Hang On, Wasn’t Jeremy Renner Already in a ‘Knives Out’ Movie?

Remember the hot sauce that became extremely important to Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig) and Helen Brand’s (Janelle Monáe) plan in Glass Onion? Do you remember what it was called? Or, I guess, more importantly which celebrity‘s hot sauce it was?

Rian Johnson’s Knives Out universe is a hilarious who’s-who of actors but they also have some pretty funny one-off jokes thrown in. By including references to our real world, it isn’t impossible that someone who may be referenced in a past movie gets cast in the next Knives Out film. Which is what is happening with the next movie.

More casting has been announced for Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Story and it includes Hawkeye star Jeremy Renner. Which, sure, exciting, he’ll do a great job in this movie. But who is he playing? Is he playing himself? Because … that hot sauce in the last film was called “Renning Hot,” and was endorsed by Jeremy Renner, the actor.

This isn’t the first time that something mentioned in a Knives Out movie then connected to an actor in the sequel. In Knives Out (2019), Richard Drysdale (Don Johnson) goes on and on about how he saw Hamilton at the Public Theatre before it transferred to Broadway. Which, great, but that means he would have seen Leslie Odom Jr. starring as Aaron Burr in it and Odom played Lionel Toussaint in Glass Onion.

Is this a trend for Rian Johnson? Does he think this is funny?

The thing is: Multiple people instantly pointed out the hot sauce connection from Glass Onion when the news came out.

Maybe it is because it was just so funny to think about.

Renner playing himself would be funny!

People began to point out online that it is ironic that Renner is cast in a movie called Wake Up Dead Man when he did die and come back to life after his snow plot incident.

Even though there were Hamilton jokes in Knives Out and then Odom was part of Glass Onion, I do think it’d be funny if Renner joined the cast as just himself, and if Blanc was so invested in his hot sauce brand that he was ready to help solve a case.

The least that this movie can do is make a joke about how Renner’s character (whoever he is) looks just like the guy on the hot sauce bottle. But also I trust Johnson to make the best of this casting and I cannot wait to see what happens. Maybe Renner’s character will have an app that is supposed to give updates but he shuts it down to have a music career.