This Decade-Long Fast & Furious Beef Can Finally Come to an End
Fast X is about to premiere, and Dwayne Johnson is still not returning to the franchise. Now is as good a time as any to remember all the behind-the-scenes drama that caused him to quit in the first place. Shall we?
Tensions were flying high in 2021 when F9 came out without The Rock, and we were all invested in the feud between Johnson and Vin Diesel that lasted a decade.
In 2023, only the hardcore fans remember what came down between the two.
In short, these alpha males couldn't handle sharing the screen time. The longer version includes the infamous Instagram post back from 2016.
In the now-deleted post, Dwayne Johnson opened up about his experience on the set of the Fast & Furious saga, and it wasn't pretty.
He accused some of his male co-stars of being "too chicken sh*t" and "candy asses," most likely referring to Vin Diesel. Ouch!
That post was the first concrete proof of the feud, and things only went south from there. In a 2021 interview for Vanity Fair, The Rock shared that he regretted going public with his feelings, admitting that "it wasn't his best day."
Interestingly enough, while the post did cause "a firestorm," it also reportedly gave crew members a chance to "thank" Johnson for speaking out.
Dwayne didn't regret his words, he just wished he hadn't put them out there for everyone to see. Fair enough!
After the notorious post, the two stars had a meeting where they came to the conclusion that they were "two separate ends of the spectrum." Apparently, that was when they decided to bury the hatchet. If only it were that simple…
A month after the interview, Diesel posted a controversial message to The Rock, practically begging him to come back for Fast X.
In a December interview for CNN, Johnson clapped back. He recalled being "very surprised by Vin's recent post" because they had actually talked in person about Dwayne not filming the next installment.
The Rock perceived the post as "manipulation" and didn't appreciate that Diesel "brought up his children in the post, as well as Paul Walker 's death."
Still, Johnson called his experience "an amazing journey" and wished the Fast & Furious saga nothing but the best. Seems like a fitting end to a decade-long beef, doesn't it?
Source: Vanity Fair, CNN