Fast & Furious (also known as The Fast and the Furious) is an American media franchise centered on a series of action films that are largely concerned with street racing, heists, spies, and family. The franchise also includes short films, a television series, toys, video games, live shows, and theme park attractions. The films are distributed by Universal Pictures. The first film, based on the 1998 Vibe magazine article "Racer X" by Ken Li and written by Gary Scott Thompson, Erik Bergquist, and David Ayer, was released in 2001. It began the original tetralogy of films focused on illegal street racing, which culminated in the film Fast & Furious (2009). The series transitioned towards heists and spying with Fast Five (2011), which was followed by five sequels in that genre, the most recent of which, Fast X, was released on May 19, 2023. Universal expanded the series to include the spin-off film Hobbs & Shaw (2019), while its subsidiary DreamWorks Animation followed this with the six-season animated streaming television series Fast & Furious Spy Racers (2019–2021). Soundtrack albums have been released for all the films, as well as compilation albums containing existing music heard in the films. Two short films that tie into the series have also been released. The series has been commercially successful. It is Universal's biggest franchise and the seventh highest-grossing film series, with a combined gross of over $7 billion.[2] Critical reception for the first four films was mixed until the fifth and later films, which were more positively received. Outside of the films, Fast & Furious has been the focus of other media, including attractions at Universal Studios Hollywood and Universal Studios Florida, live shows, commercials, toys, and video games.