The LA Actionverse: The Shared Universe Los Angeles Built
How Fast & Furious, Better Luck Tomorrow, The Transporter, The Italian Job, Heat, and Den of Thieves quietly formed Hollywood’s real multiverse—one rooted in LA’s streets, crews, and code
Before Kevin Feige turned crossover storytelling into a corporate science with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, another shared universe was quietly forming—one the studios never branded, but which now spans more than a dozen major action films. It doesn't revolve around a single hero or IP catalog. It revolves around Los Angeles—and you've probably watched parts of it without realizing they were connected.
The sun of this accidental universe is the Fast & Furious franchise—11 movies, over $7 billion in box office revenue, a rotating and ever-expanding cast, and global adventures involving everything from car heists and safe-cracking to cyberwarfare and their version of a space force. But it began—and remains—rooted in LA's actual street racing scene. Films like The Fast and the Furious (2001), Fast & Furious (2009), and Furious 7 (2015) return to Los Angeles not just for plot, but for identity. The city isn't a setting; it's the home turf and emotional anchor of these films.
F&F's tentacles into this larger, hidden, unbranded cinematic universe—call it the "LA Actionverse"—stretch back to 2002, six years before Iron Man launched the MCU. The first spark came with Better Luck Tomorrow (2002), Justin Lin's Sundance breakout about high-achieving Asian-American teens who spiral into crime in Orange County. One of them is "Han," played by Sung Kang—cool, quiet, always snacking. Four years later, when Lin took over The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, he brought Han back, and retroactively, a low-budget indie drama became canon in a multi-billion-dollar franchise.
The second spark of 2002 came from actor Jason Statham. In Fast & Furious 6 (2013), he debuts as "Deckard Shaw," a British ex-special forces operative with a vendetta. But before that, he'd already played: "Frank Martin," the British ex-special forces operative driver-for-hire in The Transporter series (2002–2008); "Handsome Rob," the premier wheelman in The Italian Job (2003), which culminates in an elaborate LA heist; and "Airport Man," in Collateral (2004), who passes a briefcase to Tom Cruise's hitman Vincent—later confirmed to be Frank Martin, aka the Transporter.
Got all that? Is "Shaw," who comes from a British family of special forces operatives-slash-criminals, just another alias for "Martin"? Maybe. The skills match. The arc fits. The connections were never formally announced, but enough was confirmed to make the theory credible—and fun. The timeline:
2002 – Better Luck Tomorrow – "Han" (Sung Kang) is introduced in Orange County (just south of LA)
2002 – The Transporter – "Frank Martin" (Jason Statham) driving for southern France's underworld
2003 – The Italian Job – "Handsome Rob" (Jason Statham) helps pull an LA heist
2004 – Collateral – "Airport Man" (Jason Statham) hands off a briefcase at LAX
2005–08 – Transporter 2 & 3 – "Frank Martin" (Jason Statham) resurfaces in Miami and Europe
2006 – Tokyo Drift – "Han" (Sung Kang) resurfaces in Tokyo
2013–2023 – F&F 6–10, Hobbs & Shaw – "Shaw" (Jason Statham) and "Han" (Sung Kang) storylines expand; multiple films return to LA
2019 – Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw – "Shaw" (Jason Statham) explicitly references The Italian Job
In an era when cinematic universes are planned years in advance, the LA Actionverse emerged organically—through overlapping creators, actors, and tone. It reveals something studios can sometimes forget: audiences don't just care about continuity. They care about coherence. Han and Shaw feel like they belong in the same world because they do—cinematically, thematically, emotionally. So do Collateral's Felix (Javier Bardem) and Vincent (Tom Cruise), both stuck in LA's moral quicksand.
And the LA Actionverse extends further still. Heat’s Neil McCauley (Robert De Niro) and Vincent Hanna (Al Pacino). Den of Thieves’ detective “Big Nick” (Gerard Butler) and robber Ray Merrimen (Pablo Schreiber). Los Angeles is the main character, binding these people and their actions together: a noir city of night driving, loyalty codes, and silent professionals with murky pasts.
(Don't even get me started on whether Charlize Theron's "Stella Bridger" from The Italian Job reinvents herself as "Cipher" from F&F.)
Disney’s Marvel built an empire. But Fast & Furious—along with Better Luck Tomorrow, The Transporter, The Italian Job, and Collateral—quietly built something more elusive and resonant: a mythos.
It just doesn’t have a logo.