Original Fast & Furious Director Wants to Return For Final Film

The Fast and The Furious director Rob Cohen wants to return to helm the forthcoming final installment in the long-running series, Fast & Furious 10. Cohen directed the 2001 Fast & Furious film based on a script by Gary Scott Thompson (Hollow Man) and David Ayer (Suicide Squad), with a story by Thompson. The film was inspired by the Vibe magazine article “Racer X,” which documented street racing in New York City, yet it was an original story that ended up spawning one of the most commercially successful franchises in cinema history.


The first Fast & Furious film wasn’t exactly a critical success, but it earned a whopping $207.3 million globally against an estimated production budget of $38 million. That was enough to spawn a sequel, 2 Fast 2 Furious, and a spinoff, Tokyo Drift. But Universal didn’t really start to see the franchise’s potential until Justin Lin directed the series’ quasi-reboot in 2009, Fast & Furious (after directing Tokyo Drift). From then on, a Fast & Furious film has released every two years, with Lin directing each installment except the last two. The franchise ended up peaking with 2015’s Furious 7, which earned an astonishing $1.516 billion at the worldwide box office. And now, Cohen is hoping to return to helm the series’ upcoming final installment, Fast & Furious 10.


In an interview with Screen Crush for his latest movie, Hurricane Heist, Rob Cohen briefly discussed the Fast & Furious franchise, as well as his hopes to direct Fast & Furious 10 for Universal. When asked about doing just that, Cohen said: “I always wished Universal would come back to me to direct the last one.”


Given how popular the franchise is (The Fate of the Furious has the highest-grossing worldwide opening of all-time with $541.9 million), Universal Pictures is unlikely to let it go anytime soon, but they are planning on closing out the core saga with two more installments, and then continuing with spinoffs based on the series’ most popular characters. Fast & Furious 9 was originally slated to release in April 2019, with Fast & Furious 10 following suit in April 2021. However, that plan was slightly altered due to the untitled Hobbs/Shaw spinoff.


Universal recently dated the Hobbs/Shaw spinoff to release in April 2019, with Dwayne Johnson reprising his role as DSS Agent Luke Hobbs and Jason Statham as Deckard Shaw. By releasing that film in 2019, Fast & Furious 9 was delayed to April 2020, with Fast & Furious 10 retaining its April 2021 release, at least for now. While that means Fast & Furious fans now have three movies to look forward to, which will be releasing back-to-back, Fast & Furious 9‘s delay ended up becoming the source of a feud between Johnson and Tyrese Gibson, who felt the ninth film should keep its 2019 date.


At the moment, Universal is looking to Deadpool 2‘s David Leitch to direct the Hobbs/Shaw spinoff (with the film expected to enter production later this year), with Justin Lin returning to direct Fast & Furious 9 after taking a break from helming the past two installments. He’s also expected to direct Fast & Furious 10, but anything can happen and Rob Cohen could potentially get his wish and return for the franchise’s final installment.

Absolutely no chance Universal would put such a profitable franchise in Rob Cohen's hands, he's literally never made a good movie. The original flick is the only noteworthy thing on his CV! It's his only claim to fame, he's just looking for a paycheck if you ask me. Thanks for sharing.