Is John Wick 5 happening because the franchise is too profitable to end?

John Wick is a franchise that has, over the years, become synonymous with action in modern times. Keanu Reeves is the titular hitman, and the films in the franchise have ended up becoming critical and commercial successes. The most recent entry was John Wick: Chapter 4, released on March 24, 2023. It minted around $447.3 million at the box office, becoming the most profitable in the franchise.

The success of the fourth installment might have once again tempted the makers to go ahead with another film. This begs the question of whether the franchise is too profitable to end.

John Wick 5 is happening because of the numbers of the fourth film

John Wick 5 is currently under development, and it will have Keanu Reeves reprising his role as the hitman. This was obvious, given the box office numbers of the fourth film. Each John Wick film has made more money than the previous one in the franchise. This is the opposite of how sequels are generally received by the viewers. They tend to get less popular with entry, but not in this case. The first film was made on a budget of $30 million and grossed $86 million. It's now a billion-dollar franchise.

A spin-off called Ballerina, starring Ana de Armas, was released on June 6, 2025. This further cemented the fact that the franchise might keep growing as it's too profitable for the makers not to.

In March 2025, the franchise director Chad Stahelski attributed its success to its realistic action and the depiction of guns. He said,

"The technology of being very safe with blanks and guns and all that, we just had the sweet spot [with John Wick]. In Safe, it wasn't quite there yet. We had been doing a lot of work with Jason at the time, who still is a very good friend of ours and we still work with quite a bit. We had the idea, we pitched it, and we thought it was cool, [but] it didn't quite fit with what the director was trying to do [with] the character and stuff."

Chad said the usual action style did not fit the film.

"It wasn't like anybody said, 'No, we hate it.' It [just] didn't quite fit with the storytelling because it was more a guy down on his luck that had been hidden. It just had to be a little bit more ballistic and bombastic, and it was a little bit more of a cat and mouse [situation]. We didn't want to force the style. You can't force a style on someone."

He further said that the film's action does not fit the way The Matrix has shot its action.

"It really wasn't about missed opportunities or [that] somebody didn't like what we were doing–it just didn't fit. It's like if we did John Wick and it was all wire like The Matrix. It just doesn't fit. [Or] if we did grappling in The Matrix, it probably wouldn't fit."

The gun-fu (a mixture of gun fights and kung-fu) has been popularized by the franchise, and it might be one of the contributing factors to its success, along with Reeves' performance, writing, and direction.