Sometimes when everything is terrible, you’ve just got to watch some dumb action movies. That was my thought when I decided to marathon the John Wick trilogy, which I’d mostly ignored before now. The 2014 Keanu Reeves fronted action vehicle just seemed to me like another lame direct-to-VOD action movie starring a washed-up actor, that just happened to get a theatrical release. Like Bruce Willis, Nicolas Cage, and John Travolta before him, Reeves in 2014 was no longer the big star he’d been at the height of his Speed or Matrix years, so this seemed like him finally succumbing to that same wasteland of steady but largely unseen and disliked work. That and the title “John Wick” just seemed so incredibly bland to me. I barely gave it a thought even when critics raved about it being exactly not this after its release. Eventually I came to assume they were right, but didn’t bother to go back and watch it or see either of the two sequels when they came out, despite the equal praise they received and their single-handed revitalization of Reeves’ career -without which there would be no upcoming Bill & Ted Face the Music, no Matrix 4 in development, and most importantly, no Duke Kaboom in Toy Story 4.
It was COVID-19 that finally got me to sit down and watch these films at last, see what all the fuss was about, whether they were indeed Reeves’ finest performances, if they were as exciting, innovative, and fun as everyone said, and I was fascinated by the result.
The movies are good -very good in fact, and rather smart action movies for some of the silliness there is to them. Apart from Reeves, the casts across the films are incredibly strong, including Ian McShane, Michael Nyqvist, Willem Dafoe, Halle Berry, Lance Reddick, Asia Kate Dillon, Ruby Rose, Alfie Allen, Common, Adrianne Palicki, Anjelica Huston, John Leguizamo, Saïd Taghmaoui, Franco Nero, and (in a charming Matrix reunion) Laurence Fishburne. The action takes its cues from martial arts and “gun fu” films, with a lot of close fighting and intricately choreographed sequences shot and edited with rapid precision, creating a visual language much more akin to action cinema coming out of Korea, Hong Kong, or China than anything in the west -making the films feel incredibly distinct. The plot, characters, and storytelling owes a lot to noir, suspense thrillers, and even stylized westerns like The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly and The Wild Bunch.
And yet all of these unique influences and elements are wedded to a very blockbuster-friendly kind of world-building that expands and develops with the same enthusiasm and narrative techniques as the MCU. Though perhaps the most apt comparison might be with Men in Black, which like John Wick is specifically about a network of professionals based out of New York operating in secret, with international chapters, various sub-systems and characters, and whole histories revealing themselves as the series progresses. Of course the Men in Black sequels weren’t good, much like the similarly-inclined Pirates of the Caribbean sequels and even Reeves’ own Matrix sequels. But the John Wick sequels are, despite being relative in scope and development to all those movies. Why is that?
Well let’s take a look at each of these series, in which the first installment at least is generally agreed to be good. A key reason for that is simplicity: the plots are fairly basic and easy to latch on to. Men in Black is about a cop being recruited into an elite organization where he investigates and takes down an alien menace. The Matrix is about a guy who realizes his reality is a lie joining a resistance movement to destroy a great oppressor and liberate the world -classic hero’s journey stuff. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl is about “good” pirates fighting and defeating evil cursed pirates. And John Wick is about an assassin coming out of retirement to exact vengeance on the bastards who killed his dog. The premise is streamlined enough that there’s a lot of room in and around that to experiment, explore ideas, and have fun. None of these movies are driven by their plots. Men in Black is driven by its concept and characters, The Matrix by its themes and visual innovations, Pirates of the Caribbean by its adventure, humour, and thrills, and John Wick by its aesthetic and action. The movies are so enjoyable and interesting because of these and other elements allowed to breath due to a strong central foundation.
For three of the four, that foundation is not present in the sequels, much more concerned with expanding the story’s world, complicating the plot, and exploiting the increased budget that comes with a successful first movie, than anything else. Often, priorities are placed in the wrong areas, ignoring what made the original work for more spectacle and a denser mythology than is strictly necessary. They try to make these movies something they were never meant to be. A swashbuckler flick did not need to be an elaborate epic, a nifty sci-fi comedy did not need to be a world-spanning Bond film. Both the Matrix and Pirates sequels additionally had to contrive a way to retcon the closed-endedness of their initial films and haphazardly fit them into a much larger narrative. And the result is a bunch of bloated movies that feel obligated to be the next Star Wars franchise and consequently lost sight of what made the original so special.
But the John Wick sequels …do all of this too. They also have much higher budgets and get away from the central theme and conflict of the first movie. They turn a revenge film in the mould of Death Wish or Oldboy into a grand-scale action epic, establishing a deeper mythos, heightened world-building, and more convoluted plots and character arcs. And they too try to fit that first movie into a larger narrative that isn’t pointedly about John’s deceased wife and dog, to the degree each film feeds into the next, thereby setting the events of the whole series (including upcoming sequels) over a relatively short period of time -much like the Back to the Future films which are likewise comparable. So how do John Wicks 2 and 3 manage to stay good through all this? Is it merely more competence on the part of the filmmakers?
To a degree, yes. The aforementioned driving forces of John Wick, its aesthetic and its action, has remained consistent if not more prioritized across the series. Both John Wick sequels look amazing, the action choreography and the neon-noir production and lighting choices seemingly get more pronounced and energized with each new film. There’s greater creativity as well, specifically in the hall of mirrors fight in Chapter 2 and the knife fight in 3. Exactly what was loved and most impressive about the first film is there to even greater quantities in the sequels. But that’s not to say other elements go unnoticed. The writing is still good, with its welcome touches of humour and gravitas, and though the inciting incident of the first film is no longer strictly relevant, the sequels haven’t forgotten it -tying John’s story back into his grief if not totally organically than at least plausibly enough. And John maintains your investment in part because despite how unstoppable he is, he’s explicitly mortal -never leaving a fight without a few wounds. He can get hurt, but it doesn’t phase him next to his inner turmoil, kept close and secretive from even the audience, allowing Reeves to actually stretch himself, his performance in 3 being indeed one of the actors’ best.
However it’s mostly the lore-building that surprisingly works. John Wick has established for itself an intricate and compelling criminal underworld that is just similar enough to the far-reaching organizational structures of the MCU, the Harry Potter world, and yes, Men in Black; but distinct in its structures, religious code, and lack of moral righteousness that it feels like something wholly different. It is a mainstream franchise with the scope of any other sci-fi or genre property, but its’ grand connected world is one of killers, where everybody is either a bad or ethically gray person. It’s fresh in this way, notably adult, yet still fun and fascinating to be swept up in. And along with that, John Wick’s role in that world is made increasingly enticing as his own antihero’s journey is shaped by it, which Mikey Neumann discusses and articulates better than I could.
It is all a little silly of course: a secret global network of assassins operating under a strict set of rules and with a highly specific cult of death -but the movies realize this. They are aware that much of the franchise’s identity is corny, but also know exactly how to make it cool -much like classic martial arts films do. The more over-the-top and stylized the better. An appeal not too dissimilar from that of the Fast and Furious movies, I understand -though I would venture to guess John Wick is more artfully engaging. These films are deeply aware of their strengths and limitations, much like Reeves is himself, and they are the better for it. This series manages to justify every expansion to the mythos, every dumb new fight sequence, every evolving character beat, and every charismatic new cast member added as either a friend risking their life to help John or an enemy for him to ultimately kill.
And I like it, it’s thrilling. After watching the three movies back to back, I’m excited for the fourth, not least because it means seeing John team up with Fishburne’s Bowery King (easily my favourite character) to presumably go after the High Table of crime lords that had turned against him in Chapter 3. Obviously, there’s something pure to the first film that its sequels haven’t recaptured, but they’ve made up for it in their own ways. Watching these movies kind of gave me a little bit of hope for the Hollywood blockbuster, as they demonstrate an ability to both play by the rules of that form yet still be far removed from the homogeneous comforts many of their competitors rely on. And I found that it’s not so impossible to make big sequels to an original high concept action movie good.
So after avoiding you for so long John Wick, when your next movie comes (in a post-COVID world), I'll “Be Seeing You.”
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