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How Is Han Alive in Fast and Furious 9?

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We don't know how he's back, but he's back, baby! Yes, Han Lue (alias "Han Seoul-Oh") is returning to the Fast and Furious franchise in Fast 9.

Though there's a lot to enjoy, and marvel at, with regards to the Fast and Furious franchise -- like how it went from an action series about street racing to basically becoming the A-Team franchise that the A-Team movie never manifested to now being such a bonkers cinematic universe that fans easily foresee its heroes venturing into space at some point -- Sung Kang's Han has remained one of the saga's most endearing, and enduring, characters. Which means a lot when you consider that we all watched him die back in the third film, 2006's The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift.

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How Did Han Lue 'Die'?​


So here's what all went down. Tokyo Drift -- after Vin Diesel had bowed out of 2 Fast 2 Furious, and both Diesel and Paul Walker nixed a third installment -- took us over to Japan where we followed Lucas Black's Sean as he made a fool of himself on the drift racing scene. Overseas, Sean met honorable thief Han (who, through humorous happenstance, might be the same "Han" Sung Kang played in Tokyo Drift and F9 director Justin Lin's 2002 crime drama Better Luck Tomorrow). During a chase scene through the streets of Tokyo, Han wrecked his 1997 Mazda RX-7 and died in a fiery explosion.

As a way to connect Tokyo Drift more directly to the two previous films, however, Universal brought Diesel in for a cameo right at the end (Diesel did this in exchange for getting the rights to do one more Riddick movie) and in that scene it was revealed that Diesel's Dom Toretto had been good friends with Han before his death.

Then, in one of the most major instances of the Fast franchise being glorious Retcon Royalty, it was decided that the fourth, fifth, and sixth Fast and Furious films -- Fast & Furious, Fast Five, and Fast & Furious 6 -- would take place before Tokyo Drift. With this move, Han could be a part of Dom's crew. This made Han, who was the most enjoyable part of Tokyo Drift (and to many, the only thing worth salvaging from that story), a full member of the franchise while also oddly placing Tokyo Drift as the movie that takes place last (until the story eventually caught up to it with Han's death in the tag at the end of 6).

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Han then became a full (past tense) member of Dom's crew, where he fell in love with Gal Gadot's Gisele, who made her first appearance in Fast & Furious (the fourth film). The two became a fan favorite pairing and in Fast & Furious 6 they were both considering leaving the criminal world behind for a shot at a peaceful life together. But when she died at the end of that film (Or did she? SHE ONLY FELL 20 FEET! JUSTICE FOR GISELE!), Han sadly and solemnly returned to Japan...where he then met Sean and wound up dead himself.

And in a huge retcon twist, the end of Fast & Furious 6 introduced Jason Statham's Deckard Shaw (brother of the sixth installment's villainous Owen Shaw, played by Luke Evans) and revealed that HE was the one who killed Han. Yes, Deckard was driving a car that rammed into Han's Mazda - as revenge against Dom for capturing, and injuring, Owen.

With this move, which set up Statham's Deckard Shaw as Furious 7's Big Bad, the franchise's timeline caught up to Tokyo Drift (which, again, had served as the narrative's furthest future point for six movies) and was proceeding forward in the true "present."

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Justice for Han... and the Redemption of Shaw​


Despite the fact that Sung Kang seemed to be just fine bowing out of the franchise at the end of Fast & Furious 6, fans had a small [HASH=4012]#JusticeForHan[/HASH] movement going for years. At first, this was because it seemed like a great character had died unceremoniously in service of a much lesser character (Tokyo Drift's Sean), and then because it was revealed he'd been done in by a villain, Deckard Shaw, that the saga quickly sought to redeem and turn into a good guy.

After Deckard was the main adversary in Furious 7, he lived to become an uneasy ally in The Fate of the Furious (F8) - and was even forgiven by Diesel's Dom at the end of the film. That's right. Dom, Han's best friend in the world, was now totally cool with the dude who murdered Han. The [HASH=4012]#JusticeForHan[/HASH] hashtag movement was at a fever pitch. Deckard was now getting spun off into his own side franchise, with Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's Fast and Furious character, Luke Hobbs (who joined the series in Fast Five), and it became super important for the story to find a way to basically erase all the awful things Deckard had done in the sixth and seventh movie.

In Hobbs & Shaw, they dug into Deckard's past and basically told us that everything we'd learned about him was a lie. He hadn't turned on his own men while part of British special ops. He'd been the one who was turned on. He was a decorated soldier who'd been framed. He wasn't a nasty villain after all.

But guess what? This m-effer still killed Han. Hobbs and Shaw could tweak Deckard's dossier all it wanted to, but it couldn't change the ending of Fast & Furious 6. And nothing in F8 or Hobbs and Shaw (even Deckard's fight scene on a plane while holding a baby) could explain why Dom would forgive Deckard.

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Justin Lin, who's now returned to the Fast franchise after directing four films in a row, Tokyo Drift through Fast and Furious 6 (James Wan and F. Gary Grey took the reins for Furious 7 and F8, respectively), has now officially brought Han back - the character he created for Tokyo Drift (or maybe Better Luck Tomorrow) and then curated and cared for over the next three films. Talking to EW, Lin said: "When I left after Fast 6, I really thought that was it, like, there’s no more Fast stories I can tell. From then on, I would travel and just meet people and fans of the franchise, and they would tell me why they love the franchise so much and just share their stories. Then two years ago, I woke up with an idea for the new chapter."

"Along the way," Lin added, "I hadn’t seen the other two movies, and I was at a Q&A for Better Luck Tomorrow and someone brought up 'Justice for Han,' and so all these things were kind of working together."

"Obviously, I have a very personal connection to the [Han] character," Lin explained. "To be able to go through that journey with Han... when I left, I felt it was appropriate and I felt like we were putting the character to bed, but it’s because of some of the things that happened that didn’t quite make sense to me, and so I felt like if I was going to come back, I really wanted to explore why. I think it’s really up to us to bring him back and explore it throughout the themes that we’re all used to."

So now that Han is alive... is Deckard Shaw finally, fully, redeemed?

How Is Han Alive?


Han's alive? How is this possible?

Look, we're now at a point in the Fast franchise where Han's return is an easy-peasy explanation. It would be one of the least crazy things this series has done. Even Michelle Rodriguez's Letty was once killed off and brought back! All they had to do was go back and show us that she'd been pulled from the wreck we thought she'd died in.

The same could happen here, obviously. It could be as simple as showing us Han crawl out of the overturned Mazda before it blows up. Or some new character rescuing him from it. Maybe it was John Cena's Jakob Toretto, Dom's young brother (as revealed in the trailer)?

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Or... and this was a theory that popped up after the spinoff Hobbs and Shaw was released... what if Han is now part machine?

Yes, folks, there was a strong [HASH=4275]#CyborgHan[/HASH] movement after it was revealed in Hobbs and Shaw that the organization Eteon exists. Eteon -- run by a mystery character who has some connection to Luke Hobbs (his dad?) -- is a terrorist group that specializes in "transhumanism." Its soldiers are enhanced and improved with cybernetic and mechanical implants. Could Han's return tie into Eteon? Is Han back as a result of robotic design? Yes, it would mean the core Fast saga would be dabbling in the side story set-up in Hobbs and Shaw, but it could happen!

What are your theories on how Han is back and what this means for Shaw? Let us know in the comments!

6/21/21: This story has been updated with the latest information about Fast 9.

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Matt Fowler is a writer for IGN and a member of the Television Critics Association. Follow him on Twitter at @TheMattFowler and Facebook at Facebook.com/MattBFowler.

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