The next instalment in the Fast & Furious movies, the spinoff Hobbs & Shaw, is coming out later this year, and we know already it will be a crowd-pleasing car-explosion-fest.
There will be cars with bonkers go-faster buttons. There will be a stunt that tops that time they drove a car from one skyscraper into another. (It’s directed by David Leitch, who brought you John Wick, Atomic Blonde and Deadpool 2.)
There will be a sequence where Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson and Roman Reigns team up for a fight against some mercenaries. There will be shootouts and car chases and an ending that leaves things open for nineteen more sequels, and all these things are right and good and exactly what we pay to see in this glorious, unstoppable franchise.
But we also deserve something that’s totally unexpected.
Idris Elba and Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson should kiss.
At some point, rogue FBI agent Shaw (Johnson) and the villainous Brixton (Elba, the reigning Sexiest Man Alive) should totally smooch.
There are so many contexts it could happen in. A honey-trap sting before they know each other’s true identities. A moment of overwhelming lust during a close-quarters battle on a ledge strewn with debris and flaming puddles of diesel. A quick peck one plants on the other to throw him off his rhythm as they grapple sweatily.
Hell, I’d settle for a Point Break-style dynamic where their soulful connection is real, but they’re on opposing sides of the law, and their love can never be spoken aloud, let alone made flesh through the locking of lips.
The Rock and Idris Elba kissing in a major blockbuster, let alone kissing at all, would not only be an earth-shaking cultural moment, but also completely in keeping with the spirit of the franchise.
The Fast & The Furious is about the duality of love and war, speed and peace, family and enemies, friends and frenemies, and ultimately about how men express their love for one another and their own self-determination in the form of aggressive, and transgressive, motion through public spaces.
Also, homoerotic gazing.
Not all affection between men is inherently homoerotic, obviously, but come on.
Admittedly there is a Rock-sized wall of cultural and social taboos that we would have to drive through at high speed to get to this moment.
Are certain quarters of the F&F fandom ready for two swole and beautiful men to fully pash on in high-definition, for any reason, plot-based or otherwise? I hate to say it, but almost certainly not, despite how much more comfortable we are, relatively speaking, with fluid sexuality than we were as a society in 2001.
And the dampening effect it would have on The Rock’s still-not-ruled-out future presidential campaign, at least in the crucial red states, is certainly an argument against.
But the other dampening effects it would have are certainly an argument for. (I’m talking about sweating, you beasts.)
It’s also very much in the spirit of homoerotic action movie tropes and subtext, from Top Gun to, well, this deleted scene from the very first F&F.
I’m just saying, think about it. With everything else going on in the world, we deserve this moment.
