John Wick

Yeah, John killing Santino's sister seems to have been so easy because they had some sort of past relationship.

So he was basically just able to walk up to her and she committed suicide.

Anyone else would have had a lot more problems and probably would have gotten Santino killed.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on Apr 9th 2024 at 5:33:00 AM

...Either that or Gianna just knew it WASN'T going to end well, and opted the fuck out of that plane of existence first thing.

The High Table were not the literal enemy until the tail end of 3. Winston placed the bounty on John at the end of 2 and it wasn't until The Continental was deconsecrated that they made the choice to defy the High Table directly, and Winston was able to convince them it was not worth the effort to oppose him. John was fighting to survive after breaking the rules of the setting, and even the High Table was careful not to arbitrarily target people if they acted within those rules. That's part of what made 4 feel just a little off, because the High Table became more tyrannical in allowing the rules to be broken because they say so and Marquis was the ultimate Upper-Class Twit. Though I suppose that has some parallel with Iosef as the first franchise bad guy.

That's something that could've made the Marquis feel special. If his role as Autem Imperator granted him carte blanche to do literally anything in the name of bringing John down, including breaking the rules of the High Table if he sees fit.

Kinda like how the Blackstaff in Dresden Files is allowed to use magic to Kill, when that's normally like the primest taboo amongst wizards in Dresden Files.

That might have been the idea, but it still felt like the Marquis was constrained by the rules at certain points.

Edited by GNinja on Apr 9th 2024 at 1:06:43 PM

I feel like that argument doesn't exactly hold water because Santino is a member of the High Table for most of 2.

It's a Klingon Promotion.

Yes, John breaks the rules but Santino's already against one of the criminal UN Security Council. He has the High Table's resources once John kills his sister/drives her to suicide.

And Santino being such a POS inclines me to think the others are no better.

(This is also why the Marquis doesn't feel special as John has already gone after one of the Inner Council)

Edited by CharlesPhipps on Apr 9th 2024 at 6:07:21 AM

I don't think Santino had the High Table's resources, per se - I'm pretty sure Santino was paying for John's contract and extended stay at the Continental out of their own pocket.

You'd think someone in the Inner Council could've hired a more competent bodyguard than Ares.

(grumbles about how insufferable the final fight of 2 is again)

Edited by GNinja on Apr 9th 2024 at 1:11:41 PM

Well, he's the head of the Camora and the Camora is part of the groups making up the High Table.

Mind you, I don't know exactly how the secret society of supervillains works.

Board meetings are quite eventful.

You can argue that the Santino / High Table relationship in 2 is something of a Big Bad / Greater-Scope Villain deal but if John killed Santino outside the Continental the High Table would not have had any issue with him. Winston talks to Santino as an equal, not as a newly ascended top 10 most powerful person in the world, which only emphasizes the importance given for protocol.

I would want to clarify something what I have said from my previous post (back in page 34). I like all four John Wick movies but in fact do mind the spinoffs.

Straight to the point, I don’t like the Continental TV Show, and it is Fanon Discontinuity for me. I know some others liked the tv show but just not for me, I won’t bother explaining my reasons why for that.

I’m also quite skeptical about this upcoming Ballerina movie, though I won’t jump to conclusions and see how it goes.

Since I am sort of a anime enthusiast, the John Wick Anime interest me so I am looking forward to it maybe.

Edited by YatasumujiSenpai on Apr 11th 2024 at 7:52:06 AM

I think the franchise creep is ridiculous, to be honest and to the deterrent of the series.

Agreed, the first movie had the perfect balance IMO.

@~Ego-Man25 I believe the trope you're looking for is Better to Die than Be Killed. Haha. Face Death with Dignity would also apply.

The first movie is still the best hands down. It kept things stupidly simple in the best way possible: Iosef killed John's dog and now John to get to him had to kill a whole bunch of other people too.

Yeah I do get the sense that if you got a personal beef with a member of the High Table and you've violated no rules, if you can get to them, you can kill them and not face any consequences for it. That does make me think that had John killed Santino outside the Continental, no rules would've been violated. Again, I liken it to Santino set up Gianna to die so he could get her seat and it was accepted just based on having John do it with the Marker.

Edited by futuremoviewriter on Apr 10th 2024 at 9:34:01 AM

John might still have faced consequences for killing Santino, if the dude had any friends or family who want to avenge their death, but that holds true for any assassination.

The High Table's rules aren't designed to prevent people from killing each other, just regulate how they go about it.

Mind you, Santino was abusing the rules horribly.

I'm gonna be completely serious: in the grand scheme of things, I'm not entirely sure what happened in Chapter 2. I feel like 2 and 3 were almost the same story.

Edited by Codafett on Apr 12th 2024 at 10:04:46 AM

I feel like 4 was a better film than 2 and 3.

3 had the best trailer.

2 had the best ending and had the most quotable lines. Seriously what a great setup for the next film.

And... wow the first movie's trailer was going for something completely different

I don't know if the person who edited this trailer should be rewarded for not spoiling how good the movie actually was or fired for incompetence. This trailer looks like the trailer to a crappy 2000's Jason Statham flick. You know one of those random action roles Statham did like every couple of years? One of those.

Anyway, sorry, the first film had the best ratio of plot and action.

Its funny to me how we went from shootouts and car chases to freaking sword fights with bulletproof jackets.

Edited by FOFD on Apr 12th 2024 at 1:44:33 PM

Halfway through Chapter 2 the franchise went headfirst into John slaughtering dozens of would-be assassins looking to collect a bounty, which Chapter 3 and 4 never really recovered from and just went Sequel Escalation. The first film had the prominent vibe that Viggo was terrified of John and they were looking for any option to resolve the conflict peacefully. Perkins was the only actual assassin looking to collect a bounty, and Viggo even had John captured and trying to talk him down.

Kinda, the first is very much a revenge story with trapping of a bigger world and the issue was how overpower Wick was compared, there was not doubt Wick could and did kill everyone. Like the same writter did Nobody which is very much the same idea of "super duper assasin come back to the job and kill everyone". While people said 1 was best I kinda said in term of fight scene, 3 have the best with the twin fight and 4 have plenty with dragonshell and the stair fight.

I will said that for me, 1 feel near the weakest for me since I not really a fan of "super invisible chararter" Wick vibes.

Edited by unknowing on Apr 13th 2024 at 5:45:22 AM

For me, three is the best thanks to having a very solid character arc for John (trying to claw their way out of the mess they made for themself in the last two movies, and being asked what sort of deals they're willing to make to have that happen) and for having the most varied and creative fight scenes.

Unarmed fight with a giant in a library! Battle in an antique weapons shop! Bringing attack dogs to a gunfight! Bulletproof stormtroopers! Swordfights! Stealth ninja kills! Underwater battles! Motorcylce chases! Horse vs. motorcycle chases! Using a horse as a weapon!

Super invincible character, you mean?

Also thought third was the peak, but mostly because I still cared about the story, while in the fourth the parts between setpieces were hardly interesting enough to justify a runtime nearing 3h.

i honestly wasn't a fan of the Dragonshell fight in 4.

I think my issue is that when I first saw them I thought "Oh neat, they'll provide an interesting obstacle for John to overcome"

but that's not how they're ultimately treated. John procures one of the launchers himself right away and goes to town on everyone else without much effort.

So, I guess the idea wasn't meant to be "Oh, what an interesting obstacle" it was "Oh, what an interesting TOY for John to use" which I find much less interesting.

Edited by GNinja on Apr 13th 2024 at 10:15:42 AM

I do get what you mean but on tbe other hand, I'm not sure what obstacle they could have provided?

I guess the idea is that overcome John's armour? So they could have used it to force him to go more steathily for a bit but really that only last until he steath kills someone with the gun and then it plays out the same.

It's not like John usually tanks shotgun hits unless he has to. Though there was a lot of holding the jacket up to intercept pistol fire in 4...

Anyway I'm rambling.

It's also why I'm not too much of a fan of the bulletproof mooks either

Because functionally all John needs to do to beat them is hold them down and fire point blank shots at them. They're just not an interesting obstacle.

Edited by GNinja on Apr 13th 2024 at 11:51:05 AM