Vin Diesel says Paul Walker's Brian O'Conner could return in 'Fast & Furious 11'

Vin Diesel says the planned finale of the long-running “Fast & Furious” franchise volition travel with an unexpected passenger.

Speaking astatine Fuel Fest, an automotive lawsuit successful Pomona implicit the weekend, Diesel told fans that the last “Fast & Furious” movie volition bring backmost 1 of the series’ astir beloved characters: Paul Walker’s Brian O’Conner. The longtime on-screen spouse to Diesel’s Dominic Toretto, O’Conner past appeared successful 2015’s “Furious 7,” which was completed aft Walker’s decease successful a car mishap successful 2013 astatine property 40.

The franchise — known for its blend of thoroughfare racing, elaborate heists and outsized enactment — has grown into 1 of the astir palmy of each time, with much than $7 cardinal astatine the planetary container office.

“Just yesterday I was with Universal Studios,” Diesel said successful a video from the event. “The workplace said to me, ‘Vin, tin we delight person the finale of ‘Fast & Furious’ [in] April 2027?’ I said, ‘Under 3 conditions’ — due to the fact that I’ve been listening to my fanbase.”

Those conditions, helium said, were to bring the franchise backmost to L.A., instrumentality to its street-racing roots and reunite Dom and Brian.

“That is what you’re going to get successful the finale,” Diesel promised.

How the accumulation mightiness execute that reunion remains unclear. When Walker died during the making of “Furious 7,” the filmmakers turned to a premix of archived footage, integer effects and performances by Walker’s brothers, Caleb and Cody, who served arsenic stand-ins for unfinished scenes. Artists astatine Weta Digital created much than 300 visual-effects shots to representation Walker’s likeness onto his brothers’ bodies, often piecing unneurotic dialog from existing recordings. The film’s farewell — showing Brian and Dom driving broadside by broadside earlier splitting onto abstracted roads — became 1 of the franchise’s astir memorable and affectional moments, wide seen arsenic a tribute to Walker’s legacy.

A instrumentality for Brian O’Conner would articulation a increasing database of posthumous integer performances successful large franchises — a signifier that continues to disturbance statement implicit wherever the enactment should beryllium drawn. In 2016’s “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story,” Peter Cushing’s Grand Moff Tarkin was recreated done a premix of question capture, CGI and archival material, decades aft Cushing’s death. In 2019, “The Rise of Skywalker” relied connected antecedently unused footage and integer stitching to instrumentality Carrie Fisher’s Leia to the surface 3 years aft the actress’ passing.

And successful past year’s “Alien: Romulus,” the precocious Ian Holm’s likeness was recreated arsenic an android utilizing AI and integer effects, with the support of his property — a prime that sparked contention and led to much applicable effects being utilized successful the film’s location release.