Now that the Fast & Furious movies stride the Earth like a gaggle of good-natured, multicultural blockbuster Colossi, Vin Diesel has earned enough cache to get all the weird little sequels and action movies made that he wants. First, it was Riddick, the third installment of a series that began as a smart little sci-fi actioner, then blossomed into a so-ridiculous-it’s-great flop of a sequel before he returned it to its smaller-sized roots. And now, Diesel has decided the world is once more crying out for an extreme sports dude-bro of a hero, and since Spider-Man isn’t cool enough to take up the challenge, the responsibility falls to him. The actor posted a picture to Instagram claiming he would begin filming a new installment of the xXx films this December.
For those who may not remember just how Xtreme this character was, the first xXx movie featured Diesel as Xander Cage, an extreme sports star athlete (which extreme sport, you ask? All of them, bro) who gets recruited by the government to be a special agent. He’s like James Bond but without all those old-man requirements, like training and knowledge and not yelling “Suuuuuuuurge!” when you sky-surf into the middle of a week-long rave in Ibiza. (The second movie, by comparison, is just something we’ve all agreed to pretend never happened.)
There’s no word yet on any of those secondary considerations like plot, character, and the like, but presumably there’s already a truck filled with Monster Energy drinks in the Philippines, ready and waiting for shooting to start. One can only hope that Diesel realizes we like watching him despite characters like this, not because of them. Though, if he can get Asia Argento and Sam Jackson back on board, that could go a long way to making this decade-plus-later sequel worth watching. Well, that and a complete overhaul of the Xander guy’s personality, but baby steps.