After Fast & Furious 7 managed to haul in an astonishing $1.5 billion at the worldwide box office, one could wonder if that was partly caused by the huge attention the franchise got due to Paul Walker's death. But that theory falls short when we look at the financial success of the eighth installment The Fate of the Furious. It is the second entry that passed the billion Dollar mark ($1.235 bln., to be exact), however, it's notable that the domestic market did not even generate enough money to make back the production cost of $250 million. The big money was made in the rest of the world. It is a challenge to appeal to so many different markets and hit the mainstream's taste. This film is a prime example of an attempt to service everyone and offend noone.

When it comes to censorship, similar choices have to be made. After it earned its PG-13 in the US, it turned out that the British ratings board had an issue with one scene they deemed to be too violent for the desired 12A classification. The threat to issue the BBFC 15 rating was a warning sign to Universal Pictures who then edited said scene in a more harmless way so that the BBFC would grant it its BBFC 12 rating. The BBFC's online database reads:

This film was originally seen for advice. The company was informed it was likely to be classified 15 uncut but that their preferred 12A classification could be achieved by reducing one scene of violence. When the film was submitted for formal classification, that moment of violence had been acceptably reduced and the film was classified 12A.

Subsequently, the publisher had its desired rating and the consumer had a censored version in cinemas. The financial numbers show that Universal surely benefited most from this action since the UK turned out to be the most profitable market in the EU with a box office of $37.5 million. Unfortunately, this censorship made its way to the British home video releases, as well. If you want to avoid it, there are plenty purchase options in the EU alone. What we couldn't verify is whether the same censorship is also visible in the British Extended Director's Cut edition (which we compared here separately). We'd appreciate any info on that.

Compared are the British Theatrical Version (contained on the BBFC 12 DVD/Blu-ray) and the International Theatrical Version (e.g. contained on the German FSK 16 Blu-ray, both by Universal Pictures).

1 scene with alternate material = 0.32 sec.