When a franchise reaches a certain length, one of the coolest special features is the ability to have legacy characters make splashy re-appearances. This is a dramatic trick that the Fast and the Furious movies have pulled off before, for example with the return of Lucas Black's Sean Boswell's in Furious 7, but now it looks like F9 is set to do it again. While we can't be entirely certain, there's a possibility that the brand new Super Bowl spot for the blockbuster gives away the return of Twinkie, the character played by Bow Wow in The Fast And The Furious: Tokyo Drift.
In order to spot him in the F9 trailer, you really have to be paying attention – and, again, we can't be certain that it's actually him. If you start playing the trailer, pay attention to the picnic table that appears about three seconds in (immediately after the close-up shot of Han and Sean Boswell hugging). Dom (Vin Diesel), Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) and their daughter are approaching their friends, and it appears that Twinkie is sitting between Han and Sean. Check out the screengrab below as evidence.
And for reference purposes, you can watch the F9 Super Bowl trailer right here:
For those who are keeping track of the wild Fast And Furious continuity, it's not exactly a stretch that Bow Wow's Twinkie could be making a return in F9. Every movie after Furious 7 is set after The Fast And The Furious: Tokyo Drift, and when we last left Twinkie in that story he was living a peaceful life in Tokyo after Sean Boswell dominated in the underground drifting competition. Exactly what he's been up to since then is obviously a mysterious, but that could be a part of the fun seeing him pop up again in the new blockbuster.
Perhaps more importantly, the presence of Twinkie could be a clue regarding the return of Han in F9. They were allies together in Tokyo prior the Han's "death," so is it outside the realm of possibility that Twinkie had some role in his rescue from the hit orchestrated by Jason Statham's Deckard Shaw? That curiosity is more than enough to make up for the surprise spoiled by this potential leak.
Should Bow Wow actually be in F9, he will be a part of an expansive cast that includes not only the aforementioned Sung Kang, Vin Diesel, Michelle Rodriguez, and Lucas Black, but also Tyrese Gibson, Chris "Ludacris" Bridges, John Cena, Jordana Brewster, Nathalie Emmanuel, Helen Mirren, and Charlize Theron. While it's likely that the film won't actually arrive until theaters are ready to fully reopen, Universal Pictures currently has the movie dated for release on the big screen on May 22.
