The biggest reveal from the Fast & Furious 9 trailer wasn’t that John Cena was playing Vin Diesel’s brother (they look nothing alike, by the way). No, it was the shocking return of Han. A beloved character in the franchise, Han seemingly perished when his car exploded after being hit by a mysterious driver at the end of Fast & Furious: Tokyo Drift.
It wasn’t until a post-credits scene in Fast & Furious 6 though that we found out the driver was Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham). Shaw was targeting members of Dominic Toretto’s (Vin Diesel) crew as revenge for Toretto killing Shaw’s brother, Owen (Luke Evans). Honestly, we need a white board with strings to keep track of all of these plot lines at this point.
Han’s death was the driving force of Furious 7 but it turns out he’s been alive the whole time. And according to director Justin Lin, Fast & Furious 9 will indeed explain how that is.
“You’ll find out, but Han is a very special character for me. He’s been kind of a special character throughout, and when I left in [Fast & Furious 6], we kind of left together. One of the reasons for me to come back was to bring him back.”
Fans certainly had a thing for Han as following F6, #JusticeforHan began circulating on Twitter. Lin is aware of the movement, too, which is why he felt the need to bring the character back.
“I was at a Q&A for a film and someone in the audience said they were confused about what happened,” Lin continued. “It really kind of got in my head and inspired me that if we’re gonna continue, we should have justice for Han, for sure.”
Of course, Lin won’t reveal how he’s alive, but he says the bigger picture will tie everything together.
“It’s all connected, let’s just put it that way. Everything happens for a reason in the Fast Universe.”
As much fun as I have with this franchise, there doesn’t appear to be stakes anymore. All of these characters are basically superheroes who can survive any car crash, bullet or explosion. In the trailer for Fast & Furious 9, someone (it looks like Toretto) even has a car literally thrown at them.
I used go to these movies as a substitute for comic book films, but now we have super-enhanced people (Hobbs & Shaw) and magnet planes. I guess at this point, there’s no line they won’t cross. They brought back Han, after all. Why not get Gal Gadot back as well?