At this point it seems like Dwayne Johnson has done it all. He's been a professional wrestling champion. He's been the star of massive blockbuster movie franchises. He's done fun for all ages family comedies. He's about to make his debut in a superhero movie He's a producer as well, creating a wide variety of projects, including some where you never see his face. But there is one corner of Hollywood Dwayne Johnson has yet to conquer, the Christmas movie. But just wait, because it appears The Rock is going there next, and he's bringing part of the Fast & Furious franchise with him.
This morning it was announced that Dwayne Johnson's Seven Bucks Productions has partnered with Amazon for Red One, a new project that is described as "imagining a whole new universe to explore within the holiday genre" which is a fully loaded sentence if I ever saw one. While specific details of what Red One actually is have not been released, the film was written by Chris Morgan, who wrote Fast and Furious movies five through eight as well as Dwayne Johnson's spinoff, Hobbs & Shaw. It's based on a treatment written by Seven Bucks President Hiram Garcia.
The "Christmas Movie" is such a mainstay that it seems that anybody who works their way through Hollywood will find their way in at least one. But Red One feels like just the sort of holiday film we would expect from The Rock. It's not just a movie with a holiday theme. It's some sort of massive franchise that "takes beloved holiday mythology and turns it on its head." I'm imagining something like Rise of the Guardians, but done as a CGI box office blockbuster in live-action.
It seems like something designed to have an interconnected universe with multiple sequels. The MCU of Christmas movies. The press release does actually quote Dwayne Johnson calling this the "Red One holiday universe" so this comparison is not that crazy. How it would all work is anybody's guess, but Dwayne Johnson is set to star in whatever Red One is.
It's also indicated that the partnership between Seven Bucks and Amazon on Red One could go beyond the screen, so there could already be an eye toward the potential merchandising of this franchise, with Amazon acting as the portal between the products and the consumer.
This certainly seems like it's designed to be the beginning of something quite big. Of course, we're clearly at the beginning of the process and it's impossible to know just where it all could go from here. Still, this is designed to be a fun for whole family sort of thing and any movie like that that's going to be set, and one assumes released, during the holiday season could certainly find a massive audience and easily launch whatever sort of massive franchise this is designed to be.
