Universal is Revving Up FAST & FURIOUS Spin-Offs and Prequels

As a huge fan of the Fast & Furious franchise, I'm excited to relay this information from Variety: Universal Pictures is developing spin-offs and prequels surrounding the characters from the mega-successful film series. The news comes directly from producer/star Vin Diesel himself:

“We’ve written out story lines for various characters,” said Diesel. “We’ve been playing with it for a long time. It’s a very rich property and we’re committed to treating it with a lot of class.”

“We’re certainly in conversations about how we can expand the franchise now,” said [Universal Pictures Chairman Donna] Langley. “It’s an ensemble cast and there’s room to bring characters in and out.”

There's no word yet on which characters will get their own movies, but it's easy to see Dwayne Johnson's Agent Luke Hobbs going on solo adventures, especially since Johnson has been talking about a Hobbs-centric spin-off for years already. I can also imagine a prequel surrounding Jason Statham's Deckard Shaw and the trouble he gets into before he entered the series in this year's seventh installment.

I'm excited about the idea of expanding the Fast & Furious universe even further than the next three films, and — as the report in Variety notes — Universal is taking the Marvel/Star Wars route here and really building on their tried and true franchise. I love the idea of giving different directors chances to come in and put their stamp on this world in spin-off and prequel films, much like what Gareth Edwards is doing with Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.

As for the next three movies, it sounds like a big part of the reason they brought in Straight Outta Compton director F. Gary Gray is, according to Diesel, because he's "going to bring the darkness out and bring out the character." It seems like Universal is aware that they won't be able to top the action of Furious 7 in the next movie:

“You can’t keep having every movie have bigger and bigger stunts forever and ever and ever,” said Jeff Shell, chairman of Universal Filmed Entertainment Group. “Eventually you have to really focus on the story. We’ll still have big stunts but bringing in this amazing storyteller is going to be great.”

I like the idea of cranking things down a little bit. I loved Furious 7 — it's my favorite movie of the franchise so far — but that film rode an extremely fine line of ridiculousness and legitimately awesome stunts, and writer Chris Morgan is probably very aware he risks a "jumping the shark" moment if they try to go too much farther with those kinds of moments. Bringing it down a notch might be exactly what they need.

What do you guys think about this news? Who should get a prequel or spin-off in the F&F universe, and what do you want to see happen?