John Wick: Chapter 4 — the fourth entry in the neo-noir action franchise — was its most ambitious outing yet, with Keanu Reeves again taking the lead under the direction of Chad Stahelski. Studio Lionsgate was laughing all the way to the bank, with the fourth outing earning a massive $440 million worldwide and becoming the 12th highest-grossing movie of 2023.
As Wick tries to get out from underneath the High Table, the tease of one last job hinted that Chapter 4 would settle Wick’s debts or see him buried in his sharpest suit. Stahelski definitely delivered a potential end to the story, but one question remains.
Is this the end of the road for Jardani Jovanovich or is there one more round in the magazine for John Wick: Chapter 5?
Warning: major spoilers for John Wick: Chapter 4 ahead
Will there be a John Wick: Chapter 5?
In August 2024, rumours started to spread that Stahelski would return to helm the fifth John Wick instalment with filming set to take place in 2025. However, these were quickly debunked.
Collider confirmed that no such plans were in place, with Stahelski was set to direct his Highlander reboot with Henry Cavill as his next project.
Back in 2020, Lionsgate CEO Jon Feltheimer said John Wick: Chapter 5 would shoot back-to-back with Chapter 4. But Stahelski ended up deciding against this move, as he wanted to focus on one movie at a time.
The director told Screen Rant in March 2023 that filming back-to-back was “kind of a cheat”, saying “I think the greatest part is that, after each John Wick, I took two years off to go live and get better; to travel, to read more, and to get better. I don’t know how to do a movie back-to-back and get better for the second one.”
In a separate chat with The Hollywood Reporter, he appeared to throw doubt on the development of a fifth movie. He said he would “give John Wick a rest” but added: “If everyone loves it and it goes kooky, then we’ll take a quiet minute.”
Giving his thoughts to Total Film (via GamesRadar), Reeves said: “You have to see how the audience responds to what we did. The only reason we’ve had a chance to make these movies is that people have liked what we have done... Hopefully they’ll like it.”
Given that Chapter 4 has a rarely unified critical and audience response of 95% on Rotten Tomatoes, it’s safe to say the fourquel has impressed audiences.
The most definitive answer came from Lionsgate exec Joe Drake. He promised Deadline: “We’re not ready to say goodbye to Keanu with this franchise. It’s what alternative there will be. There’s a lot of different things that we can do.”
But he warned The Hollywood Reporter that “there’s no guarantee”, adding: “Keanu and Chad, rightly so, are very protective about never screwing with the audience. So we certainly have our work cut out for us.”
What happens at the end of John Wick: Chapter 4?
Having survived his fakeout death at the end of 2019’s John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum and then taking out the Elder (George Georgiou), Wick was once again in the crosshairs of the High Table. Spurred on by Winston (Ian McShane) to avenge the death of Charon (Lance Reddick), Wick challenged the Marquis Vincent de Gramont, (Bill Skarsgård) to an old-school duel at Paris’ Sacré-Cœur.
The Marquis selected blind assassin Caine (Donnie Yen) as his champion, and despite the former’s best attempts to kill Wick before the duel, it's pistols at dawn. Although it looks like Wick is bested, he pulls a trick on the Marquis and shoots him dead. With Caine and Wick’s slate wiped clean, John succumbs to his injuries, sees a vision of his late wife, and seemingly dies.
The final scene featuring Winston and the Bowery King (Laurence Fishburne) at Wick’s graveside all but confirms his demise, but with Stahelski’s original plans being to film a mythical Chapter 5 back-to-back with Chapter 4, fans are rightly asking whether this is really the end of the road for Johnny boy.
For now, even those at the top might not have the answer, with co-writer Michael Finch admitting to Polygon that things were left open-ended: “What I will say is that we never actually see him dying. We see a [grave] plot. What happened in between is up for interpretation.”
How can John Wick return?
We know Reeves will be suiting up for Len Wiseman’s Ballerina. The spin-off is set between the third and fourth John Wick movies and stars Ana de Armas as an assassin called Rooney, who briefly appeared (played by another actor) in Parabellum.
Alongside the return of McShane, a posthumous Reddick, and Anjelica Huston as the Director, Reeves will appear in some capacity. With Rooney being the focus, we expect it’ll be more like Bryan Cranston reprising his role as Walter White for Better Call Saul.
It comes after the release of Prime Video’s The Continental, a three-part prequel series that visits the infamous haunt in the 1970s. Colin Woodell plays a young Winston, with an expanded cast including the likes of Mel Gibson. More Wick-adjacent stories from other directors give Stahelski his chance to let the character “rest.”
An obvious story to tell would pick up the Chapter 4 post-credit tease of Akira (Rina Sawayama) taking vengeance against Caine for the murder of Koji (Hiroyuki Sanada). This solves the problem of tying up loose plot threads while keeping Wick’s noble end intact.
It’s hard to imagine a fifth John Wick movie without the man himself, and unless he’s confined to flashbacks à la Tobin Bell in Saw, the most likely option is to give Wick another miraculous resurrection.
He didn’t exactly have a happy ending in Chapter 4, but to drag him back into the criminal underworld for the sake of churning out another movie is sure to rattle more than a few fans.
Then again, if Stahelski and co. can get anywhere near the quality of Chapter 4, most won’t care if Reeves comes back as a clone, robot, or John’s twin brother.
John Wick: Chapter 4 is available to buy or rent on digital.
