In relation to discussing franchises, there’s a huge lexicon of phrases that can be utilized to explain completely different installments. We stay in an age the place there are way over simply easy sequels: there are spinoffs, prequels, crossovers, team-ups, capstones, legacyquels, reboots, retcons, and extra. It supplies fashionable filmmakers with loads of artistic choices on the subject of including to an current canon, and it’s one thing that director Len Wiseman very a lot appreciates when it got here to creating his new motion film Ballerina starring Ana de Armas.
Ballerina is a title that expands the breadth of the ever-growing John Wick universe (which introduced various different thrilling in-the-works initiatives a couple of weeks in the past), and it sits in an attention-grabbing place inside the continuity. After I spoke with the movie’s director earlier this 12 months throughout a press day at 87Eleven Motion Design, he defined how the film slots into the timeline of the motion franchise and famous that it’s one thing a bit completely different than your normal sequel or spinoff. Mentioned Wiseman,
It takes place between Chapter Three and Chapter 4. It was a enjoyable journey to seek out the way it, the way it intertwines with three. It was additionally extra attention-grabbing to me of like doing that than in say a derivative, as a result of it is actually extra of a parallel story inside that very same world throughout chapter three and likewise how John Wick intervenes with our timeline. So I used to be extra drawn to that as a result of it was not like a sequel or a derivative. It was positively in that world inside the factor.
Audiences who’ve seen John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum have gotten an early look into the a part of the canon world that will probably be additional explored in Ballerina. Within the 2019 film, the titular Keanu Reeves character is on the lookout for secure harbor as he’s being hunted by each murderer on Earth, and he finds it in a theater with an outdated acquaintance generally known as The Director (Anjelica Huston). It’s through the sequence at this location that we study of a program that concurrently trains younger girls to be each dancers and killers – and it’s right here that Ana de Armas’s Eve Macarro enters the image.
The story in Ballerina primarily makes use of this sequence as a launching pad, and whereas it unfurls principally with Eve on a solo mission of private vengeance, the plot additionally finally sees her cross paths with the legendary Baba Yaga as he’s gearing up for what audiences acquired to witness in 2023’s John Wick: Chapter 4. It’s a cool twist for followers who having fun with marathoning their favourite franchises in particular watch orders.
Additional solidifying it inside the John Wick franchise, Ballerina not solely options Keanu Reeves’ return because the world’s most harmful murderer and Anjelica Huston reprising her position as The Director, nevertheless it additionally has Ian McShane again as Winston Scott and Lance Reddick delivering is remaining efficiency as Continental Resort concierge Charon. Lengthy within the works, Ballerina will probably be arriving in theaters in every single place on June 6.