Something Wick This Way Comes

John Wick 3 out soon.

ITT talk about John Wick and movies. about John Wick

Firstly: world-building is usually just another term for fan service and its therefore usually bad.

This applies here also.

But they manage to absorb the hit and keep momentum going, for the most part.

Like John Wick

Secondly: Meta casting is a good thing and can be worth twenty mins of exposition, exposition being the devil.

This applies here also and is a significant ingredient in the franchise success so far

Thirdly: Looks as good as a raven in a silk cloak shot like a George Michael video in 1995

Fourth(ly?)- hums along with the internal rhythms of a norse saga

The problem with the fishburne casting isn’t that it’s meta it’s that the scene is very bad and long and he is very very bad in it

that comes under world-building imo

all casting in this is meta casting fishburne is minor stuff

I only saw the first JW movie last week. The action is hilariously brutal.

I always feel like a cop for suggesting these films might actually be better without the tedious bits but yeah it all comes under “world building”. I believe it was our skot who said “ppl love rules I guess”

well look fanfic is demonstrably an evil in this world, not all world-building or expansion is that and some of it is good but mostly its terrible

theres enough good about the wicks not to dwell tho

having the inciting incident of these movies being the murder of the world’s most adorable puppy is maybe the best plotting decision in cinema history imo

not because i hate puppies but because it means whatever carnage wick unleashes is 140% justified

it absolutely matters, yeah

i cant even remember how the line is delivered in the first one or if im just imagining it but the main dudes incredulous "you shot john wicks DOGGGGGGG?" when he discovers why his entire org must fall is a good mood setter for the entire series.

yeah ridiculous and yeah funny but also sorry you all have to die and nobody has to care thats the way it is bub

these movies are, i think, the very best keanu vehicles because he’s a really gifted physical actor and they are stripped of almost everything which gets in the way of letting him move

yeah, sure they dont even let the poor bugger stop afaict

The second one's background/world-building were never going to live up to the whole sequence of John Leguizamo sipping on a Scotch looking weary, "he killed John Wick's dog" "oh," O'Riley from Oz as henchman all cross cut with Wick breaking up concrete to get to his guns and coins.

cant see that as world building

thats just setting a comeuppance

the worldbuiiding, such as it is, works because it’s inherently kinda silly and cartoonish, ie a good backdrop for the ultraviolent looney tunes of the action sequences

it works as far as it does because its surrounded by excellence

if the execution(s) or keanu were any less superb then it would drag the movie down into just another cynical nerd/completionista exploitation flick

Lovejoy's hotel for assassins concierged by Cedric Daniels is definitely a place I would stay

it is p much the job i see him quitting the cessmire of major crimes for, def

cynical’s an interesting word to bring up in this context - are these the least cynical action movies of recent times? like, the whole thing is an exercise in the joy of motion more than anything else - it’s like the olympics but with more neon violence and less shocking corporate corruption

they are very lean, which i think is at least aligned to non-cynical, in that you have to add in elements to get cynicism (among other things)

all centres on keanu, rly. you cam project a lot, or nothing, onto his casting/role/performance

keanu is very lean too

Tbh it’s only in the second one that the bad stuff drags the fun stuff down - the fucking barter system of hogwarts assassin guild or whatever should have as little time spent on it as possible because it’s embarrassing shit however you deadpan it. I only saw it once but it felt like 20 long minutes at a time of that stuff between action scenes when I was in the cinema. The version of jw2 that’s 90 minutes long may well be lean

Still up for pt 3 obv

david lean six sigma thats how good this is gonna be

smdh at first one; needed a shower after

if this is satire, it forgot to be satirical

is it satirical?

i wouldn't have said so.

knowing, but not winking.

if you cant appreciate it for what it is then i think abe had a line for you to use as a future guide

Started re-watching 2 last night - I think my favorite bit is when Keanu arrives in Rome and the proprietor of the local Continental asks him if he's there to kill the Pope. When the answer (after a long pause) is no, the guy smiles and says "OK then - enjoy your stay" and hands him his room key. Cracked me up in the theater; still funny now.

All of the septuagenarians in my gf's family are psyched to see 3 this weekend, q: will I need to see 2 first in order to follow the intricacies of plot

the proprietor of the local Continental asks him if he's there to kill the Pope

yeah this was genuinely hilarious

also just noticed that JW2 and JW3 feature, respectively, a genderfluid and non-binary primary cast member, which is neat!

if this is romcom, it forgot to be rom or com

if this is a musical, it forgot to have songs

if this is documentary, it forgot to be a record of real-life events captured contemporaneously

neither of these movies are satire my god

i do like to think of them as a horror movie franchise from a retired horror movie monster's perspective

(Only barely tangentially related but have you seen Tucker & Dale Vs. Evil, Brad?)

as a teen beach party movie starring frankie avalon and annette funicello, it’s a real failure iirc

TBF and IMO, the failing of most films is that they are not teen beach party movies starring Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello.

well, yeah

ol, yes see 2

fwiw i didn't think the first one was satire. just crap.

ol, yes see 2

How about the first one, is that necessary for the other two? I think the only way I could watch this with my partner would be to skip the puppy murder.

look

i cannot in any faith recommend anyone to not see john wick

insofar as plot matters youd have to seem em all in order but happily.....prob plot is a nice-to-have in these movies

****SPOILERS***
****SPOILERS***
****SPOILERS***

John Wick 3 as the 2016 election/Pro-Bernie propaganda

--The high table is the democratic party, obsessed with rules and norms to their own detriment
--The adjudicator is Hillary, a seasoned professional fighting a broken system just trying to keep everything normal.
--John Wick is Bernie Sanders, the rogue veteran, a little old but still a scrapper. He's already got the young fighters obsessed with him (Zero), but has to win over older voters who are set in their ways/routines (Anjelica Huston) and the women who still claim fealty to the high table (Halle Berry)
--Visiting Berrada was the DNC kneecapping him in the primaries
--Winston is Trump, whose only concern is himself and maintaining status/money/power and his HOTEL
--Lawrence Fishburne and his crew are the mobilized lower class electorate who is going to help Wick and Bernie rise to victory in Part 4 (2020)

wheres biden

sorry, meant to post that to the twin peaks thread with a fuller theory that it itself is a 2020 allegory

This was so violent it was almost hallucinogenic at times.

The least of the three but only really cause the last 10 minutes is a bit enh

This was so violent it was almost hallucinogenic at times.

seeing this tomorrow at 10:00. ANTE MERIDIEM!!

Very much worth reading this Stahelski interview but ONLY after you've seen the film.

this is the best movie i’ve ever seen

by god the only review that matters is in lads. we move.

hell yes

Loved this. Only film series I can think of that gets progressively better.

World peace would be nice but a part of me wants to live in this world where amazing fighters/assassins are so commonplace that people at dance clubs and drivers don't feel the need to avoid them that much. And it's much harder to kill people.

just got out. it was no John Wick imo but it had its moments.

as always, fantastic cast (of old people!) getting a chance to have so much fun, incredible stunts, sexy hardware if you like the kinda thing.. and of course a dog.

if this is how the wickverse ends, we got our money’s worth. tho it did leave some spin-off potential…

oh, and one brief and charming take, blink and you’ll miss it, where the body language is pure Ted
“Theodore” Logan. vv charming.

honestly a little surprised by all the love here and elsewhere, caught it cold and friday night and it felt a little like series had run out of steam for me. the first one is so lean, there's a very effective revenge angle that adds emotional weight to the fights, and it mostly doesn't look like a videogame. I like all of those things about it and I'm not so into what we've gotten instead, which seems like hours of "world building," explaining rules I don't care about in detail, and kinda deflating the action when it finally arrives. it felt a little too marvel or something, I dunno. there's good stuff here, esp donnie yen in zatoichi mode, but I walked out wishing they cut like 90mins... which is a lot of minutes.

Apparently the original cut was something like 3 1/2 hours!

furies, the sequel to veitnam's furie, also came out on netflix over the weekend. just wrapped it and was surprised by how much more I got out of it vs. wick 4.

Apparently the original cut was something like 3 1/2 hours!

looking forward to finding out more about fetch quests you gotta do when you're excommunicado lol

it’s a sumptuous action opera. everything it offered me was something i wanted. especially any scene that took place in a room that looked like a sunset was happening within it

also i feel like ppl overstate how much the world building takes up the runtime of these films but that’s prob marvel related damage

also marvel movies are shot like shit and this is shot like a fucking beautiful movie ok

sorry i’m not ready to feel jaded about this

donnie yen eating noodles in steely blue silhouette

Yeah the color palette of the films alone really is something special to see. (Did a one-a-day rewatch of them all last week in the runup to seeing 4 on Thursday, and that was the element that leapt out at me the most.)

I won’t see this until it’s streaming, but I’m both looking forward to it and glad to see the series ending. Agree that whatever else can be said about them, these movies look amazing. Every penny is on the screen, as they say.

yeah i don’t relish being a killjoy (well, maybe a little…) but i’m also kinda confused about why it felt so flat for me. had a blast with JW3 and i could probably say many
of the same things about that one.

re: marvel - i haven’t watched one since like 2004 tbh so i’m totally talking out of my ass there. prob a bad comparison but things like the poker scene, the post-credits scene, all the rules in place to pad things out, and the looming threats of spin-offs … that’s kinda just what i imagine these movies to be like.

my review: simply cannot recommend taking chantix and finishing a wick past midnight

As I say above: I think this series got better with each film but I felt the main weakness is the dialogue scenes, they're not written that well and I get the feeling some of the actors just don't care that much, the hints of past relationships doesn't add much depth. And the dog pissing on the guy just isn't funny, it feels like a cliche.
But the action scenes and the settings and how all of this is filmed more than makes up for the flaws. That's often the way it goes with this genre. John Wick 3 and 4 are ranking pretty high among my favorite action films.

I watched this with my two good buddies who are action movie junkies, and they both loved it. I hadn’t seen a wick before and action movies in general are not really my thing, but I appreciated the fight choreography (even if there are only so many times I can watch the same kill…) and the overall look of the movie.

I watched the first one last night hoping it would explain some of the high table stuff but it really didn’t! despite the length I preferred 4

take an edible and see an afternoon showing

I did think the dog peeing on the dead guy was in very poor taste but I am a humorless old snob

It is probably the film the reminds me most of 3d fighting games during and after the PS2 era (Tekken 4 for example)

like the warriors stuff, i’d hope that the dog pissing scene was a nod to *spoiler* the ending of disgraced slob seagals action classic out for justice: the search for ritchie

donnie yen eating noodles in steely blue silhouette

― flamenco drop (BradNelson), Sunday, March 26, 2023 2:25 PM (two hours ago)

otm

would see another four movies of just Donnie Yen and Rina Sawayama doing a cat-and-mouse thing

re: marvel - i haven’t watched one since like 2004 tbh so i’m totally talking out of my ass there. prob a bad comparison but things like the poker scene, the post-credits scene, all the rules in place to pad things out, and the looming threats of spin-offs … that’s kinda just what i imagine these movies to be like.

― (⊙_⊙?) (original bgm), Sunday, March 26, 2023 2:42 PM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

addressing this post bc i have seen a recent marvel movie (multiverse of madness) and can say that the problem with the mcu at this point (marvel fans beware i have hated most of these movies since at least spider-man: homecoming which is almost remarkably way more forgettable than any of the raimi spider-man films despite casting michael keaton as the villain, like what the fuck) is that the movies are just signposts for a long-term story that they are failing to tell well. like the movies and the post-credits scenes are just there to carry something forward that is hard to care about unless you are extremely immersed in it

whereas john wick 4 is like... pretty immediately accessible to anyone unfamiliar with the previous entries or the "rules" or whatever. and the post-credits scene just completes something brought up earlier in the film. i don't particularly care whether rina sawayama kills donnie yen, it could literally dangle forever, but the suggestion of it is enough and my imagination can fill in the gaps

just to jump in and you know i would never buy

Spiderman Homecoming is of course one of very very very few mcu efforts that are good, and not just "for an mcu movie" but as a movie

buy/but

yeah the MCU movies rely on institutional knowledge to get audiences to numb their asses on seats with opening and closing credit scenes

I'm fucking sick to death of post credit scenes

I kind of like the idea of throwing something extra to people who care to hear all the music and read the credits but if the scene is really any good, maybe everyone who left is kind of cheated?

Is there any really good post credit scenes? I'm sure there was one I liked but can't think of any. Can't remember if the supermarket scene was after the credits in Army Of Darkness.

Some post-credits sequences in Hawks and Ford films were exquisite.

I hate it because now, everybody stays until the end of EVERY movie, even if it's like a goddamn romantic comedy.

I loved what Scream 6 did, which was go to a post-credit scene where the character said "not every movie needs a fucking cut scene"

few people saw the De Palma Scarface cut scene, where Tony was very much alive and tanning his balls

I will admit the ones in Marvel films building up to the Infinity War were very cool but since that ended I've been less interested.

I don't watch trailers, I don't watch post-credit sequences.

I don't sing for nobody, makes me look like a joke

Ppl should watch all the credits anyway, I always do.

if i don’t have to pee, i usually stay anyway. esp when there are bloopers and replays of the best stunts.

furies, the sequel to veitnam's furie, also came out on netflix over the weekend. just wrapped it and was surprised by how much more I got out of it vs. wick 4.

I don't want to derail because I've enjoyed the previous three Wicks, but Furie is easily my favorite action movie of the last ten years. Going to watch the new one tonight.

yeah, also love the first one. enjoyed the second one too! they both have a lot of heart imo

Hey if there's no thread for 'em, fire it up.

This was a fun Wick, but I'm pretty glad the story is done now - as much as I was impressed by the overall filmmaking (the lighting work alone!), some of the plot points re: rules and consequences and who-betrayed-who felt a bit repetitive/tedious and I def found my attention sagging in places.

fave bits:
- bill skarsgard's goofy french accent + incredible outfits + overall ridiculousness (e.g. the part where he destroys his mobile phone and then makes another call on a gold-plated landline phone lmao)
- really impressed by Rina Sawayama - considering it's her first film role, thought she held her own against reeves, yen, sanada. Hope she gets a spin-off, I want a world where she can be both a pop diva and a legit action star
- you knew wick was gonna end up saving the dog the moment there was a dog on screen, his gravestone should've read "ultimate wife guy and dog dude" imo
- keanu reloading a gun in the half-second it takes for a bus to drive past him
- that loooooong take of ian mcshane walking past all the paintings
- overhead sequence
- stairs fall was lol

agree (spoiling nothing) the overhead sequence was where it really came to life

Weirdly I think I like the 'world-building'/non-action sequences more than the action ones in these movies. Would also be fine if there were zero guns. Psyched to see it this weekend though.

ridiculous number of on-location action scenes in this one

feeling sheepish that I couldn't quite put my finger on who the large german man was when I'm definitely a Scott Adkins fan

just putting this here

https://defector.com/the-gunplay-of-john-wick-is-a-bit-too-real-for-comfort