A teaser has launched for the Fast & Furious 9 trailer ahead of its release and live concert next week. Paramount has yet to begin marketing the ninth Fast & Furious movie, which is odd considering it comes out in May. Most of the other big studio films opening that month - like Marvel's Black Widow and WB's animated Scooby-Doo reboot Scoob! - are already well into their promotional campaigns, having dropped their trailers in the final quarter of 2019. Perhaps in an effort to make up for lost time, the Fast & Furious 9 marketing will start things off a little differently.

Back in December, Paramount announced it would be debuting the Fast & Furious 9 trailer on Friday, January 31, as part of a live concert in Miami. The event will include appearances by Fast & Furious mainstay Ludacris and Cardi B (who's costarring in Fast & Furious 9), among other musical artists associated with the Fast & Furious brand. And just in case you'd forgotten about that, the studio has unveiled a new video as a reminder.

The Fast & Furious 9 teaser went live today, confirming fans can follow the trailer premiere live via The Fast Saga's YouTube and social media channels. You can watch the video below.


Timing-wise, the Fast & Furious 9 trailer will arrive a day before 2019's spinoff, Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw, dropped its own trailer last year. Hobbs & Shaw didn't open until the following August, but it arguably needed the extra time to hype the franchise's first spinoff. Fast & Furious 9 is more of a surefire bet by comparison, coming off Furious 7 and The Fate of the Furious' respective $1.51 billion and $1.24 billion worldwide grosses. At the same time, this also means the commercial expectations are higher for this installment than they were for Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham's team-up adventure. As such, Paramount mostly stands to benefit from making a bigger show of the Fast & Furious 9 marketing kicking off.

Fast & Furious 9 is being positioned as the penultimate non-spinoff in the franchise, with the plan being to wrap things up with Fast & Furious 10. That's probably a smart move too, considering the critical response to Fate of the Furious (while positive overall) suggested the property might be starting to run out of fuel at this stage. Fortunately, Justin Lin - who helmed most of the best-received Fast & Furious movies so far - is back directing Fast & Furious 9, with Johnson sitting the film out ahead of a possible return in Fast & Furious 10. That should allow the movie to really focus in again on Vin Diesel's Dominic Toretto and his family as they go up against whatever threat the world throws their way next. And this time, they might have more to worry about than Charlize Theron with a new hairdo.

Fast & Furious 9 (2020)
Release Date: May 22, 2020