Warning: SPOILERS for Hobbs & Shaw and Game of Thrones
Fast & Furious Presents Hobbs & Shaw‘s biggest shock is that it blatantly spoils the ending of Game of Thrones. The first spinoff from the mainline Fast & Furious movies reunites heroic lawman Luke Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) and British rogue Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham) as they are forced to band together to save the world and Shaw’s sister Hattie (Vanessa Kirby). However, one of the films’ surprises is a cameo by Ryan Reynolds, who plays a CIA agent named Locke and, without warning, Locke ruins Game of Thrones‘ ending for anyone who hasn’t seen it yet.
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Game of Thrones season 8 was controversial and overall not well-received, to say the least. Showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss opted for a shorter final season of only 6 episodes as opposed to the 10 episodes of Game of Thrones seasons 1-6. Even though the final four episodes of Game of Thrones season 8 were roughly 90-minutes in length, fans took umbrage at how season 8 shortchanged the complex characters and their intricate relationships, hurtling many of them to final fates that didn’t fulfill fans’ high hopes. Arguably the most egregious was the sudden about-face of Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke) into the Mad Queen so that she became the final villain of the series, only to be murdered by her lover (and nephew) Jon Snow (Kit Harington).
Related: Game of Thrones: Why Jon Snow Killed Daenerys
In one of Hobbs & Shaw‘s end-credits scenes, Locke reappears to set up the planned sequel and, for no reason, spoils the Jon/Daenerys twist. Locke is shown in a secret location killing soldiers from the cyber-terrorist organization Eteon, and he barricades himself in a room to call his “best friend” Hobbs. As Locke fills Luke in on the existence of a second virus from the one Hobbs and Shaw kept out of the hands of Eteon, he suddenly starts rambling about Game of Thrones‘ ending and Locke blurts out the series finale’s biggest moment: “Jon Snow had sex with his aunt and then he killed her!”
The Game of Thrones series finale aired on May 19th and Hobbs & Shaw‘s filmmakers obviously felt a pop culture reference as prominent as Game of Thrones was fair game. The end-credits scene with Ryan Reynolds was obviously filmed and inserted within the 10 weeks before Hobbs & Shaw‘s August 2nd premiere. However, while Game of Thrones was the biggest TV series in the world, that still doesn’t mean everyone who watches Hobbs & Shaw will have been all caught up on all of the events of Westeros, especially since it’s only been a little more than two months since Game of Thrones ended.
Even though a record-setting 19-million people watched the Game of Thrones finale on May 19th and millions more have seen it since, there are still many who chose to wait until the series was over and planned to binge all of Game of Thrones at some later point of their choosing. Now, any unlucky Game of Thrones‘ holdouts who decide to watch Hobbs & Shaw are in danger of having the biggest twist of the finale unapologetically spoiled by Ryan Reynolds out of the blue.
Game of Thrones also gets another, non-spoiler shoutout early in Hobbs & Shaw: When Locke is introduced, he interrupts Luke and his daughter Sam (Eliana Sua) having pancakes at a diner. Luke gets upset when Locke thoughtlessly describes the deadly potential of the film’s McGuffin, the CT17 “Snowflake” virus, while his 9-year-old is at the table but Sam calmly tells her father, “It’s okay, dad. I’ve seen worse on Game of Thrones“. Later, Hobbs informs his daughter that the CIA agent “knows nothing, Jon Snow”. Unfortunately, anyone still working their way through Game of Thrones will leave Hobbs & Shaw knowing far too much about the final fates of Jon Snow and Daenerys Targaryen.
Key Release Dates
- Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw (2019) release date: Aug 02, 2019
- Fast & Furious 9 (2020) release date: May 22, 2020
