shaw afterward.Director Louis Leterrier Release Date April 4, 2025 Distributor(s) Universal Pictures Writers Christina Hodson , Oren Uziel
Fast & Furious 11 Release Delay & Filming Start Date Confirmed By Director
Vin Diesel Already Has His Perfect Fast & Furious Replacement Franchise With 51-Year-Old Remake
The Rock’s WWE Run Means Fast & Furious 11 Must Make 1 Major Hobbs Change
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