Ford spent years letting the Raptor sell itself — no big ad campaigns, no celebrity spots, just a desert truck that earned its reputation one Baja mile at a time. That era ended this weekend. Ford handed the Raptor’s origin story to Hollywood: a short film directed by Ben Affleck, narrated by Jon Bernthal, and built around the real Ford Racing engineers who dreamed the truck up in 2006 — and watched Ford executives kill it six times before it ever reached a showroom.
Key Takeaways
- “How to Make a Monster” is Ford’s new short film about the F-150 Raptor’s origin, directed by Ben Affleck and starring Jon Bernthal alongside real Ford Racing engineers Derek Bier, Tim Smith, and Chris Paiva.
- The film traces the Raptor to a 2006 skunkworks project inspired by the Baja 1000 — a project Ford executives killed six times before it was revealed in 2008 and went on sale as a 2010 model.
- It made its broadcast debut October 23 on Apple TV during Formula 1’s United States Grand Prix coverage, and aired October 24 on ESPN during the Ole Miss vs. Texas game.
- Despite a week of speculation, the October 24 date was the film, not a new truck — Ford has announced no new Raptor variant or V8 return.
- The Raptor is now a three-truck sub-brand (F-150, Ranger, Bronco) sold in 125 markets, and the film anchors Ford’s celebration of 125 years of Ford racing.
What’s New
The film itself is the news — and the rollout was deliberately cinematic. Ford Racing teased it on October 20 with a short clip and a single line: “How do you create a monster? Learn how the first Raptor came to life. 10.24.26.” That date sent truck forums into overdrive for a week, with many convinced Ford was about to announce a V8-powered Raptor. It wasn’t a truck reveal at all. The date marked the film’s television moment: a 60-second spot that debuted October 23 on Apple TV during the United States Grand Prix in Austin, then ran in primetime October 24 on ESPN during the Ole Miss–Texas college football game.
The production is a genuine Hollywood affair. Affleck directed through Artists Equity, the production company he co-founded, and Bernthal — who plays the Punisher in the Marvel Cinematic Universe — narrates and drives. The pairing isn’t a casting gimmick: Bernthal has owned Raptors for years, and on the set of The Accountant he took Affleck for a desert spin in his. Affleck was hooked, and now owns two Raptors himself. The film was shot with a Raptor fitted with a Russian camera arm and stabilizer to chase the hero truck at speed.
Ford’s timing is deliberate. The company is celebrating 125 years of Ford racing, and the Raptor is the vehicle it chose to show how racing technology reaches customer driveways. As Dan Barbossa of Ford Communications put it: “Directed by Ben Affleck and featuring Jon Bernthal alongside Ford Racing engineers, ‘How to Make a Monster’ brings Raptor’s origin story to life, from a wild idea in 2006 to years of testing, racing and pushing to create a new kind of off-road truck.”
Design and Performance
The story the film tells starts in 2006, when a small group of Ford Racing engineers decided to build a road-legal truck with the same mechanical capability as the machines they raced in the Baja 1000. The brief, as Bernthal tells it, was to give customers the exact same hardware the engineers ran in competition: the same frame, the same high-output engine, the same long-travel shocks — “even the same cup holder.”
Nobody inside Ford thought a truck that size had any business going that fast off-road. There was no precedent and no competitor, and executives killed the project six separate times during development. The team kept going anyway, quietly refining and re-testing prototypes across thousands of desert miles in Baja until leadership finally relented. The F-150 SVT Raptor was revealed in 2008 and went on sale the following year as a 2010 model, creating a category — the factory desert truck — that effectively had no competition until Ram answered years later with the 1500 TRX.
Sixteen years on, the formula hasn’t changed much, only the hardware has. The current F-150 Raptor runs a 450-horsepower 3.5-liter High-Output EcoBoost V6, while the Raptor R carries a 720-horsepower supercharged 5.2-liter V8. The film’s closing line is the thesis: making the monster was the easy part. The hard part, Bernthal says, was stopping at just one — and Ford didn’t, expanding Raptor into a sub-brand spanning the F-150, Ranger, and Bronco.
What It Means for Enthusiasts
First, the speculation check: if you were waiting for October 24 to bring a cheaper V8 Raptor or a new Raptor variant, this wasn’t it. The teaser was always about the film — Ford’s own caption said “learn how the first Raptor came to life.” That doesn’t close the door on future Raptor news; Ford CEO Jim Farley has said hybrid V8 engines are coming to the lineup, and we’ve covered why a hybridized V8 may be how the Raptor keeps its eight cylinders. But nothing new was announced this weekend, and anything else is rumor until Ford says otherwise.
What the film does confirm is how Ford sees the Raptor now: not as a trim package but as the flagship of its entire off-road identity, worth a Hollywood director and primetime sports placement. For a truck that was nearly cancelled six times, that’s a remarkable reversal — and a reminder that the most interesting vehicles are often the ones somebody inside the company had to fight for. The full film is available to watch on Ford’s official video channel.
Vicrez Products for Ford F-150 Raptor
One honest note on fitment: Vicrez lists one bodykit specifically for the F-150 Raptor 2021–2023, while the Raptor R Style parts below are listed for the Ford F-150 in the year ranges shown — they give a standard F-150 the Raptor R look, not a factory Raptor replacement. Fitment years are exactly as listed on each product page.
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Ownership disclosure: VicrezDriver and Vicrez.com share ownership. Editorial policy.
Vicrez Replacement Raptor Style Bodykit vz112423 | Ford F-150 Raptor 2021-2023
$2,057.35
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Ownership disclosure: VicrezDriver and Vicrez.com share ownership. Editorial policy.
Recommended Product
Ownership disclosure: VicrezDriver and Vicrez.com share ownership. Editorial policy.
Recommended Product
Ownership disclosure: VicrezDriver and Vicrez.com share ownership. Editorial policy.
Source: Ford Racing on X, October 20, 2026; Ford Communications; Detroit Free Press, October 23, 2026; AutoGuide, October 23, 2026; MotorTrend, October 23, 2026. Watch the film on Ford’s official video channel.
