Spoiler alert: if you haven’t seen Episode 10 of The Masked Singer, Robopine’s identity will be revealed in this article.
Season 5 of The Masked Singer has been packed with top-notch talent, and it was all on full display as the show featured the Spicy 6 finalists. Unfortunately, that means plenty of great singers are being picked off one by one. Just as it went with the double elimination revealing singer Bobby Brown and actress Tamera Mowry-Housley ahead of the sing-along ep, the soulful fan-favorite crooner Robopine was given the boot. After his surprising elimination, Robopine revealed the clue he didn’t want to be included during the Fox singing competition.
Much like every reveal this season, Robopine’s identity had everyone, including the judges, constantly guessing, with the judges bouncing between prominent singer-actors like Terrance Howard and their favorite always-wrong guess, Jamie Foxx. But it was Nicole Scherzinger and guest judge Chrissy Metz who hit the nail on the head with Robopine, figuring out that it was multihyphenate entertainer and Fast & Furious franchise vet Tyrese Gibson. While he'd thrown the audience off all season with his bizarre clues, his name was indeed floating out there, and it was a pretty blatant Paul Walker nod in his final clue package that gave him away. Turns out the F9 star wasn't super into using such an obvious detail, telling EW:
The thing is, I didn't necessarily want them to talk about things that are so obviously connected to me. I think what I really wanted was, I wanted them to go as far as they could to not have any clues and hints that people would be able to put two and two together. So, if you said you had a really close friend that passed away that's a costar/movie star, they're gonna be like, ‘Well, clearly that's Tyrese.’
Including that mournful information in his clue package is almost definitely what gave away Tyrese Gibson’s identity. The loss of his Fast and Furious co-star left an indelible mark on the singer-actor and their co-stars, with arguably no one else in the cast sporting a voice as polished as Gibson's. With that said, it was a sweet and vulnerable moment for the entertainer to share that with the viewers, and even though it wasn't the ideal situation for Gibson, acknowledging Paul Walker was a nice moment for any Fast and Furious fan. Even on a show as ridiculous as The Masked Singer.
Tyrese Gibson gave more insight into his Paul Walker moment from his last clue package, saying that from the very beginning, he felt his tribute would give him away. Gibson said about the touching hint:
The Paul Walker of it all, I didn't want to create any buzzkills you know, because it's such a tragedy, right? It's not necessarily something that you can go hee-hee-ha-ha after you talk about Paul. For me, it's, ‘Oh my god, I love him. I miss him. It breaks my heart. It is such a tragedy.’ So, I respect the show, but I just kind of thought that hint was a little obvious.
Tyrese Gibson’s Paul Walker tribute might’ve been obvious, but it was arguably necessary. Gibson couldn’t have told his true backstory without including some kind of dedication his friend. The Fast and Furious franchise bonded them together in both life and death. Despite his passing, Walker’s impact on the franchise can still be felt by its cast and fanbase, as seen in Gibson’s hint.
But looking at the competition, Tyrese Gibson was a long shot to make it to the Final 3 given the bonkers talent of contestants such as Black Swan and Piglet. If you want to see who gets eliminated next, check out The Masked Singer every Wednesday night on Fox at 8:00 pm ET.
