John Wick Chapter 2
is the follow up to the 2014 surprise action hit John Wick. This second film, directed by original co-director Chad
Stahelski, picks up shortly after the events of the first film and finds John
Wick tying up the final loose ends from that film. After Wick thinks he’s back
out he is called upon to do a job based on an agreement he made with an
individual many years before. The film sees Keanu Reeves return as Wick along
with a stellar supporting cast including Riccardo Scamarcio, Ian McShane, Ruby
Rose, Laurence Fishburne, and Common.
This film is an absolute triumph as an action film and as a
sequel. There is so much going on in this that it would be easy to get lost in
it all but, at the end of the day, what this film does so effectively is take
the concept from John Wick and expand
on it in every way. The first film introduced us to this world of assassins in
such an intriguing way, revealing very little about the true underlying infrastructure.
This film pulls back the curtain and expands the universe of John Wick tenfold. Yet it managed to
retain all of the intrigue contained within. That is something that is nearly
impossible to do and most sequels fail at it spectacularly.
On top of effectively expanding the world, the film also
manages to be a great action flick in and of itself. The story itself all makes
relative sense, you care about the characters and what they’re dealing with,
and the action/fight sequences are shot and executed to near perfection. Much
like the original, Stahelski and company do a great job setting the stakes for
the film and giving you reasons that you should care what the different
characters are doing. This is something sorely missing from most pure action
films today. In a film that is so steeped in that world to so effectively break
through the barriers to go from an “acceptable” action film to just a “good”
film is impressive.
As I’ve mentioned, but avoided digging into, the action in
this film is gripping, intense, and wall-to-wall amazing. There are few films
with as high a ratio of action to non-action than John Wick Chapter 2, but every moment of it is treated with care. The
fights are all so well shot to show you exactly what is going on, the gun shots
have force and consequence, and you feel, as an audience member, the pain of
every injury inflicted because of how visceral it is. We don’t get nearly
enough action this well shot and constructed. So many major blockbusters could
learn a lot from the John Wick franchise in this respect (and hopefully will as
it becomes more popular).
Though John Wick
Chapter 2 is really really solid, it’s not a perfect film. One action area
that could use a bit of work is their car chases. The sound design and
geography of them is fantastic, however, the way they are shot felt like it was
trying to avoid showing everything going on so they could cut corners
(something they didn’t do in the hand-to-hand combat and “gun fu” moments). In
a film as impeccable about its action as this that is disappointing. The only
other nitpick I have with the action is that injuries to John Wick have
extremely time limited effect on him whereas they have extensive impact on the
goons he takes down. This made it feel a bit unbelievable in a bad way. I also
thought that there are a few plot points later in the film that felt a bit
hokey, even in the world that has been established.
Overall, I think John
Wick Chapter 2 was stellar and an extremely enjoyable movie. The film was
exciting and engaging and did everything I wanted it to do in terms of a sequel
attempting to expand the universe and create levels that may have been absent
(or unrevealed in the first). It’s really hard for me to say which of these
films I like better, but the one thing I can say for sure is that I badly want
to see a third chapter!
Ryan’s Score: 8.5/10
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