XXX: The Return of Xander Cage – Did this sequel happen way too late?

The summer of 2002 kicked off a whole new era in spy movies, but not in the way Hollywood expected. You see, three spy movies were coming out that year, and only one of them was predicted to be a hit. They were the Ben Affleck Jack Ryan flick, The Sum of All Fears, his pal Matt Damon’s The Bourne Identity, and Vin Diesel’s XXX. In fact, all three of them made money, but The Bourne Identity, a notoriously delayed and troubled production at the time, became a classic. The movie everyone expected to be a hit, XXX, did fine, making $142 million, which was a tidy sum. Still, given that it was expected to be the biggest hit of the summer, Hollywood insiders considered the film a disappointment. While the end of the film promised that Xander Cage would return, but the time XXX: State of the Union hit theaters three years later, Diesel had bailed on the series, being replaced by Ice Cube as a new XXX agent, Darius Stone. The film was a colossal flop, and as such, should have spelled the end of the series. Yet, despite being killed off in a short film included with a reissue of the first film on DVD, Xander Cage would indeed return, even if it took a whole lot longer than anyone thought it would.

So, why did Vin Diesel return as Xander Cage a full fifteen years after the first film? 

To understand why, one must look at what happened to Diesel’s career in the wake of the first film. Famously, Diesel had declined to return for a sequel to his breakout hit, The Fast and the Furious. The film, 2 Fast 2 Furious, went ahead with Paul Walker, and was a respectable hit. However, Diesel had his own tentpole franchise movie planned, The Chronicles of Riddick, which would spin-off his character from the horror hit, Pitch Black, into his own franchise. It was an insanely ambitious film, with it boasting a budget that was at least four times what the original cost, and swapping genre to become more of a fantasy film, in the vein of Lord of the Rings. It wound up being an embarrassing flop for Diesel, and his career ended up in serious jeopardy not long afterward, as with the exception of the Disney comedy, The Pacifier, all of his follow-up films flopped, most notably the French-produced Babylon A.D.

Unsurprisingly, at this moment, Diesel reconsidered his choice to drop out of the Fast & Furious franchise, reprising his role as Dominic Toretto in a cameo for Tokyo Drift. He was enticed back for Fast & Furious, which was a reunion film that, to the shock of many in the industry, was a major financial success. It was so big that Universal Pictures made the daring move to up the budget for the fifth film, Fast Five, and change it from an urban-set street racing film to a global heist franchise. The movie was a smash hit, as were all the sequels, and suddenly Diesel was once again a superstar.

With his new clout, Diesel was able to get another Pitch Black movie made, Riddick, but many believed the franchise that really should be rebooted was XXX, as the Fast Saga had morphed into a spy franchise of its own, and perhaps a Diesel led XXX would give a rival studio a small taste of the massive grosses those movies were pulling down consistently. 

As such, the decision was made to resurrect Xander Cage, with the notion in the film being that rumors of his death had been greatly exaggerated. Initially produced by Sony, the rights were instead picked up by Paramount Pictures, who would give the film a relatively lavish budget, albeit not one on par with the Fast Saga, to relaunch the franchise.

By this point, Rob Cohen, who had directed the first film, was out of the picture, and instead D.J Caruso, who has helmed the well-received Eagle Eye and Disturbia, was brought in to direct. The film would be heavily inspired by the Fast Saga, with it being a team-based film, peppered with international stars, in the hopes that the movie would play well to an international audience, who had made the Fast Saga a global phenomenon. Donnie Yen, the biggest star in Asia, was cast as Xiang, himself a xXx agent who is set up as the movie’s antagonist, but later becomes a secondary hero/protagonist. Bollywood star Deepika Padukone would play Xander’s love interest, yet another xXx agent who becomes part of his team, while Chinese rapper Kris Wu, Thai action film superstar Tony Jaa, and model Ruby Rose, would fill out the team. Samuel L. Jackson would reprise his role from the previous films as Augustus Gibbons, while Toni Collette, Nina Dobrev and Game of Thrones star Rory McGann would fill out the cast.

The action was notched up to Fast and Furious style levels, with the film adopting a distinctly tongue-in-cheek approach. This is perfectly summed up in Xander’s re-introduction to the franchise, where he land skis through a jungle. The film was so closely patterned on the Fast and Furious movies that they even hired that series’s composer, Brian Tyler, to score it. 

All involved hoped xXx would become a franchise, with threads being left dangling throughout the film, teasing a global franchise. Heck, they even brought back Ice Cube to make a cameo as Darius Stone, who saves the day in the finale with a line that I’m sure they hoped would become the XXX version of “we’re family” – “X takes care of its own”.

Here’s where it gets interesting. XXX: The Return of Xander Cage, was a gigantic flop in North America. It only made $44 million domestically, which was a disastrous result. Yet, it was a huge blockbuster internationally, making a stunning $300 million. As such, plans were put in motion to make another film, but so far the movie hasn’t happened, due in part to Diesel’s obligations to the Fast Saga, and the fact that the franchise’s rights are tied up in legal limbo. You see, a studio called Revolution Films, which was run by Joe Roth, owned the rights, and when that company ended, Roth brought in a Chinese Company called the H Collective to co-finance a new film, based on how huge a hit the movie had been in Asia. Sadly, the company has suffered a series of financial setbacks, and the question over who owns the franchise rights is, apparently, still up in the air. Had that not been an issue, we would have likely gotten a fifth xXx movie. While Diesel has teased the fact that he’s eager to continue with the franchise, many believe the moment might have passed, given the waning popularity of the Fast Saga, and that American movies are no longer the cash cows in Asia that they once were. In the end, perhaps Xander Cage’s most prominent foe was time. 

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