John Wick: Chapter 4

Stahelski's breakthrough as a director is that he treats the action sequence as a scene, not a punctuation mark. Chapter 4's best set pieces are authored through blocking, wardrobe color, and geography — not through coverage or music drops.

The mythology, once a franchise liability, becomes a structural asset here. The Marquis Vincent de Gramont exists to give the film an aesthetic ruler, and Bill Skarsgård's performance is the best villain the series has produced.

The Osaka Continental gunfight opens with Hiroyuki Sanada and Donnie Yen executing choreography that would be the climax of a lesser film. The Arc de Triomphe traffic circle sequence is shot in a literal 360 — the camera orbits a real Paris roundabout while stunt performers work live, not in a blue box.

The Sacré-Cœur stairs sequence, filmed in an overhead single-take-style composition, is instantly canonical. It turns an action set piece into an architectural essay: every landing is a beat, every railing a plot point.

Donnie Yen's Caine is more than stunt casting. The blind-assassin conceit lets Yen reassemble his screen persona — comedy, sadness, precision — into one of the franchise's best supporting roles.

Hiroyuki Sanada's Shimazu is given real dramatic weight, and Rina Sawayama's debut as Akira holds its own against him. Scott Adkins's Killa is a crackling comedic break before the film's final hour.

Pros: The best staged action of the year; Donnie Yen's best English-language role; an ending that honors Reeves and the character.

Cons: At 169 minutes, the film tests even action enthusiasts; the Table mythology is now dense to the point of self-parody; some viewers will find the operatic tone too stylized.