John Wick 5 receives the green light and is set to be filmed immediately following the conclusion of the fourth installment.
Looking at how immensely successful John Wick’s film series is ever since it first hit theatres in 2014, it’s not shocking that following John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum‘s release in 2019, the fourth chapter, immediately received the green light.
Granted, we are going to have to wait a bit to witness John Wick: Chapter 4, but on the bright side, John Wick 5 is already happening.
This news comes straight from Lionsgate CEO John Feltheimer, who announced that John Wick: Chapter 5 is coming down the creative pipeline during the studio’s earnings call (via Deadline). But wait, there’s more!
Feltheimer also mentioned the plan is to shoot the fourth and fifth John Wick movies back-to-back once franchise lead Keanu Reeves’ schedule clears up early next year.
If things had progressed according to schedule, John Wick: Chapter 4 would have begun shooting later this year to meet its initial May 21, 2021 release date.
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The global pandemic, however, contributed to Keanu Reeves’ job on Matrix 4 being delayed owing to a shutdown in mid-March and then a restart in late June. As expected, John Wick: Chapter 4 got postponed for a full year.
Lionsgate, impressively, was able to turn lemons into lemonade despite the dire situation. Not only does John Wick’s plot proceed to a fifth movie, but the company reduced the shooting period between the two films.
Paramount Pictures went for the same back-to-back strategy they took with Mission: Impossible 7 and Mission: Impossible 8 at the beginning of 2019.
Since John Wick: Chapter 4 and John Wick: Chapter 5 are filming back-to-back, we assume this implies the latter installment will be out a year later, i.e. in 2023, as opposed to being kept for two or three years.
That said, let us not ignore the final two Matrix movies were released in 2003 six months apart, and perhaps this Keanu Reeves series will do something identical and get John Wick: Chapter 5 primed to go by the winter of 2022.
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In any event, this is yet another continuation of the John Wick chain. In addition to the silver screen iteration, there’s also a spin-off TV show The Continental on the way.
John Wick has also headlined a number of computer games and became the subject of Dynamite Entertainment’s comic book miniseries.
The last time we saw John Wick in the third film, he was evidently deceived by Ian McShane‘s Winston (there was certainly more happening than what meets the eye) and left with little to no chance of survival, but he was saved by Laurence Fishburne‘s Bowery King.
All of them now carry a large bone to pick with The High Table, so the conflict will last at least two more installments.
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Last modified: August 7, 2020