During Apple TV’s San Diego Comic-Con panel, the first trailer for Matchbox The Movie was revealed. Following in the footsteps of 2023’s Barbie, this John Cena-led flick is based on another Mattel toy line, Matchbox cars.
Whereas Barbie was more of a meta-commentary on feminism and misogyny, this trailer shows that Matchbox The Movie goes a more Fast & Furious-inspired action-movie route. Cena is an undercover CIA agent named Sean who gets mixed up in a globe-trotting conspiracy along with his childhood friends. The Matchbox connection is that Sean’s childhood friends call themselves the ‘Matchbox gang’ because they played with the toys as kids.
The trailer confirms that Jessica Biel, Teyonah Parris, Sam Richardson, and Danai Gurira all star in it, so Matchbox The Movie has a surprisingly stacked cast. You can watch the trailer below.
Mattel Studios and Skydance have been working on this Matchbox adaptation in some form since 2022, before Barbie. Production really got up and running once Extraction director Sam Hargrave came on board in 2024. Filming took place in 2025, and it is now finally coming out.
Matchbox The Movie will be the second Mattel Studios movie release of the year, following June’s Masters of the Universe. These Mattel-based films still live in the shadow of Barbie, which became a cultural phenomenon with Oppenheimer upon its release and received multiple Oscar nominations.
Comparatively, Matchbox The Movie definitely doesn’t seem like it’ll be awards bait, but will instead fill the void left by the lack of a new Fast & Furious. It’s also much different than the rest of Apple TV’s Comic-Con lineup, which includes the horror show Widow’s Bay and sci-fi series like Dark Matter and Silo.
Matchbox The Movie will be released on Apple TV on Oct. 9.