The head of the Fast and Furious family wants one of its key players to come back for one last ride.
In an Instagram post, actor Vin Diesel personally invited Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson back to his role as Luke Hobbs for Fast and Furious 10, the first half of the two-part franchise-finale. Diesel's post began by saying, "My little brother Dwayne... the time has come. The world awaits the finale of Fast 10." Diesel continued, speaking about how special Johnson is to his children, what he means to the franchise and a promise that Diesel made to Johnson many years ago. "I say this out of love... but you must show up, do not leave the franchise idle you have a very important role to play," he wrote. "Hobbs can't be played by no other. I hope that you rise to the occasion and fulfill your destiny."
Diesel's post seems to be an attempt from the actor to put his long-standing feud with the Rock to rest. Over the summer, Johnson said he was done with Fast and Furious after a series of verbal jabs publicly exchanged between him and Diesel. These issues date back to problems that arose on the set of The Fate of the Furious, where Diesel, as a producer of the film, was particularly tough on Johnson. This prompted Johnson to indirectly call out Diesel on social media, critiquing an unnamed co-star for being a "candy-ass," which was later revealed to be Diesel. Many crew members shared the sentiment and privately thanked Johnson for voicing his issues in a public forum.
Johnson initially joined the Fast and Furious franchise for the fifth film in the series, appropriately titled Fast Five. His star value helped earn the movie over $416 million, the most in the series at the time. He then stayed on for the subsequent three sequels and his own spinoff titled Hobbs & Shaw, the first Fast film since 2003 to leave out Diesel. While Johnson doesn't seem to have interest in coming back to the mainline movies, he did pitch his own idea for a Hobbs & Shaw sequel to Universal Pictures, one that he claims would be the "antithesis" of the series.
With a total of over 10 films, an animated television series and multiple theme park attractions, Fast and Furious is one of the biggest cinematic draws of all time. In the past, actor Sung Kang, who played Han Lue for six of the franchise's films, said that the series is able to succeed because the people who make the movies don't take themselves too seriously. "It's still entertainment. If we can laugh at ourselves and then make some jokes in the film, then that's where that theme of the family is," he said. "The audience knows that the filmmakers are listening to them."
As Kang mentions, family is one of the core elements behind Fast and Furious, something Diesel echoes in his statement. As his character Dominic Toretto knows all too well, families fight and have differences from time to time. While it remains to be seen if Diesel and Johnson can patch things up, Fast and Furious 10 is fueling up for an April 7, 2023 release.
Source: Instagram