

There are indeed spinoffs in the works for the John Wick franchise, including Ballerina, featuring Ana de Armas, and a prequel series showing the New York Continental Hotel’s early days. One could argue that dying (or “dying”) was the only way John could win, so maybe this was all part of his plan. But perhaps a set-up for a sequel or spinoff of some sort. It’s Akira (Rina Sawayama), whose father Caine killed earlier in the film. He holds a bouquet of flowers, which suggests that he will finally be able to let her know he’s there.
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We see Caine, now re-retired and supposedly free of all his obligations as a hired assassin, walking to listen to his violin-virtuoso daughter as she plays in a crowded outdoor plaza. Surely there’s an end-credits stinger showing us that John Wick is still alive? Maybe lunching with his new family in a café on the banks of the Arno, Bruce Wayne style? In fact, there is an end-credits scene, but it’s not what we expect. We see none of these things, and the credits finally start to roll. What’s next? A shadow in the distance watching them? A telltale mop-top quietly moving into frame? The dirt on the grave levitating mysteriously? No. And there’s a hint of it as we see the dog turning off-screen.

Of course, scenes of people standing over the graves of heroes who didn’t actually die is a common motif in modern action cinema, so we keep waiting for that inevitable reveal. Then he too walks away, as the camera cranes up. Winston stays behind, touches John’s grave, and mutters, “Farewell, my son,” in Russian. The King chuckles to himself as he walks away. “I never thought I’d see the day,” the King says, before asking Winston if he thinks John is in Heaven or hell. “Loving Husband,” the gravestone reads, just as John himself had requested earlier in the film. After that, we cut to New York, with Winston (Ian McShane) and the Bowery King (Laurence Fishburne), along with John’s dog, standing over his grave, where he’s been buried next to his late wife, Helen. We do, in fact, see Wick, seriously wounded and bleeding after his literal pistols-at-dawn duel with Donnie Yen’s blind assassin, Caine (not to mention an entire night of getting shot, punched, kicked, and run over by seemingly everyone in Paris), keel over, lifeless, on the steps of the Sacré-Cœur basilica. We are recirculating it now that John Wick: Chapter 4 is available to own digitally. This piece was originally published in March. That final shot and the end-credits stinger might be more closely connected than they appear.
