In 2014 the world was introduced to sleeper-hit John Wick (Chad Stahelski, David Leitch) which won fans over with its great action, cinematography, world-building and the best performance from Keanu Reeves since The Matrix (1999, The Wachowskis). And then in 2016 the sequel continued and improved on the story. And now the third wishes to push its protagonist into far darker territory. Now with no allies and a $14 million bounty on his head, the stakes have never been higher and the carnage has never been more brutal!
Initial Thoughts
This is a great follow-up to the previous movies! Definitely levelling up from John Wick 2 because everything is dialled up to an eleven! The action is incredible, the stuntwork is amazing and the world of the assassins just getting bigger and far more interesting!
Keanu Reeves/John Wick
John Wick is the role that Keanu Reeves was born to play. Like Tom Cruise with Ethan Hunt, Reeves shows off his merits as a hard-working action star by doing most of his own stunts and looking great while doing it. But Reeves is also able to sell the pain of John Wick. And Wick gets the stuffing kicked out of him... a lot. Which helps to humanise his character. Sure, his line delivery is still flat but Reeves's physicality is enough to make you sympathise with John Wick.
Mark Dacascos/Zero
The movie introduced a new antagonist, Zero (Mark Dacascos) who, much like Wick is a force to be reckoned with. The way he takes down his enemies with such ease is very disturbing, which makes him a great adversary for Wick. Their fight in the third act is definitely a highlight for this movie. Which is really good because, as good as the first two movies are, the final fights are a little disappointing compared to everything else. So I was very happy that they improved on that.
Action
Now, what would a John Wick movie be without some killer action and stunt work? This is some of the best practical and well-choreographed action since Mission Impossible: Fallout (2018, Christopher McQuarrie). But what makes the action scenes so good is that they're quite distinct from one another and each one holds a different challenge for Wick. Something that I had a problem with the previous movies was that the action never really got bigger. It stayed on the same difficulty level. But I'm happy that in this movie they've fixed that and the action gets more intense and challenging as the story goes on.
Style
What really separates this movie series from any other action series is its style. This movie has a lot of great set-pieces, that are occasionally wrecked in the carnage, hard-lighting and an eye-catching colour palette that makes every shot just pop! Giving this movie series its own distinct personality, which is really good in a cinema landscape where most action movies look very much alike and have no personal style.
World-Building
Besides the action, another thing that this series is praised for is its world-building. Which I'm happy to say is built even more in this movie. Diving a little into John Wick's origins, the hierarchy of the Assassins and the different struggles of power. So that was very interesting to watch and I'm very interested to see how they build on it even more, particularly with the supposed spin-offs like Ballerina, which is slightly dived into in this movie, and the TV show The Continental.
Conclusion
If you love action movies then you will absolutely love John Wick 3: Parabellum! The action is bigger and better than ever, the set pieces are incredible and the world of the Assassins just gets keeps on expanding.
So that's my review of John Wick 3: Parabellum. What did you think of the movie? Do you agree or disagree with anything I have just said? Please leave a comment down below. And, if you liked this review then you can follow this blog for more content. Thank you for reading!
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