John Cena weighs in on CandyAssGate
John Cena observes the natural order of alphas in the wild with Dwayne Johnson and Vin Diesel as a case study
Aux News John Cena
“You have two very alpha, driven people. You get two, there can only be one.” That’s John Cena’s theory on The Fast And The Furious Feud, otherwise known as the Candy Ass Controversy of 2016, otherwise known as Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson vs. Vin Diesel. This is common knowledge: nobody can out-alpha an alpha, so two True Alphas are destined to keep attempting to dominate the other unsuccessfully until the moon explodes (isn’t that the plot of one of the Fast movies?)
Speaking on the Armchair Expert podcast (via People), Cena acknowledged that “there’s certainly rumors about” Johnson and Diesel being “a tough pairing.” “Rumors” is a circumspect way of saying they publicly talked a lot of shit and threw a lot of shade at each other over the last decade or so. Johnson kicked off CandyAssGate by, well, calling an anonymous Fast co-star a candy ass. That co-star obviously turned out to be Diesel, and the two ended up engaging in something of a war of words via social media and the press. It culminated in Diesel urging Johnson to come back to the franchise, Johnson flatly refusing (and accusing Diesel of being a male manipulator), and then actually coming back for Fast X.
Fact of the matter is, after the major Black Adam flop and an unsuccessful attempt to take the reins of the DC Universe, Johnson apparently saw the need to get back to basics. That’s why he’s back with the WWE, returned to the Fast franchise, and back to conspicuously not endorsing political candidates. “Last summer Vin and I put all the past behind us,” Johnson posted on social media in June 2023. “We’ll lead with brotherhood and resolve—and always take care of the franchise, characters & FANS that we love.” He’s now going to star in a new Hobbs-centric Fast spin-off “that will serve as a fresh, new chapter & set up for FASTX: Part II,” as Johnson explained it. (But he recently obtained the copyright to “candy ass,” so Diesel better be on his best behavior.)
And so, the two alphas return to warily circling each other. This is not a problem for Cena, a fellow WWE veteran and Fast co-star, because he knows how to handle alphas. Coming from wrestling with “generational vets,” he learned how to “know the room and just kind of adapt to what’s going on,” he said on Armchair Expert. With the Fast franchise, “I’m being invited into someone’s home, into someone’s family. And regardless of how they look physically in comparison to another human being, this is one IP that has had nine installments and it’s an action movie—that’s rarefied air. At the very least, there has to be respect for that,” he said. “I’m not trying to get the sandbox. That’s not my thing. I’m grateful for what you’ve given me, I just want to be the best firetruck I can.”
43 Comments
love that it’s gonna be like 5 years before we get closure on that cliffhanger ending.
That kid’s gonna be so old when they eventually make the last one. He’ll have a beard and take the wheel in seconds.
The Rock has carny running through his blood, the feud with Diesel could have been complete or partial kayfabe, we’ll never really know.
Yeah, the whole thing smells like a work to me. I’ve never watched a single Fast movie, but do they play rivals in it? Sounds like a good way to promote the franchise.
In the Fast universe, rivals are rarely rivals for long.
Everyone is family eventually
Don’t really care about any of this, just want to say that John Cena very quickly became one of my favorite people. He seems super nice and he has a record for make-a-wish visits. Pretty awesome.
His apology (in Mandarin, which – props to him – is pretty cool) for calling Taiwan a country will always leave a bad taste in my mouth. Talk about a candy ass.
He also understands that being willing to lampoon yourself a bit goes a long way towards ingratiating yourself with audiences. Johnson and Diesel? Not so much.
I feel like Johnson used to be that way but at some point took a turn to really wanting to be taken seriously. And not like “serious actor” serious, like “respect me” serious.
Yeah the further he got from his wrestling days the less he seemed to appreciate the value of hamminess.
His work in “The Suicide Squad” was a great performance made that much funnier by how it was essentially a dark reflection of his wrestling character. He’s danced in his tighty whities for the camera and made it work. Hell, the man walked out 98% of the way buck naked onstage at the Oscars.He knows the value of being willing to look ridiculous in the right moments. It’s a lesson Johnson could sincerely learn. Think how much better Black Adam could’ve been if they’d just leaned into the comedy bits that were lurking under the hood.
I think the problem with Black Adam wasn’t the lack of comedy so much as a fundamental misunderstanding of the character, attempting to stay on brand with The Rock’s ‘hero’ style, and just poor writing. I mean, all they had to do was make a Superpowered version of the Rock’s film ‘Faster’ and they would’ve nailed it.
Black Adam would’ve been a lot better if it dropped the kid and actually established a real villain earlier on. They tried to copy the dynamic used in Terminator 2 between John Connor and the T-800 and wound up making the criminal organization seem less evil than the child. Other than the villainous leader who was related to the female lead, the Intergang mercenaries in Kahndaq just seemed like a PMC running security checkpoints. They were only shown being violent after the kid actively provoked them with full knowledge that the murderous superhuman would kill them. It gets weirder when you consider the plan of the film’s villain involved being so blatantly evil (betrayal, kidnapping, threatening to kill a kid) that someone would succeed in killing him just so that he could meet an evil deity and become it’s avatar. He had no actual plan for dealing with Black Adam and the heroes other than “hope I wind up stronger than them”. If the plot didn’t tank Black Adam’s resolve for a few hours, the villain would’ve had the shortest godhood-to-death time on the big screen.
See how Alpha he is after he calls Taiwan a country.
Or, it could’ve been a work to drive up interest in a shitty franchise.
Yeah, because if there is one thing we know about fast and furious movies, it’s that nobody watches them. They certainly don’t have multiple entries that have made more than a billion dollars…………
The only correct response to this “feud” is “spending even one second thinking about this irrelevant bullshit is a colossal waste of time.” But I realize why Cena wouldn’t say that, even though he’s definitely thinking it.
You are commenting on an article about it, you’ve cared more than most
What it seems like it that there are two “wanna-be alphas” being insecure about being an alpha while the actual alpha sits there and lets them be douchebags because he doesn’t need to prove anything to anyone.
The “no one is allowed to beat me up” clause makes them seem not very tough.
John Cena — Clearly has a sense of humor. Both in general and about himself. So all this “alpha” bullshit is gonna roll off him like water off a duck’s back. Well played.Johnson — The Rock not a human being. He’s a brand. He makes business decisions and public pronouncements all in the service of one overriding goal, protecting his image and the viability of current and future projects. That Diesel was able to penetrate the calculated image Johnson has crafted for himself is frankly kind of impressive. Diesel — Clearly gets high off his own supply. But he’s also a genuine fan. He happens to be a fan of himself, but he’s also a fan of story telling, comics, super heroes, spy shit, whatever, he’s a fan and he’s successfully remixed a bunch of different genres to turn a B-level rip off of Point Break into a 9 film multi-decade $7B franchise. Credit where credit is due. A shame about the sexual assault stuff cause that kind of quashes any respect I had for him as a person.
No one seems less “alpha” to me than Dwayne Johnson. He might as well just get a giant tattoo that says “I’M INSECURE” across his chest.
That sounds like kind of badass tattoo actually
Honestly I would appreciate the sense of humor of the guy who had this tattoo in real life.
If the Joker had had “Insecure” tattooed on his head rather than “Damaged” people might have actually liked Suicide Squad
Whoa, let’s not go too far here.
If you need it in writing that your character in a movie can’t lose a fight, you can’t be considered an “alpha” or have any kind of standing to call anyone else a candy ass.
That’s some Steven Segal level insecurity and self-seriousness right there.
Pretty sure insecurity is a defining trait of men who feel the need to label themselves “alphas.” It’s all bravo and braggadocio.
I think going bald took away his ability to be ‘fun’. He definitely was a different person pre- Fast 5.
Honestly that screams “Alpha” or to be more specific anyone who says they are an “alpha”. Never met a person who would tell people they are an “alpha” who wasn’t just an insecure bully with huge self esteem issues.
What about Vin Diesel?
By “alpha” you of course mean “huge, frail egos”.
They’re both doofuses, but at least Vin is something of a meathead artist, whereas the The Rock is just totally devoid of scruples, creativity, or any other redeeming quality, and completely business focused. Just completely detestable and phony. Nothing about him seems authentic. I always found him mildly annoying, but the straw that broke the camels back for me was his insipid social media posts in the lead up to Black Adam about the marketing and strategizing. So clear that money and corporate-style metrics are all he cares about as an “entertainer.” And always with his stupid drinks and other brands shoehorned into the pictures, label forward.Dwayne, there is a reason other actors and movie stars aren’t plastering social media with corporate strategy meetings, it’s lame and no one cares. He is not a man, he is a living brand. And that should definitely be understood as the incredible insult that it is. Watching him sink everything into Black Adam and then implode after its failure was spectacular. Immediately announcing a live action Moana and running back to wrestling and Fast&Furious so that he could hide behind past successes… Plus his totally unnecessary announcement that he won’t make an endorsement in the presidential election is a typically cowardly move. If he doesn’t want to endorse someone? Don’t say anything at all, rather than this move clearly made to appeal to MAGA and earn their money in his next garbage venture.
I just want Alan Ritchardson character to beat the shit out of the Rock, Jason Statham and Vin Diesel’s character at the same time in the next movie. Because Alan seems cool and all 3 of those geeks need to learn their movie charcters are allowed to get slapped around.
It is quite literally stipulated in Diesel’s contract that he can’t be.
I know, someone said it was also in the Rock’s and Jason’s that they can’t look weak either. How stupid is that!
“Johnson flatly refusing (and accusing Diesel of being a male manipulator)”I’m sorry…a what?
There was that video of Diesel being happy about Riddick 3 sales and ‘dancing’ which involved him just moving around and rubbing his crotch.
“You get two, there can be only one.”Wait, are The Rock and Vin Diesel Highlanders? Will one cut off the other’s head and absorb his powers in a halo of lightning?
Rock already tried the lightning thing and it didn’t work out all that well for him.
I don’t the think the F&F situation was really Dwayne Johnson’s fault, it started with an SNL or late night talk show bit he did called Franchise Viagra where he sang his addition to franchises gave them a boost which is true,Love him or hate him you can’t deny that Dwayne Johnson has charisma to spare and his addition to the Fast franchise is one of he things that helped it out, the big issue is Vin Diesel’s fragile ego, just remember that the Fast Franchise wasn’t Vin’s to begin with, it was Paul Walker’s. He was the main protagonist of the first two movies, and it wasn’t until the 4th that it became an ensemble franchise, then they decided (Most Likely at VD’s urging) to make his mumbling LA hoodrat racer a nigh invincible superspy who could defy all physics once you put him behind the wheel of a car. I enjoy Vin Diesel’s movies for the mindless splosion fests that they are, but he’s not at all charismatic or likeable, in every movie he comes off as arrogant and over confident and the only time that worked for him and seemed kind of cool was in Pitch Black. His best performances were in Saving Private Ryan, The Iron Giant, Find me Guilty and the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie. basically the only times he wasn’t playing “Vin Diesel”.Vin Diesel also has the same can’t lose a fight clause in his contract but that’s more of a brand representation thing. It seems that there were also a lot of hurt feelings that DJ and Statham got their own spinoff movie with franchise potential but when looking at the big picture Diesel comes off way worse than Dwayne Johnson does in that whole debacle.
And so, the two alphas return to warily circling each other. This is not a problem for Cena, a fellow WWE veteran and Fast co-star, because he knows how to handle alphas.That’s right: by personally apologizing to Xi Jinping that human rights exist.