Why did Gal Gadot leave the ‘Fast and the Furious’ franchise?

On the face of it, Fast & Furious might seem like the least nerdy film franchise around, but take a closer look (or a look under the hood, if you prefer) and you’ll find that it has as tangled and complex a timeline as the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Come for the muscle cars and constant use of the word “family,” but stay for the unexpectedly convoluted, geek-appealing lore.

This is best shown through its constantly changing cast of characters, most of whom have been killed off and resurrected by this point, with their ever-evolving interconnected histories that require a Charlie Day-alike conspiracy board to keep track of. Case in point, remember when Gal Gadot was in these movies? Since the Wonder Woman icon left the Fast franchise back in 2013’s Fast & Furious 6, it’s easy to forget what happened to her… or why’s she now returned (more on that in a moment).

Why was Gal Gadot’s Gisele killed off in the Fast & Furious movies?

With commiserations to Vin Diesel’s Dominic Toretto and Michelle Rodriguez’s Letty Ortiz, Han and Gisele have to be the most fan-favorite of all Fast & Furious‘ couples. Sung Kang’s Han Lue and Gadot’s Gisele Yashar were both hits with audiences in their respective debuts of 2006’s Tokyo Drift and 2009’s Fast & Furious (the fourth one), so it only made sense to pair them off in 2011’s Fast Five. The only problem was that Han had a date with destiny.

See, this is what I was saying about F&F‘s complicated timeline. Tokyo Drift was the third film released, but it takes place after the sixth film because it features the death of Han. Han’s journey in the fourth through sixth movies acts as a prequel to explain how he ended up as a loner with a mysterious past living in Tokyo in Drift. In 6, we discover the answer: he broke away from Dom’s family out of depression after Gisele sacrificed herself to save him in the film’s climax.

All this is to say that the reason Gal Gadot was written out of Fast & Furious appears to have been purely in service of Han’s character arc. This franchise is many things, but on the cutting edge of cinematic feminism it ain’t. On the other hand, Gadot may well have requested an exit herself — perhaps to expand her career opportunities — as she certainly embraced the chance to take on bigger, better roles afterward. F&F 6 released in May 2013 and by the end of that year she had been cast as Diana Prince in the DCEU.

With the DCEU dying a death, however, Gadot is now free to get fast and furious once again. In 2023’s Fast X, she returned for a brief cameo which confirmed that Gisele (inexplicably) survived her earlier death. This precedes a bigger comeback in the intended eleventh instalment. And, don’t worry, Han and Gisele shippers, Han’s back from the dead himself these days so everything’s coming up roses for this couple.

2026’s Fast XI — also bringing back Dwayne Johnson’s Luke Hobbs, after his last appearance in spin-off Hobbs & Shaw (which is set between the eighth and ninth movies, timeline nerds) — is being talked about as a finale for the Fast saga, but we’ll believe that when we see it. In the meantime, Gal Gadot appears as the Evil Queen in Disney’s Snow White, releasing March 2025.