The Fast and the Furious (colloquial: Fast & Furious) is an American franchise based on a series of action films that is largely concerned with illegal street racing, heists and espionage, and includes material in various other media that depicts characters and situations from the films. Distributed by Universal Pictures, the series was established with the 2001 film titled The Fast and the Furious; this was followed by seven sequels, two short films that tie into the series, and as of May 2017,[1] it has become Universal's biggest franchise of all time, currently the sixth-highest-grossing film series of all time with a combined gross of over $5 billion.Universal lacked a major event movie for the following summer and quickly rushed Furious 7 into production for a release in Summer 2014. Justin Lin decided not to return to direct the seventh film as he was still performing post-production on Fast & Furious 6 and James Wan took over directorial duties.

Universal lacked a major event movie for the following summer and quickly rushed Furious 7 into production for a release in Summer 2014. Justin Lin decided not to return to direct the seventh film as he was still performing post-production on Fast & Furious 6 and James Wan took over directorial duties. Like Fast 5, Furious 7 is seen as a transitional movie which shifts the franchise from a heist to a spy action movie genre. The untimely death of Paul Walker in a car accident in November 2013 while half way filming Furious 7 forced Universal to major re-shoots, script changes, hiring Weta Digital to use CGI to create Paul likeness and ultimately delayed releasing the movie from July 2014 to April 2015. Furious 7 was the most successful film in the franchise and producers decided to retire the Paul Walker character instead of killing him off.