Keanu Reeves gushes about John Wick spinoff ‘Ballerina’

With chapter four in the John Wick franchise premiering on Friday, it’s still uncertain if there will be a fifth film in the franchise. But while fans wait for confirmation, John Wick star Keanu Reeves can be spotted in the franchise’s upcoming spinoff ‘Ballerina’.

The spinoff film will star Ana de Armas as Rooney, a ballerina assassin who’s out for revenge. In a recent interview, Reeves revealed that he had some creative control over the film, being able to choose where in the John Wick timeline the film would take place.

Reeves decided where in the John Wick universe ‘Ballerina’ takes place

“Yeah, I got to work with Ana de Armas, and the director Len Wiseman, and they had a great script, and John Wick has a small part to play in it,” Reeves told Entertainment Weekly.

“Len Wiseman was cool. He was like, ‘Where do you want to pitch this story in [the] timeline?’ So, it takes place between chapter 3 and chapter 4 of the John Wick stories. It was fun to put the suit back on.”

By Reeves placing the new movie in between ‘John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum’ and the upcoming ‘John Wick: Chapter 4′, this means that ‘Ballerina’ takes place during the time that John Wick is recovering from his encounter with the Bowery King, sometime during the six months after chapter three.

“Well, we figured the first three movies almost happened in like a week, week and a half, somewhere in there. That’s my version, I think Keanu’s is a little different, and I think this is like six months later. So within a year, I think it all happens. I would say almost within 7 to 8 months,” director Chad Stahelski told Collider.

Since chapter 3 saw Wick wounded and left for dead, he may very well have only a small role to play in ‘Ballerina’.

‘Ballerina’ was not originally set in the John Wick universe

“‘Ballerina’ has just been a completely fascinating journey for me overall because it started as a spec that was not related to the John Wick movies six years ago,” screenwriter Shay Hatten told Screen Rant.

“And then just kind of got brought in and then Chad was kind enough to let us kind of set it up in three by showing the ballet theater,” he said, referring to the school John Wick trained in.

“The original script was set in the Swiss Alps, which is territory that the John Wick movies have not touched. So, I think in a great way, it meant that we could kind of stick to the original story of that script from Ballerina without stepping on the toes of John Wick,” he added.

Hatten also says that the movie will give fans another perspective on John Wick’s origins, especially regarding his earliest training experiences, and how these all shaped him to become the character he is known as today.

“I think in ‘Ballerina’ you’ll get to see some of the hints of what John experienced during his origins in that place, but through the eyes of a different character. It still solves some of the answers of Wick, just through the eyes of a new character.”