John Wick 4 Main Character Confirmed To Return
A critical character is coming back for John Wick 4. It is hard to imagine this guy not being around in the franchise going forward.
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It’s hard to imagine any John Wick movie without Winston and luckily, we won’t have to worry about that going forward. The cast is starting to round out for the next installment, John Wick 4, and we are getting a sense of who will be around for this next film. Deadline is reporting that Ian McShane will be reprising his role from the first three flicks and has been integral to the story up until this point.
Again, Ian McShane joining John Wick 4 was something of a foregone conclusion considering the trajectory and plotting of the first three movies. In addition to the franchise star Keanu Reeves, only McShane and Lance Reddick as Charon have appeared in all three movies up to this point. They are integral to the overall story, running the Continental but also interwoven now into the larger plot with the Adjudicator and the High Table. Winston and Wick have entered into a delicate balance of a relationship, needing each other in some way, but oddly at odds at the end of the last one.
Like the other movies in the franchise, John Wick 4 is likely to pick up directly following the events of the third film with Wick and The Bowery King (Laurence Fishburne) joining up forces. The two are on a collision course with The High Table, something we will almost definitely see in this next flick. If the other installments are any indication, the pair now will need McShane’s Winston in some way, though there’s likely to be more than a little animosity. Winston tried to kill Wick at the end of the third movie after all.
John Wick 4 will continue this surprisingly successful franchise, one that only continues growing its story, weaving in a much larger world of assassins than we ever could have imagined with the first flick. That one was about a widowed former killer, his dead dog, a stolen car, a secret group of hired guns, a Russian mob body count that would make most shoot’em ups blush. The first one turned a tidy $89 million at the box office and earned solid reviews from critics, sitting at 86% on Rotten Tomatoes. The next two began to blow things out of the box, racking up almost $500 million combined and continuing on the solid critical path as well.
John Wick 4 was supposed to be shot back-to-back with the fifth installment, but that plan was scrapped because of the pandemic-related shutdowns and delays. They opted to just shoot this next film and pick up the rest of the story later. The fifth movie will definitely be made, it’s just going to involve a longer timeline now than originally expected.
This Ian McShane news for John Wick 4 comes while the film is in active shooting, releasing one of its first looks last week. A video of franchise newcomer Shamier Anderson surfaced with the actor rehearsing a fight scene for the film. If the previous movies are any indication, there will be plenty of those along the way.
