It’s strange to think that the John Wick franchise launched less than 10 years ago. The worldbuilding it created as well as the visual style it used to depict its violence and mayhem set a new standard that many that came after would imitate but few to none would surpass. Fans were left with a cliffhanger at the end of John Wick: Chapter Three – Parabellum, and the delay of the pandemic left them wondering for an extra two years if he would ever have peace from the High Table. This question and more are answered quite well, and Chapter Four ends the series on the highest of notes.
Despite the threat from the High Table and his status as Excommunicado, John Wick (Keanu Reeves) is still rightly feared by the empire of assassins, so the High Table grants the Marquis Vincent de Gramont (Bill Skarsgard) unlimited power and resources to bring him down. Wick discovers a way to freedom by challenging the Marquis to a duel which would release him from the Table forever should he win but cost him not only his life but that of Winston (Ian McShane) should he lose. With only hours to go to get to the duel before he forfeits, John must make a mad dash through Paris facing not only an army of assassins and his former colleague and equal Caine (Donny Yen), but also the entire might of the Table, a feat which might be insurmountable even for The Boogeyman.
John Wick has always been about over-the-top action, physics-defying stunts, and flings with death that no mere mortal could survive. In short, they’re superhero movies, and that is upped to the Nth degree with Chapter Four. The way he fights, drives, and escapes scenarios completely obliterates the suspension of disbelief but still does so without crossing the line into the absurd. So in this sense, it almost plays out more like an R-rated Marvel film than a traditional action flick, but it does it so well that maybe Marvel should take note for their next outings.
This also takes every trick director Chad Stahelski has learned from the first three and not only weaves them into a hypnotic dance of death like we’ve never seen before but puts most other films in this genre to shame. Never before have we felt like we were standing shoulder to shoulder with John as he faces impossible odds, dispatches enemies with ease, or barely escapes with his life. In fact, most of this feels like the most realistic video game you’ve ever played except you’re a bystander and not controlling the character yourself. That said, it shouldn’t be surprising that Stahelski was influenced heavily by the John Wick Hex game that came out awhile back, as the cinematography of many of the fight scenes, especially towards the end, mirror a lot of what was found in that game.
Simply put, this is the best that John Wick has ever been, and I couldn’t have hoped for a better capstone to his quest. It is a tad long at almost three hours, and while I do feel they could have chopped 20 minutes or so off without changing the story, the time whizzes by. Fans will leave pleased, and any newcomers are going to want to go back and revisit the previous movies to see the events that set this one into motion.
We’ve come a long way from a man merely getting revenge for the death of his dog, and after being dragged through broken glass, blood, and a hail of innumerable bullets, we’ve finally arrived at the satisfying ending we and John deserve. It’s bittersweet to see the series go, but the destination was more than worth the journey to get there.