During a surprise appearance at FuelFest 2025 in California on Saturday (June 28), Vin Diesel claimed the 11th and final entry in the Fast & Furious franchise will hit theaters in April 2027.
He also dropped a major bombshell about the movie, telling fans that he’ll make the film with Universal Studios on the condition the late Paul Walker’s Brian O’Conner — last officially seen on screen in 2015’s Furious 7 — returns to reunite with Dom.
“The studio said to me, ‘Vin, can we please have the finale of Fast & Furious April 2027?’ I said under three conditions. The first is to bring the franchise back to L.A. The second thing was to return to the car culture; to the street racing,” the actor shared, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
“Oh, this is good, you wanna know what the third thing was? … The third thing was reuniting Dom and Brian O’Conner. That is what you’re gonna get in the finale,” Diesel, who plays Dominic “Dom” Toretto in the series, promised, according to clips making the rounds on social media.
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It’s unclear how Brian could appear in the upcoming film, though advancements in computer animation visual effects and AI technology certainly haven’t stopped studios from inserting other deceased stars, such as Peter Cushing in 2016’s Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, in posthumous film roles.
Walker tragically died at the age of 40 in a vehicle collision on November 30, 2013.
At the time of his death, he had not completed filming Furious 7, which received rewrites and utilized CGI, VFX and the actor’s brothers — Cody, co-founder of FuelFest, and Caleb — as stand-ins to make his character’s appearance possible.
In 2015, Walker and his character received an emotional send-off at the end of Furious 7.
In the touching scene, Brian pulls up to Dom at a crossroads while Charlie Puth and Wiz Khalifa’s “See You Again,” commissioned specifically as a tribute for the moment, plays.
“You thought you could leave without saying goodbye?” Brian asks Dom. Interspersed with a montage of their scenes together over the years, the two men smile and race each other for a bit before they drive off in different directions. “You’ll always be with me, and you’ll always be my brother,” Dom resolves in a voice-over.
Furious 7 was released on April 3, 2015. The film grossed over $1.5 billion at the global box office, making it the highest-grossing entry in the franchise.
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