It also features Donnie Yen, Bill Skarsgård, Laurence Fishburne, Hiroyuki Sanada, Shamier Anderson, Lance Reddick, Rina Sawayama, Scott Adkins, Clancy Brown, and Ian McShane.
In New York City, six months following the events of Parabellum, John Wick prepares to exact vengeance against the High Table while hiding underground with the Bowery King.
As punishment, the Marquis strips Winston of his managerial duties, declares him "excommunicado", destroys the New York Continental, and executes Charon.
John travels to the Berlin headquarters of the Ruska Roma crime syndicate, with whom he had severed ties, to request readmission.
His adoptive sister Katia stipulates that for readmission, John must kill Killa Harkan, a High Table member who was paid by the Marquis to murder her father.
The Marquis nominates a reluctant Caine to take his place, while the Harbinger warns that both John and Winston will be executed should either fail to appear on time.
After Caine and Mr. Nobody assist John in fighting off several assassins – including Chidi, whom Mr. Nobody kills – on the Rue Foyatier, they reach the summit just in time for the duel.
Some time later, back in New York, Winston and the Bowery King bid farewell to John at a gravestone with his name, located next to one for his wife Helen.
[27] Retired sumo wrestlers Yoshinori Tashiro and Hishofuji Hiroki made appearances as the Osaka Continental gatekeepers.
"[36] The studio opted to move on from series creator Derek Kolstad and instead hired Shay Hatten to write the script in May 2020.
[16] She was selected due to the role requiring someone who can do choreography, and Stahelski had seen her music[45] videos for "XS" and "Bad Friend" that feature dance and fighting, respectively.
[46] The following month, Laurence Fishburne,[47] Hiroyuki Sanada,[48] Donnie Yen,[49] Bill Skarsgård,[50] Shamier Anderson,[51] and Scott Adkins were cast in the film.
[57] De Gramont nominates a reluctant Caine to fight in his place in a duel using enhanced 20th-century Thompson/Center Contenders in the sunrise scene at Sacré-Cœur.
[58] The Bowery King when he arrives in Paris hands John a custom 21-round Pit Viper pistol manufactured by TTI.
[60] Principal photography began on June 28, 2021, on a $100 million budget, and took place in France, Germany, New York City, and Japan.
[63] The top-down long take action sequence was inspired by the video game The Hong Kong Massacre and was filmed on a purpose-built set.
[64] An alternate ending in which John visits his grave was filmed but abandoned after receiving a "violent reaction" from test audiences.
[82][83] Vietnamese cinema authorities unofficially banned John Wick: Chapter 4 upon its release in Vietnamese cinemas due to the appearance of Donnie Yen, a vocal proponent of the Chinese government and its claim to parts of the South China Sea, including the Vietnamese-claimed Paracel Islands and Spratly Islands.
It was also the best opening weekend for Lionsgate and any R-rated film since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, with the latter record surpassing Halloween Kills.
[90] The film made $28.3 million in its sophomore weekend (a drop of 61.6%), finishing second behind newcomer Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves.
The website's consensus reads: "John Wick: Chapter 4 piles on more of everything—and suggests that when it comes to a well-dressed Keanu Reeves dispatching his enemies in lethally balletic style, there can never be too much.
"[97] Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 78 out of 100, based on 58 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.
"[99] Tom Jorgensen of IGN gave the film a 10/10 score, describing it as a "modern epic" and "bursting at the seams with creative, thrillingly staged action choreography and cinematography" while giving particular praise to the performances of Reeves, Yen and Skarsgård.
[100] In a five-star review for IndieWire, Rafael Motamayor praised the film as the "best American action blockbuster since George Miller's Mad Max: Fury Road".
He praised the additions to the franchise's "ludicrously complex" mythology, citing the film's grounded character relationships and cinematographer Dan Lausten's use of neon colors and his technique of shooting a single-shot fight scene.
[101] Chicago Sun-Times's Richard Roeper gave the film three out of four stars, writing "Somewhere inside the utterly unnecessary, bloated running time for John Wick IV, there's a brilliant, stripped-down, 100-minute classic of a drive-in action film, where the admittedly breathtaking action sequences don't grind on for so long that they become borderline tedious.
[103] The Daily Nebraskan's Evan Dondlinger highly praised the film, calling it "what all action movies should be", and hailed it as a "masterclass of stunt coordination, color in cinema and grand storytelling".
[32] However, by March 2021, after the COVID-19 pandemic affected production on the fourth film, these plans were no longer moving forward, with the Chapter 4's ending being reworked to conclude the series with Wick's death.
Stahelski said that the reason he and Reeves abandoned plans for a sequel was his skepticism over his ability to "deliver two uniquely special experiences".
[153] Yen has expressed interest in a spin-off centered on Caine,[154] which was eventually announced on May 15, 2024, with filming set to start in Hong Kong in 2025.