As a managing partner at Apex Marketing Group, Eric Smallwood analyzes the value of product placement and strategic advertising for both brands and production companies. "I’m amazed at how it was used," he says of Corona’s placement in the Fast franchise. "The verbal mentions — it’s very overt." The series’ only movie without Dom Toretto, 2 Fast 2 Furious introduces Roman Pearce (Tyrese GIbson) and Tej Parker (Chris “Ludacris” Bridges). The story follows Brian O’Connor and Pearce as they go undercover to take down a drug lord in exchange for having their criminal records expunged — a mission that's ultimately successful. It also introduces a new love interest for O’Connor in Eva Mendes’s Monica Fuentes, who only appears again briefly in Fast Five. This is the last Fast film with Paul Walker’s Brian O’Conner, as Walker died during the time of its filming. Furious 7 ends with an emotional farewell to Brian/Walker. The second of the series’ two short films, Los Bandoleros takes place between Fast 1 and Fast 4, though its exact placement on the timeline is never specified. Written and directed by Vin Diesel, Los Bandoleros is set in the Dominican Republic, where Dom is lying low after the events of Fast 1. In its 20-minute runtime, the film manages to cover an oil war, corrupt politics, and a prison break, culminating in a romantic reunion between Dom and Letty. Chronologically, it’s also the first time we see Sung Kang’s death-defying Han Lue. If you were to poll people that saw these movies — ‘What kind of brand did you see in the movie?’ — a large percentage would say Corona," he continues. "It’s got a brand association with the franchise."

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Mr. Nobody is this mysterious guy — nobody knows who he is — so the idea was to bring Dom to the office and start layering in a little bit of trust and familiarity," Morgan says. "And you can talk about, ‘Hey Dom, here’s what I know you did with that car,’ but I was looking for one thing to put in there to give the audience a wink. We played that for a joke, but also, this is how well this guy knows Dom. It’s just a fun, character-y moment."

The elephant in the 1970 Chevrolet Chevelle SS is the fact that moviemaking is a business, and product placement — even really good product placement — is almost always about a capitalistic exchange, rather than world-building. Brands pay a production company to be prominently featured in a film. The exchange manifests in varying ways — from Heineken partially funding the production budget for 2015’s Spectre with a product placement deal to Oliver Stone getting a free pair of boots for showing a certain brand name in Natural Born Killers. As Cohen noted, the initial deal between The Fast and the Furious and Corona was small and rather unofficial: a few cases of free beer in exchange for an overt mention of the brand name.

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It’s been an honor to have Corona Extra play a part in pop culture history with the Fast and the Furious franchise over the years," a spokesperson for the company told The Ringer in an official statement. "While we had no formal agreement with the production company, we were aware of the incorporation of Corona into several of the films." ‘Fast & Furious,’ 2009 (Universal Pictures) The Fast & Furious franchise became what it is today — a billion-dollar box-office juggernaut, with seven sequels and at least two more to come — in part because the movies embraced their absurdity. They drive cars through skyscrapers, make 100-foot leaps into ravines, and drive bank vaults through Rio, stripping themselves of all self-seriousness and adherence to the laws of physics. But beneath the nonsensical stunts and the utter disappearance of the threat of death, when everything gets boiled down, the Fast movies remain focused on a family of misfit thrill-seekers who sit around a table drinking beer — almost always Corona — together well after the sun goes down. That truth layers emotion behind every stunt and every illogical plot development and engenders loyalty from the audience. During Race Wars, Letty Ortiz is pit against a male racer who immediately believes she shouldn't be racing because she is female. However, Letty convinces him to put his money where his mouth is and they both race. Although the male racer is gleeful as he seems to be winning, Letty activates her NOS and easily surpasses him, the other racer unable to catch up due to him not having any NOS. They were one of the companies that was smart enough to get in with us at the ground floor," Cohen adds. Whether the company actually foresaw the success of Fast or just didn’t see the point in denying any movie’s outright endorsement of their product, the decision to allow Corona to be featured in The Fast and the Furious has developed into a profitable one.

Nitrous oxide ( N₂O) is a gas commonly referred to as "nitrous" or simply NOS in The Fast and the Furious series. Notable uses of NOS in the series Corona is] the unpaid official beer of Fast & Furious," longtime producer Neal H. Moritz told The Bill Simmons Podcast. "I know it’s crazy. I should have a pallet of it in front of my house right now." ‘Furious 7,’ 2015 (Universal Pictures) Fast X is set to be the second to last chapter in the Fast and Furious series. Dom will have to protect his family from a new enemy named Dante (Jason Momoa) who is looking for revenge after the death of his father in Fast 5.

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Brian and Roman both use NOS during their race against Korpi and Darden, Brian's NOS enabling him to barely beat Korpi. Not to be confused with The Fast and the Furious , Fast & Furious is the franchise's fourth mainline film, though it precedes Tokyo Drift (film number three) in the chronology. It's a sequel to Fast 1, set five years later, with Dom and Brian teaming up once again to take down a drug lord and avenge the “death” of Letty. Dom is ultimately arrested and sentenced, though en route to the prison, Brian, Mia, and Tego Leo (Tego Calderon) are seen intercepting the prison bus. Fast & Furious also introduces Gal Gadot’s Gisele Yashar. It was the Wonder Woman actor's first major film role.For more than a decade and a half, the Fast & Furious franchise has ripped, roared, and pressed every last NOS button on its way to action-franchise preeminence. To mark the release of The Fate of the Furious , the series’ eighth installment, we’re declaring it Fast 8 Week . Please join us in living life one quarter-mile at a time. I saw the original movie in the theater and I was just a fan." Having joined the franchise in 2006, Morgan is one of the most tenured members on the Fast team, and he’s personally responsible for every Corona reference the movies have made since the original. He continues to bake them into his scripts for one primary reason: precedent. "They branded themselves [in the original]," Morgan says. "‘If you’re gonna fit in with our crew, this is what our crew does.’" When he first got to write for Dom in the fourth installment, Fast & Furious (Diesel appears in only the waning seconds of Tokyo Drift), Morgan used the mention and presence of Corona to show that while years have passed, the characters haven’t changed. He achieved the same effect, wrapping continuity into nostalgia, with a barbecue scene that closes Fast & Furious 6 — and dutifully mirrors the barbecue scene of the original Fast, beer and all. ‘Fast & Furious 6,’ 2013 (Universal Pictures) After completing their tunnel run, Dominic turns the cap on a container of NOS, as well as turning on the cigarette lighter in his 1970 Chevelle SS. This causes all the cars next to it, including Brian's Skyline, to explode, giving the distraction Dom and Brian need to escape. Over the course of 16 years and eight installments, the Fast & Furious franchise has had to survive a lot of changes. Whether it was the fictional death of characters like Gisele ( Gal Gadot) and Han ( Sung Kang), the fan-inspired resurrection of Michelle Rodriguez’s Letty, or the very real, heartbreaking, and technically challenging loss of Paul Walker as Brian O’Conner, the series has not only survived, but also thrived. And while it makes sense that both Walker and his character’s partner, Jordana Brewster, would be absent from the latest installment, The Fate of the Furious, there’s another much more bafflingly absent member of the family. Corona, the officially unofficial beer of the Fast franchise, has been mysteriously replaced—without explanation—by Budweiser and Stella Artois. I guess the theme of The Fate of the Furious really is betrayal.