In Helen Mirren's F9 cameo, a seemingly innocuous line may be Vin Diesel's secret shot at Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. Dominic Toretto's (Diesel) past comes back to haunt him in F9. His quiet life off the grid with Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) and his son, Brian, is shaken up when his crew arrives with a new mission that leads to a another world-threatening crisis. Toretto quickly realizes the foe this time is his long-lost brother Jakob (John Cena), and the pair's dark history is on full display. To save the day, a number of characters from The Fast Saga need to return.
Dame Helen Mirren is among the actors making a comeback. First appearing in Fate of the Furious, Mirren plays Queenie Shaw, the outlaw mom of Deckard (Jason Statham), Owen (Luke Evans), and Hattie Shaw (Vanessa Kirby). Queenie is the reason her sons make the turn from villains to antiheroes in The Fast Saga, as she arranges for them to team up with Dom in Fate of the Furious. Though her F9 appearance is small, it's also a vital role.
In addition to moving the plot along, Mirren's F9 cameo may serve as a subtle jab to an absent Fast and Furious star. In the movie, Mirren is in the process of stealing a necklace when Dom reunites with her. While outrunning the authorities, Queenie reveals she's had dealings with Jakob, and she goes on to deliver Dom to him. Before she leaves, she wishes Dom well and calls him her "favorite American." While it seems like a throwaway line, it may have deeper implications.
Though subtle, the "favorite American" line could easily be Diesel taking a shot at Johnson. Diesel's feud with Johnson started years ago. Besides being an actor, Diesel is a producer on The Fast Saga, and Johnson supposedly took issue with his decisions on the set of Fate of the Furious in 2016. Both actors have gone on to address the feud numerous times, and it's apparently been quashed in the years since. However, despite that reconciliation, Johnson doesn't appear in F9. Instead, he broke off of the main Fast and Furious franchise to star in Hobbs & Shaw, a movie more focused on his character, Luke Hobbs. Mirren appears in both F9 and Hobbs & Shaw, so her line is telling. Despite her son, Shaw, teaming up with Hobbs in the spinoff, she calls Dom her favorite.
With this F9 line, context is everything. If not for The Rock and Vin Diesel's feud, the quote is simply a throwaway moment. It's irrelevant flattery. But the feud is all about reading between the lines. For instance, Johnson noticeably left Diesel out of a social media post (via Instagram) thanking the cast and crew on Fate of the Furious. It's a diss, but it's a subtle one. So with the feud in mind, the line speaks volumes. Dom is Queenie's favorite American. Other characters, including The Rock's Hobbs, who grew up in Samoa before coming to the United States, are not. The Fast Saga is all about family, and this movie's family may still be fighting.