People were understandably hyped when Charlize Theron was announced to be playing the villain in the eighth Fast & Furious movie. Not only is the Academy Award winning actress one of the finest talents of her generation, but she’s also a proven action star that’s kicked all sorts of ass in hits like Mad Max: Fury Road, Atomic Blonde and Netflix’s The Old Guard.
Having someone of Theron’s caliber as a criminal mastermind and cyber terrorist came packed with opportunities to establish her as the franchise’s best ever villain, which admittedly isn’t a particularly high benchmark, but her contributions ultimately felt a little undercooked. Cipher was largely reduced to spouting cold, calculated exposition, and didn’t really take an active role in any of the explosive set pieces that define Fast & Furious.
However, we’ve now heard from our sources – the same ones who told us Han would be returning for F9 and allowed us to reveal John Cena’s role as Dom’s brother, long before either was confirmed – that the groundwork will be laid for Cipher to act as the end-of-game boss for the long-running series, with Theron set to be positioned as the big bad across the concluding tenth and eleventh chapters.
We know that she’s responsible for bringing Cena’s Jakob Toretto into the fold, and it’s rare enough as it is to see Fast & Furious incorporate a recurring villain into the mix, especially when the Shaw brothers were both hastily given redemption arcs, but fans will no doubt be on board for Theron to take a much more hands-on and aggressive role in making life miserable for the core ensemble as The Fast Saga gears up for its culmination.