F9 is finally hitting theatres everywhere this week and will see the return of many fan-favorites as well as some franchise newcomers. One such newcomer is John Cena, who is playing Jakob Toretto, the long-lost brother of Vin Diesel’s Dominic Toretto. Recently, Cena had a chat with ComicBook.com and spoke about his character and explained why Dom’s brother wasn’t mentioned in the first eight movies.
“First and foremost, how, how does this happened? Why are we finding out about it now? What’s the importance of this character? What would make you make such a bold decision to attach the name Toretto to a character that’s invited in the ninth installment? Why haven’t you looked at this before? All of these questions that are answered in F9 are the general legitimate questions that not only I had, but Justin [Lin] and Vin had as well. The cool thing is you’re talking to two of the deepest mythology geeks on Fast and Furious about these questions and they give you these really detailed answers that you’re like, ‘Yeah. Okay. All right. I now have direction. I can move forth and perform.’ It was actually really fun to talk about because you don’t have to create Jakob from scratch because his last name is Toretto, but you can explore an infinite amount of story points,” Cena explained.
“I like that the Fast universe has already adopted that, so we didn’t have to waste that line because I think what F9 does great as it evolves, finally, it’s taken the grace to be able to genuinely wink in the camera and reward its audience for all the years of being like, ‘You’ve given us the ability to be superheroes without capes,’ and it’s starting to encourage that we’re all in on it and we’re all enjoying it together. But I think in the introduction of a character so pivotal and so dramatic, I think one of those lines might have… It just probably wasn’t the right place for it, so I’m glad that the F9 and the Fast universe has come up with that on their own because we didn’t need to say it,” Cena added.
You can check out the official description for F9 here: “Vin Diesel’s Dom Toretto is leading a quiet life off the grid with Letty and his son, little Brian, but they know that danger always lurks just over their peaceful horizon. This time, that threat will force Dom to confront the sins of his past if he’s going to save those he loves most. His crew joins together to stop a world-shattering plot led by the most skilled assassin and high-performance driver they’ve ever encountered: a man who also happens to be Dom’s forsaken brother, Jakob (John Cena, next year’s The Suicide Squad).”
F9 hits theaters in the United States on June 25th.