John Cena was sent to play his role in the new F9: The Fast Saga movie via divine inspiration according to co-star and producer Vin Diesel.
The trailer for the latest installment in The Fast and The Furious franchise has been released featuring Cena as Dom Toretto’s villainous brother, Jakob. This is the first movie from the franchise to be released since Hobbs & Shaw starring Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson in 2019.
Vin Diesel who has played Dom Toretto since 2001 has discussed bringing someone into play his brother in the new movie. Speaking on Extra TV, Diesel noted that every actor was under consideration for the role.
Diesel explained:
“We had starting talking about the brother role way early on. When it came time to cast, that became a riddle that was so hard to answer. Every actor was on the table. Every actor was thought about. Because I’m multi-cultural, every single actor could be my brother. Everybody. […] To carefully address the overall mythology because there’ll be answers in Fast 10 that will explain or even mystify you more. It happened in two seconds.”
“The idea of John Cena came up. I had a dojo, a shrine, a ‘Dom Shrine’ where I would go and get into character, get into that Dom state of mind, and it had all the Fast memorabilia. It had weights. It was a training centre for combat to get ready for the movie.”
“He [Cena] came in one day to meet me, and I got to tell you, and it sounded crazy at the time. And it probably still sounds crazy. I had felt because I like to be in tune that Paul Walker had sent him into the shrine, and I didn’t question it at all. I said that’s the brother.”
2021 promises to be a big year for Cena in Hollywood. The sixteen-time world champion not only appears in F9 but stars as Peacemaker in The Suicide Squad also due for release this year.
F9: The Fast Saga will be released in the United States on June 25th. The movie will then be released in the UK on July 8th, 2021.