John Wick: Chapter 4 Director Clarifies Franchise Timeline

If you’ve watched the first three John Wick movies back to back, you probably noticed that they take place over an extremely short period of time. The time between the killing of John Wick’s (Keanu Reeves) new puppy in John Wick to John getting shot off the roof by Winston (Ian McShane) at the end of John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum is not much time at all. However, the start of John Wick: Chapter 4 teases some more time has passed between the third and fourth installments. During a recent interview with Collider, director Chad Stahelski explained the timeline of the four films and revealed when the newest installment takes place. 

“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,” Stahelski explained. 

He added, “I think it was in the second one, we actually kind of thought about that [including an explicit time frame] between the two, but then we were like, ‘Ah, that’s kind of goofy, we’ll just let people guess.’ Because we didn’t know how bad we were gonna injure him. You know, after number three, you’re like, ‘Okay.’ We can stretch it a little bit, but he did fall off a building, so we’re like, ‘Eh, a femur? Six months.’”

Is John Wick 5 Still Happening?

Considering the surprise ending of John Wick: Chapter 4, it’s unclear if Reeves or Stahelski will be making another film. The fourth movie was originally supposed to open in 2021 before the pandemic set back production. Not only was the movie pushed back, but the folks behind the scenes also had to alter their original plan to film the fourth and fifth movies together. In an interview with Total Film (via CBR), Stahelski explained why they opted not to film John Wick 4 and John Wick 5 back to back.

“I didn’t feel good about doing 4 and 5 collectively,” Stahelski shared, explaining that it would require a 200-day production, which he felt would be too much for the cast and crew. However, Stahelski says a fifth movie is still incoming. “Keanu calls it the John Wick fever,” Stahelski joked. “You haven’t done John Wick for two years and you’re like, ‘We gotta go do something!’”

“In our minds, Keanu and I are done for the moment. We’re going to give John Wick a rest,” Stahelski recently shared with The Hollywood Reporter. “I’m sure the studio has a plan. If everyone loves it and it goes kooky, then we’ll take a quiet minute. Wicks always, for some weird reason, always get the latest release date in Japan. It’s always like, three months later. If it’s the same this time, we’ll do a Japanese tour and release the movie in September. Keanu and I will take the long trip to Tokyo, we’ll sit in the Imperial Hotel Scotch Bar and go, ‘What do you think?’ We’ll have a couple 20-year-old whiskies and write some ideas on napkins. If those ideas stick, maybe we’ll make a movie.”

John Wick: Chapter 4 is now playing in theaters.