Ludacris maybe confirms that Fast & Furious 9 is headed to space. Collectively, the Fast & Furious movies have grossed $5.9 billion at the worldwide box office, making the franchise one of the most financially successful of all time.
Of course, much of the success of the Fast & Furious movies is owed to how they continue upping the action factor with each successive film, mostly leaving the laws of physics behind in the process. Indeed, the early Fast & Furious movies were relatively small-scale racing films with heist elements, but as the franchise grew in global appeal, the premises became more and more outlandish and the action more absurd. The last non-spinoff movie in the series, The Fate of the Furious, took things farther than ever with action set pieces including a crazy remote controlled car scene in Manhattan and a famous sequence with a submarine.
After submarines arrived in the Fast & Furious universe in the last film, it’s fair to ask where the series can possibly go in terms of ratcheting things up (besides bringing back Han). In fact, this very question was asked of Ludacris in a recent SiriusXM interview and he responded by (sort of) teasing that space could be in play. In a video clip of the exchange, the interviewer throws out space as a possible setting for Fast 9, and though Ludacris doesn’t confirm anything, he does strongly hint that the interviewer is onto something. See the video in the space below:
Indeed, the idea of Fast & Furious heading to outer space has been bandied about for a long time, and the notion was even once confirmed as a possibility by director F. Gary Gray. However, franchise writer Chris Morgan also once said the movies would only head for the final frontier if they came up with a really strong story idea. Of course, franchises going into space is not a new thing at all, with everyone from James Bond to Jason Voorhees pulling off the trick at various times. By and large, the space gimmick is seen as an act of desperation for film series that have run out of ideas and are grasping at straws in hopes of keeping audiences interested.
Given the huge box office numbers the Fast & Furious movies still pull in, there’s seemingly no compelling reason for the series to resort to the space gimmick in the ninth movie. However, if ever there was a film franchise absurd enough to make the leap to space and have it not seem like a huge stretch, Fast & Furious would be it. It remains to be seen if Fast & Furious 9 will indeed strap on its rockets and head to orbit, but it currently looks like there’s a strong possibility this will happen (unless Ludacris is just messing with fans, which frankly would be a low blow).
Source: SiriusXM
