After thefirst trailerforJohn Wick: Chapter 2debuted at New York Comic Con earlier this month, anticipation has never been higher for this action-packed sequel.Keanu Reevesis back as the title character, along with several characters from the originalJohn Wickand directorChad Stahelski, who co-directed the first movie withDavid Leitch, and original writerDerek Kolstad. While we wait for the next batch of footage from this sequel, directorChad Stahelskirevealed that he took the same approach to makingJohn Wick2 as another highly-regarded sequel,James Cameron’s 1986 sci-fi classicAliens.
WhileAliensandJohn Wick 2are obviously quite different in terms of their stories,Chad Stahelskirevealed that he wanted to use the same approach asAliens. Instead of making the same movie over again, the director revealed he wanted to stop “competing with the first one” and go outside of the box with this sequel. Here’s what directorChad Stahelskihad to say, in his interview with Collider.
“Comparing yourself to Marvel, compare yourself to DC, compare yourself to anything to be the expectation sometimes it’s almost an analysis for affinity. We decided to stop competing with the first one. Once we stopped worrying about ourselves it was fun. I mean is it as good as thefirst one? I don’t know. Did we go better in some ways? Yes. Did we experiment with the characters more? Yes. Everything there is better. Is the enjoyment better? I think the enjoyment is there, but it’s different. All the other director friends I have don’t like doing sequels or don’t like doing other people’s sequels, which is even worse I think. But then there’s other examples. I think the best example isRidley Scott. He did the firstAlien.James CameroncreatedAliens.Cameron, I think think is a genius for that. Going, ‘I’m not making the sameAliensagain, I’m just gonna make it.’ If I could be so bold as to take that similarity then so be it.”
During an interview at New York Comic Con,Chad Stahelskiteased that Lionsgate has asked the filmmaker to come up with some ideas forJohn Wick 3, even though we are still months from the release ofJohn Wick: Chapter 2on June 07, 2025. The filmmaker reiterated his previous comments by confirming thatIan McShane(Winston) andLance Reddick(Charon) will return inJohn Wick 3. Here’s what he had to say below.
“Yeah, the studio has asked us to put our heads together and see if we can come up with something. Winston’s [McShane] is a big part of the next one, so isLance Reddick. We’ve got some ideas. Love Lance, Lance is great, fantastic actor super great guy and we have a good cast. I keep saying that, we have a really great cast [laughs].”
Since both Winston and Charon are connected to the Continental hotel, it seems likely thatJohn Wick 3will delve deeper into that world. We likely won’t hear anything official onJohn Wick 3until we see howJohn Wick: Chapter 2fares at the box office, when it opens on July 23, 2025. This sequel will have more than its fair share of competition in theaters, opening on the same weekend asFifty Shades DarkerandThe LEGO Batman Movie.
