Without a doubt, John Wick: Chapter 3—Parabellum pushed the franchise further than ever. This exposed the most notable flaws and potential weaknesses I’ve seen from the John Wick movies to date, but it also meant that the filmmakers doubled down on the best aspects of the series with regards to action, storytelling, characters, and emotional impact.

To make a sequel that lives up to or exceeds the original film is a notoriously difficult accomplishment. To do it twice in a row and create a trilogy that’s excellent throughout is an even rarer feat.

But I think this franchise absolutely has the ingredients it needs to pull this off.

I saw someone make a comment that really, John just wants to be left alone.

And while I do have some questions, I strongly agree with that assessment for the most part. The carnage in his wake makes it easy to misconstrue the man, but let’s look a little deeper. There are bigger factors at play to explain why and how he keeps ending up in these situations.

The John Wick Universe is a rich, deep, mysterious one. The franchise makes clever and fascinating use of visual storytelling and an approach that is simultaneously minimalist and layered. It’s definitely a fun, visually striking picture and can be enjoyed for that alone, but delving deeper proves to be really rewarding.

Initially I had resigned myself to not being able to get any of these posts done prior to the film’s official premiere date of May 17, 2019. That’s less than a week from now, after all. But it occurred to me that there were a few particular posts—the ones dealing with theories and predictions related to the newest film—that really needed to go live _prior_ to the premiere.