Fast & Furious Star Threatens To Quit Over Dwayne Johnson

Another day, another bit of drama involving the Fast & Furious movie franchise. Tyrese Gibson, who has starred as Roman Pearce in five of the eight movies released thus far, is threatening to quit Fast & Furious 9.

His ultimatum is simple: If Dwayne Johnson is in it, he wants out. It's the latest in a long one-sided war of Instagram posts between the two actors, which stems back to Gibson's anger over Johnson and co-star Jason Statham getting a spin-off movie. That project, Hobbs & Shaw, pushed back the release of Fast & Furious 9 by a year, which Tyrese wasn't pleased about.

Now, in his newest rant about Johnson, which is riddled with spelling and grammatical errors, Gibson says, "I'm sorry to announce that if Dewayne is in Fast9 there will no more Roman Peirce." Accompanying the threat is a photo of the actor, alongside Johnson and Vin Diesel. "You mess with family and my daughters survival I mess with yours," he continues.

He also seemingly alleges that Johnson takes steroids, writing, "folks that GP to the gym and get big naturally #NoJuice #NoOJ spin off huh?" Naturally, Johnson has yet to respond to this or any other shot Gibson has sent his way over the last several months.

Regardless of how much Gibson complains about it, there's no stopping this franchise. As Hobbs & Shaw is looking for a director, with Iron Man 3 helmer Shane Black reportedly in the running, Fast & Furious 9 is moving full-steam ahead. Diesel announced on Facebook that Justin Lin would return to direct the next two films, while also announcing the return of Jordana Brewster to the franchise as Mia Toretto.

In the end, when it comes down to it, it's hard to believe that Gibson would call it quits on the profitable franchise over a squabble with a fellow actor--the latter of whom may not even realize it's happening. That said, unless this is all one very bad marketing idea or manages to get settled before it goes too far, things are going to be very awkward on the set of the next movie once it goes into production.

The ninth Fast & Furious movie will arrive on April 10, 2020--almost a year after the spinoff starring Johnson and Statham premieres on July 26, 2019.