THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS: TOKYO DRIFT Was Originally Pitched as a Vin Diesel Movie

Here's an interesting piece of trivia for all of you Fast & Furious fans out there. Did you know that the third film, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, was originally pitched to be a sequel led by Vin Diesel's Dom Toretto? Dom makes an important cameo at the end of the third film, but writer Chris Morgan told Uproxx that when he originally pitched the studio about writing it, he had a different plan in mind:

"Originally, I started as a fan. I went to see the original film at a late-night showing. I just loved that brotherhood between Dom and Brian. And then I got asked to do the third movie. There was an open writing call for the third film. I think originally I came in and pitched. Essentially it was Tokyo Drift, but it was with Vin, and his character kind of had to go out and learn drifting. And there was a murder he had to solve. And they said, ‘Nah, can’t do that. We have to do high school.’ And so the movie became what the movie was. I was really proud of it. And the audience, they came to see it. A lot of people liked it. It kind of did the worst of all the films."

I'm not crazy about the third movie (I realize it has a tremendously vocal fanbase), so I think I actually would have preferred to see the version Morgan originally pitched instead of what we ended up with. But hey — I guess it all worked out in the end.

The Fate of the Furious, the eighth movie in this unlikely franchise, hits theaters this Friday.