Michael Bay is known for creating ‘total bayhem’ on screen in his action movie blockbusters, especially in the Transformers movie franchise. But the Fast and Furious movies, which were mostly directed by Justin Lin, are known for their spectacular car chases and causing maximum vehicular destruction. So this begs the question – has Bay or Lin destroyed more cars on the movie screen?
Handily, that question has been answered by a Scrap Car Comparison blog, which has done the meticulous research required for an accurate conclusion to be brought. Their research found that in third place was John Landis – who is famous for having caused the biggest pile-up onscreen in the classic comedy movie musical The Blues Brothers (1980). In that movie, and its sequel released in 1998, Landis destroyed an impressive 120 cars.
And…Justin Lin comes in at second place, having “only” wrecked a total of 135 cars across the ten films he’s directed. If Lin had directed all of the Fast and Furious movies, this number would undoubtedly have been higher. Lin has directed five of the nine Fast movies released thus far and was set to direct Fast and Furious 10 but left a couple of weeks into production.
So, that leaves us with Bay. According to the report, Bay has totalled a whopping 354 cars across the 15 movies he’s directed – an average of 24 per movie. This includes writing off an incredible 155 cars just across the five Transformers films that he directed alone. This is surely set to increase in the upcoming Transformers 7, although that one is not directed by Bay.
The seventh Transformers movie and the tenth Fast and Furious movie will be going head-to-head in Spring/Summer 2023. Fast X will be out of the gate first on May 19, followed by Transformers: Rise of the Beasts on June 9.
They are two of the highest-grossing franchises of all time – with Transformers bringing in a total of $4.8 billion and Fast and Furious bringing in over $6 billion. It will be interesting to see which of the new movies comes out on top in 2023.
While we wait, check out our guide to the best adventure movies.