Keanu Reeves’ Return in Ballerina Doesn’t Put an End to Chad Stahelski’s Biggest Secret

John Wick has already made its mark on film and television. With Keanu Reeves bringing the fabled assassin alive for the first time in 2014, Baba Yaga not only became a part of modern pop culture lore but one of its most treasured fictional characters to ever grace the screens. A decade later, the universe expands to make space for more stories to dominate the vacancy left behind by Reeves’ overwhelming presence.

Ballerina now arrives to carry forward the mantle of John Wick. However, the film is hardly a continuation of the main series, let alone a follow-up of the events of the fourth and latest adventure that ended on a rather fatal note for our main protagonist. On the contrary, Ballerina serves to narrate a spin-off story splintered off from the primary timeline of events inhabited by Keanu Reeves’s doomed vigilante.

Ballerina Fails to Tie Up Loose End

In any other universe, cinematic interconnectivity and world-building would automatically designate a level of importance to the narrative storyline or the characters around which the plot revolves. However, in the case of Keanu Reeves‘s John Wick, franchise expansion doesn’t seem to work quite in favor of the audience.

Ballerina, the newest addition to the John Wick universe that doesn’t directly associate with Baba Yaga, has one purpose to serve – expand the enriching, neo-noir, neon-fuelled, adrenaline-injected world of elite and deadly assassins. While Reeves only gave us a glimpse of his section of the world, Continental further expanded on that vision by going back in time. One can only hope that Caine, Akira, and the Bowery King are given the same privilege and platform.

However, through it all, the decade-long journey was made tolerable by Keanu Reeves’ dangerously wholesome presence and his character’s inability to stay down no matter how insane the plot progressively gets. With the final film ruling that possibility out, or at least making it seem highly likely that Keanu Reeves’s assassin might be decommissioned at the moment, the flavor for unattached spin-off stories like Ballerina suddenly loses its taste.

Even so, the non-linear timeline of Ballerina‘s plot leaves one big question unaddressed: did John Wick truly survive the dubious finale of his last film?

Keanu Reeves Plans a Comeback in John Wick 5

Following the screeching success of Chad Stahelski’s John Wick franchise, the actor-director duo seems eager to carry on their creative partnership. However, the ending of John Wick: Chapter 4 was technically left ambiguous for exactly this possibility. Unfortunately for the studio, the fans seem content with how the franchise laid its tired protagonist to rest.

Days after the release of John Wick: Chapter 4, Lionsgate Films announced the development of John Wick 5, which would technically mean that Keanu Reeves was returning as our titular super assassin. The cash grab move was immediately rejected by the fans and widely criticized against considering the 10-year legacy left behind by Reeves.

For now, the universally-beloved actor is set to make a cameo appearance as the dapper-suited assassin in the spin-off film, Ballerina which takes place between the third and fourth John Wick in terms of timeline relevance and continuity. Whether John Wick 5 follows our titular hero’s journey or if it can be the final hurrah that the fans have been waiting for all along is yet to be decided.

Ballerina, featuring Ana de Armas in the lead, is set to premiere on 6 June 2025.