PR in the Philippines

(SeaPRwire) –   How can you bring John Wick back from the dead?

Now that John Wick 5 has been officially confirmed, this is a question that John Wick director Chad Stahelski and his Chapter 4 co-writer Mike Finch will need to tackle. But Derek Kolstad—who wrote John Wick and its two subsequent sequels, and has stressed to Inverse that he is not involved with Chapter 5—doesn’t believe this will be a major challenge for the fifth film. “He died off-screen in that latest entry,” Kolstad told Inverse. “So of course you’ll bring him back.”

Kolstad helped launch the John Wick franchise in 2013, when his spec script Scorn was picked up by film producer Basil Iwanyk. Keanu Reeves, alongside co-directors Chad Stahelski and David Leitch, quickly joined the project, and the rest is history. After penning Chapter 2 and Chapter 3, Kolstad stepped away to work on other action-thriller projects, including the Bob Odenkirk-led Nobody and the upcoming Normal, though he has always held a soft spot for the John Wick films—much like Reeves, who will reprise his role as the perpetually beleaguered assassin once more. “Keanu isn’t someone who enjoys sequels or franchises,” Kolstad explained. “But he just loves John, and it’s my grandfather’s name, so I’m glad he cares about it too.”

In the months following the John Wick 5 announcement, Stahelski has grown increasingly hesitant to share any updates about the film, but Kolstad has a few ideas for where the movie can take Reeves’ iconic assassin. “I think the sequels just got bigger and bigger over time,” Kolstad shared. “I’d love to see the fifth entry be a bit more intimate, focusing more on him riding off into the sunset.”

The fourth film teased this idea, as Wick’s allies gathered at his gravesite to say their goodbyes, though the movie intentionally left unclear whether he was actually dead. That grave could have been John Wick’s chance to finally escape the assassin underworld. Or, per a popular fan theory, he might have been dead the entire time.

When asked about the fan theory that the entire John Wick franchise takes place in hell or a mythical underworld, Kolstad pointed to the name he gave Lance Reddick’s character, Charon—the same name as the ferryman who ferries souls across the Greek underworld. “We toyed with planting those early narrative seeds,” Kolstad said coyly.

Still, Kolstad noticed some parallels between that popular John Wick fan theory and his newest film, Normal—an action movie directed by Ben Wheatley, which stars Odenkirk as a sheriff caught up in a town-wide shootout. “The most surprising moment came when Magnolia screened Normal for AMC executives; two of them approached us and said, ‘It’s The Odyssey,’” he recalled.

Beyond those possible mythological ties, Normal is a clear departure from Kolstad’s other assassin-focused thrillers: its lead character is not an assassin at all. Odenkirk’s Sheriff Ulysses—an obvious nod to The Odyssey—is just an ordinary man who winds up in the wrong place at the wrong time, forced to rely on his own wits to survive the night after an entire armed town sets its sights on him. For that reason, Kolstad doesn’t expect Normal to become a franchise like John Wick and Nobody, though he’s not ruling it out entirely.

“If Normal works as a standalone film and audiences embrace it, I’d be incredibly proud and happy for it to remain just one movie,” Kolstad shared. “But I’ve already mapped out four follow-up stories in my head, since that’s just how I think. If those films ever get made, I can’t wait to revisit that world—but more importantly, to work with this team again.”

Normal hits theaters on April 17.