"John Wick" Is Getting an Anime Prequel Movie

In a new chat with The Hollywood Reporter, Chad Stahelski– who co-created the John Wick franchise, and has directed all four mainline films to date – confirmed that a prequel film is in the works, though it won’t be a live-action movie, but instead will take on the form of anime.

The mainline franchise, which stars Keanu Reeves as the titular character, won’t spawn any more sequels as Wick’s journey is “a complete story”. However, the franchise will continue with prequels and spin-offs. 

 “Right now, we’re knee-deep in development on a feature anime about John Wick. It’s a prequel to the movies, which is awesome. It’s fun that it’s in a different medium," he said.

Stahelski continued: “It’s meant to be fun. Some of the prequels and sequels that you see in other franchises, we’re not meant to be built that way. We just want to have fun. We want to have fun with the Wick world, but we’ve already capped it on one end [with John Wick: Chapter 4], so let’s go back and use a different medium.

“To keep churning out episodes of John Wick’s adventures seems a little false to us, but to explore different aspects of the world and different aspects of John Wick before the films and through a different medium, whether it’s anime or TV, that feels fun,” he noted.

“We can be a little bit more crazy and nutty in the anime, and we can be a lot more explicit in our storytelling and world building on the TV show [Under The High Table]. So those are exciting to us without seeming repetitive, and that’s where we’re putting our energies right now.”

It is currently unclear if Keanu Reeves will return to lend his voice to the prequel anime movie.