Two years ago, John Wick (Keanu Reeves) retired from the hitman life to be with the woman he loved. She eventually died, but gave Wick a puppy to cope with her loss. Our hero trudged along, but then a Russian gangster ruined his domestic life by stealing his beloved car and killing his puppy. In Chapter 2, Wick (now dad to a beautiful pitbull) has killed a bunch of people to avenge his puppy and has now come to find his car. In a great example of story continuation, the chop shop that houses Wick’s stolen car is owned by the uncle of the gangster who stole the vehicle in the first place. The attention to detail is brilliant: the hole Wick dug up to retrieve his buried guns is alluded to in part two; characters like Jimmy, a police officer (Ian McShane), and car mechanic Aurelieo, (John Leguizamo) make tongue-in-cheek cameos.
As soon as the film starts, viewers are treated to a fight sequence the filmmakers (director Chad Stahelski and writer David Leitch, Hollywood stunt artists with The Matrix , The Hunger Games ) say took three months to shoot. Here, Reeves fights his foes in a taxi warehouse, completely destroying the car he’s come to take back. Like the previous film, the actor has done almost all his stunts himself. It’s precisely why all the action in the film is a tad slower, albeit so much more realistic than any other Hollywood blockbuster. And Reeves is in his 50s. Let that sink in for a while.
But even after the fun fight sequence, the film hasn’t even started. Wick returns home and is forced to fulfil a ‘Marker’, the debt he owed to his crime bosses to leave the life of crime behind. Now Santino D’Antonio (Riccardo Scamarcio) wants Wick to do one more job, to kill his sister, so he can rule the Italian mafia. After the deed is done, Wick is then hunted by D’Antonio’s henchmen including Ares, a mute assassin played by Ruby Rose (in her third action film of the year after xXx: Return of Xander Cage and Resident Evil: The Final Chapter ).
John Wick Chapter 2 is as entertaining as its previous instalment, albeit with more dead bodies and if it was possible, bloodier massacres. There’s one particular scene where the audience is entertained with Wick’s legendary abilities using a pencil as a weapon. What’s unique about John Wick as a franchise is that it’s unlike its action peers. The film isn’t slick to the point of being cocky, nor are the dialogues cringeworthy and the bloodbath isn’t over the top. You can just sit back, relax and enjoy a flimsy storyline, that you’re not expected to keep up with, along with the more-than-enjoyable action.
