First Look at Idris Elba in ‘Fast and Furious’ Spinoff ‘Hobbs & Shaw’ Revealed

Dwayne Johnson has premiered the first look at Thor and Avengers: Infinity War star Idris Elba as gun-toting villain Brixton in Hobbs & Shaw, the first spinoff entry in the long-running Fast and Furious franchise.

You can check Elba out in the Instagram post below:

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I learned a long time ago (when I was a very sinful eyebrow raising villainous man in the crazy world of pro wrestling;) that heroes are only as great as their greatest villains. A pleasure to introduce the man himself @idriselba we brought in to our Fast & Furious franchise to wreak havoc, hell and mayhem on our heroes HOBBS & SHAW. The name: BRIXTON. The record: UNDEFEATED. The promise: SHOWDOWN OF ALL SHOWDOWNS. So cool having my brother @idriselba come and play in our sandbox. This one’s been years in the making!! As I always say, we either gonna get along or we gonna get it on... and fuck getting along 😈 #BRIXTON #TheConsequenceAgent #HellRaiser HOBBS & SHAW SUMMER 2019 📸 @hhgarcia41

A post shared by therock (@therock) on Oct 11, 2018 at 2:08pm PDT

Elba's character will "wreak havoc, hell and mayhem" on Diplomatic Security Service agent Luke Hobbs (Johnson) and mercenary Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham), enemies-turned-uneasy allies who must team up and take on the "undefeated" Brixton in what Johnson teases as the "showdown of all showdowns."

David Leitch (Atomic Blonde, Deadpool 2) directs from a script by Chris Morgan (Furious 7, The Fate of the Furious).

"There are these buddy movies from the '80s and '90s like Lethal Weapon and 48 Hours that really speak to me as a filmmaker. They're ones that made me want to be a filmmaker in the first place. So to see the chemistry [Johnson and Statham] had in the last Fast, and to see the potential that they could be...it was hard not to say yes, and say, 'Let's go do this,'" Leitch told IGN of the spinoff, which is keeping plot details under wraps.

Leitch also said the spinoff, hoping to launch its own franchise within the wider Fast and Furious universe, will be "a little bit more grounded because it's the beginning."

"It's an origin story, in a sense. It's not an origin story, but we're starting a franchise, so we want it to be a little bit more grounded, a little bit more character-centric," he told Collider. "We're going to set up the stakes for these guys and their relationship, but we're also going to have some great set pieces and some action that you'd expect."

Hobbs & Shaw opens August 2, 2019.