SEQUEL CATCH-UP: JOHN WICK: CHAPTER 4 (2023) ** ½

The evil Marquis (Bill Skarsgard) orders the demolition of The Continental Hotel, much to the chagrin of its owner, Winston (Ian McShane).  Meanwhile, everyone and their grandmother are gunning for John Wick (Keanu Reeves), who is desperately trying to find a way out of the hitman lifestyle.  Winton comes to him with a deal that could finally free John from the clutches of the underworld, if it doesn’t kill them both first. 

First things first.  There was no reason this should’ve been close to three hours long.  The filmmakers could’ve probably gotten away with making two great sequels and instead chose to make one sequel that, while decent, is overly bloated.  The gun battles and Kung Fu fights are likewise drawn out.  I also got tired of all the scenes of guys wearing bulletproof three-piece suits taking multiple gunshots at point blank range and never getting a scratch.  It’s like playing a video game on “God Mode” or playing a game of tag with your fingers crossed so there are no tag-backs. 

I will say the action is well done, and the choreography is concise.  However, the action sequences just seem to go on forever.  Consider the scene late in the picture where Wick does battle with dozens of assassins in the middle of traffic.  It starts off well enough, but it just keeps repeating the same beats (guys are shot and then hit by cars and vice versa) over and over again.  Like the film itself, it just doesn’t seem to know when to pack it in.  You know when you talk to a longwinded person and you keep interjecting, “That’s crazy” as a social cue for them to start wrapping up the conversation, but they don’t pick up on it and they keep talking anyway?  John Wick:  Chapter 4 is the cinematic version of that dude. 

The film is also full of cool ideas that it never manages to capitalize on.  Having Donnie Yen as a blind swordfighter should work, but honestly, he already played that role more successfully in Rogue One a few years back.  (I did like the scene where he placed motion sensor doorbells in various places, so he knew where the gunmen were though.)  Also, taking Scott Adkins, one of the most versatile martial artists working in film today and saddling him with a dorky fat suit was… uh… a choice.  Marko Zaror, who plays Skargard’s bodyguard, isn’t wasted nearly as much, but he really doesn’t get a chance to shine either. 

Reeves seems like he’s sleepwalking this time out.  Luckily, the other returning stars have some spark left in them.  McShane still looks like he’s having fun and Laurence Fishburne is pretty funny.  He also gets the best line of the movie when he presents Wick with a new suit and says, “A man’s got to look good when he’s getting married or buried.”

I think with John Wick:  Chapter 4, the bloom is slowly coming off the rose.  This might be a “hot take”, but I preferred the series when it was just Death Wish with a dog.  Now they feel the need to continually one-up each predecessor by adding new underworld “rules” and constant criminal empire comic book-style world-building, and frankly, it’s starting to get a little exhausting.