Fate Of The Furious Screenwriter Talks About Dom's Betrayal

It was probably only a matter of time before going so fast all the time made Dominic Toretto irrevocably furious.

If you've seen the trailers for The Fate of the Furious, you know that Vin Diesel's central character Dom unexpectedly turns against his family and sides with a dreadlocked cyber-terrorist played by Charlize Theron. But how could that possibly happen? Isn't Dom the one who has been preaching "family" through seven movies? And didn't his character recently marry Letty Ortiz (Michelle Rodriguez)? And how many innocent cars will have to be destroyed as a result?

Screenwriter Chris Morgan opened up to Entertainment Weekly about the decision to make Dom break bad, and it began with the events of Furious 7 and the real-life repercussions of co-star Paul Walker's death in 2013.

"I think [Dom's betrayal] is a direct result of the last film," Morgan said. "With Furious 7, everything that everyone had to go through considering the tragedy with Paul [Walker], and the real question during production: 'Do we shut down? Do we continue without him? What would that look like? Is there a way to do it that would give a good tribute to him?' We all linked arms and came up with what I think is a really good end of the film that let people have a cathartic moment. We shared that all together."

Morgan said that very possibly could've been the finale of the series. But that was until they came up with an idea that would shake things up in a really unexpected way.

"That movie came out, did really well, and technically could have been the end of the franchise," he said. "We all agreed that we weren't going to continue it unless there was a story that was so different, and really felt right for our characters. For seven films, Dom and the crew worked together and solved a big problem, and they stayed together as family. We all started thinking, if we're gonna do something really different, let's take that and turn it on its head. What Dom has been preaching for seven films–family, family, family, that's the code you stick to it, no matter what–what happens if your father figure, your brother, the guy who has been giving you your moral compass for your entire life suddenly breaks his? It comes down to a question of faith. Do you hold close to that code anyway? Do you abandon it? I think that was what was most intriguing for us. Just in terms of a bad guy for our team to go up against, we've seen them go after all sorts of bad guys. What happens if you have to go up against Dom?"

While this doesn't reveal Dom's true motives (is it possible he's just pretending to be bad?), it does explain the rationale behind the filmmakers' decision. And they may have been onto something: we're definitely intrigued to see how this all plays out.

We'll probably have to wait for the release of The Fate of the Furious on April 14 to find out the whole story. Until then, take a look at how much all of the damage from the first seven installments would cost in the real world. Spoiler alert: it's a lot.