Fast X Filmmakers Thought Jason Momoa's 'Twisted' Nail Polish Scene Would Just Be A DVD Extra

This post contains spoilers for "Fast X."

Fans of the "Fast & Furious" franchise have known for months now that Jason Momoa's Dante is a pretty twisted dude. They know because the trailers make him out to be an explosive-happy villain who wants nothing more than to see our heroes dead. They also know because Momoa himself has said so, telling Variety last summer that the villain is "very sadistic," but also noting that he's "got a lot of issues." In another interview, Momoa described Dante as the type of predator that distracts its prey, saying, "I wanted to make him look inviting and easy-going, to have a softer side ... I want you to be intrigued by Dante Reyes, and when you get close, he has you."

After a full year spent hyping the character, I wondered exactly how "Fast X" would be able to deliver on the promise of Momoa at his most unhinged. It turns out, they were able to do so with just two words: corpse pedicure. In a particularly gnarly scene in the new film, Dante apparently has a conversation with two of his henchmen, all while painting their nails. Except, the henchmen are dead, so he's having a slumber-party-like hangout with the bodies of two men he's killed. It's a sequence that feels more like a horror movie than something in the "Fast" franchise, and according to The Hollywood Reporter's recent interview with director Louis Leterrier, it wasn't even in the script. In fact, the filmmaker says they never planned to use it in the movie — until a Universal exec surprisingly signed off on it.

"It was not scripted," Leterrier told the outlet. "We wanted more of Jason Momoa's Dante, so we improvised a little bit more. We wanted to see Dante when he is not peacocking. We wanted to see Dante behind closed doors and realize that he is really twisted." The scene in question was intended to show that Dante is just as unpredictable and strange behind closed doors as he is when he's facing off against the family, but Leterrier knew it was unlikely it would end up in the final product. "So we shot that scene, but we thought it would be a DVD extra at best or in the director's cut version later down the road," he told THR.

Leterrier says that Universal started testing versions of the film without the scene, but also showed test audiences versions with it. They pretty much instantly got strong reactions. "The audience went crazy for it," he shared. "Some were angry and some loved it. It was all so different." In the end, Leterrier says that if you loved the corpse toenail-painting scene, you have the Universal Pictures chair to thank for its inclusion. "Frankly, it was the studio's Donna Langley who watched the scene and said, 'I love it. I love the insanity of that scene.' And so she gave us the OK." Thank you, Donna!

"Fast X" is now in theaters.