The ending of John Wick: Chapter 4 was a shocker, given how (SPOILER ALERT) the titular assassin’s fate was seemingly sealed. After making it through four movies as an unstoppable force, Keanu Reeves’ John Wick appeared to be killed off with the conclusion of John Wick: Chapter 4. Some fans weren’t quite so convinced that this was truly the end of John Wick, feeling that it will be inevitably revealed in a fifth film that the character survived. Meanwhile, other fans interpreted this as the end of the series, serving as a way of concluding John Wick’s story.
Having an ambiguous ending was the result of test screenings for the film. In a new interview with Empire, director Chad Stahelski confirms that an entirely different ending had been shot for the film. This ending was not ambiguous at all, as it clearly showed Reeves as John Wick at the very end, revealing that he was not, in fact, dead. However, when this ending and the one from the theatrical version were screened with test audiences, people seemed to prefer the ambiguous ending, so that’s why Stahelski opted to go with that one for the final cut.
“We had a different ending,” Stahelski explains. “[The theatrical ending] was the ending Keanu and I wanted, but we shot a different ending. We shot an ending where you actually saw John Wick at the end of the movie. So it was very clear that he was still alive. The audiences we tested with absolutely preferred the ambiguous ending.”
Related: John Wick Director Is Still Trying to Figure Out the ‘Why’ for a Possible Chapter 5
John Wick: Chapter 4 Ends With a Bang
Lionsgate
Stahelski also explained how part of the reason for John Wick: Chapter 4 to have such a shocking ending was that he felt like the ending of John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum hadn’t quite accomplished that. Because the director and Reeves have such great respect for the character and the franchise, they wanted to have a much stronger conclusion this time around, in case this turns out to be the end of the series.
“We didn’t feel like we had done our best. We both felt like we could have ended the series better,” Stahelski says. “We didn’t feel like we stuck the landing, and that’s a shitty feeling. Because we love the character, we love working together, we love the world.”
On crafting a stronger ending for John Wick: Chapter 4, Stahelski continued, “I had just read this treatise on samurai etiquette called Hagakure, the art of the way of dying. And we’re like, ‘Yeah, he’s got to die. And we got to come up with the coolest way to make the happen. We’ve got to make it all about, ‘you can only had a good death if you had a good life’.’ That’s the first line we wrote on a napkin in Japan, three years out. We wrote the movie backwards off that one thing.”
Having John Wick’s death more ambiguous could allow for the film to serve as a conclusion of the series, but it also seems that this may not be the end just yet. Stahelski also recently teased to Empire that he’s open to seeing the movie series continue, but he’s still waiting to see if there’s a strong enough idea for a story that warrants a fifth film.
“Now we’ve done the four, and completed the circle, so to speak, I think it’s pretty good closure for the series,” the director explains. “And then there’s the competitor, or the real director in me who goes, ‘F–k it, let’s just see if we can do it.’ It’s very appealing. I just don’t have the ‘why’ yet. But that doesn’t mean we should stop looking.”
You can view the original article HERE.
