They’re only a week into shooting, but Fast X (Fast and Furious 10) have lost its director as Justin Lin announced his departure from the next instalment on Tuesday night.
Lin, who co-wrote the film with Dan Mazeau, will remain on the franchise as a producer. The filmmaker released a statement and it seems the parting of ways was amicable between everyone involved. You can read the statement in the social media post below.
The question now is, what’s next? According to Deadline, the split was due to creative differences. They’ll continue to shoot second unit stuff whilst the production takes a small break as studio execs and producers find Lin’s replacement.
The trade continues to add that a decision on his replacement should be made soon as they’re already in conversation with candidates.
The loss of Lin is a blow to the franchise as the director has been a significant part of its success directing the third instalment, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, and was an architect of transforming the series from an action movie with street-racing to a global box office franchise.
After Tokyo Drift, he went on to helm the next three movies, Fast & Furious, Fast 5 and Fast and Furious 6. Lin returned for F9 following a break from Fast 7 & 8, during which he worked on Star Trek Beyond and was set to close off the saga.
As for possible replacements, F. Gary Gray could return having directed Fast 8, but I feel like I remember reading/hearing stories of him having issues on set with Vin Diesel or something, but I could be incredibly wrong.
Other names could be Joe Carnahan, maybe David Ayer, but I can see a female director given the keys to the movie, which would be fantastic and even doper if it’s a relative unknown and this becomes her major breakthrough.
The film is scheduled for a May 19, 2023 release and insiders have told Deadline that they currently don’t expect the need to move it.
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