The Legacy of John Wick Will Never Die John Wick 4 is great, but go see other movies too

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The non-stop action of the John Wick movies have been the guilty pleasure of millions, going on for about a decade now. These movies have single handedly put Keanu Reeves back on the map in Hollywood and among movie fans, for good reason - though the character of John Wick is a man of few words, the performance of Keanu through all the stunts and fight choreography is very commendable.

The actual stories have been simple, though hardly self contained. Throughout this series occurs a rapid escalation of the initial conflict into something far beyond what the namesake protagonist was looking for, turning a simple revenge story into a fight against the whole underworld.

This final entry into the series is the natural conclusion of that story, and unlike the previous ideas of revenge and loyalty, this movie flirts with a different set of underlying themes: freedom and purpose.

The movie asks two important questions: How many people are you willing to kill to be free? And what is John Wick if he doesn’t kill? John Wick never answers those questions in dialogue, but they weigh on the mind of the audience as he carves a path to his final destination, answered by his actions and choices throughout.

This movie by no means dwells on these weighty topics for long, and instead opts to throw intense pieces of action at the audience from minute one. The set pieces for these fights are as beautiful as the actual choreography themselves as the movie travels across parts of Tokyo, Berlin, and Paris and uses that location well.

On that note: Cinematography during action focuses clearly on the subjects in any given fight, making the action easy to follow no matter how intense it can get, and during the more calm moments, there is meaningful showing of visuals that speaks all on its own.

As a final mention, actor Lance Reddick, who had played one of the more significant characters in the previous movies, had died before the release of this movie as a result of his heart disease. This movie gives him a respectful sendoff to the character as well as the person.

All in all, this movie will be a great capstone to those who’ve already seen the previous John Wick films, though will be hard to follow for those not fully caught up on the previous three movies.

To watch it as a standalone movie would be a poor choice; since many of the movie’s best payoffs are best experienced with the context of previous movies.