Movies & TV / Columns

The Man Movie Encyclopedia: John Wick 2

February 6, 2019 | Posted by Caliber Winfield
Image Credit: Lionsgate

Greetings, all.

How are you funky cats doin? I don’t have too much to say here in the preamble, other than I’ve started rewatching The Sopranos again, and, man, I constantly wish someone would come and kill Tony. He’s such a hypocritical asshole, I can’t fucking stand him. I do love some Paulie though.

OK, let’s get down to the business of getting down.

JW2Header

We open up with John chasing a cat on a motorcycle, looking to get some sorta key. This leads him to a Russian chop shop that has his car. Naturally, it’s no easy feat getting it back, and within a few minutes we get car chases, car crashes, dudes beat to shit, shot to shit, it’s fantastic. Finally, he gets his car, and puts to bed the events from the first film, having a drink with a Russian mobster, and calling for peace.

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Afterwards he heads home, gives the car to his guy to have fixed, and reseals his guns and coins in concrete. Man, that’s way too much work. Fuck that. After I break it out the first time, the second time I’m just gonna put a sheet over it. Although, when I go to get back into the life, one last time, it won’t look as cool pulling a sheet off something as opposed to bashing up concrete with a sledgehammer.
Later on a dude shows up whom John owes a great debt to, as he was a catalyst in seeing John get out of the life. However, he’s calling in that debt, despite John begging him not to. I mean, show him where you just poured concrete. Who would ask you to dig shit out of wet cement? At one point the guy asks John if his dog has a name, to which John says no. OK, while that’s weird, it’s even more odd to ask someone if their dog has a name. Of course they do. I mean, what an odd fucking question. And what makes me even angrier, is this guy isn’t an asshole for asking, because JOHN DIDN’T NAME HIS DOG! So, he’s in the right. Dammit.
The dude wants to call in the marker, but John refuses. So, this guy has no choice but to blow up his house with a grenade launcher. Hey, gotta do what ya gotta do. Wick heads to the Continental and gets advice from the head cat, who tells him to do whatever Santino wants, be free of the debt, then fuck him up.
John meets up with Santino, who says he wants his sister killed. She has a seat at a table of very powerful people, a seat that was his father’s before he died and left it to her. If she’s gone, it’s all his. John agrees, and heads to Rome, where she happens to be. Once he touches down, he sets up at a hotel, where he meets freaking FRANCO NERO! None other than Cole, from Enter the Ninja! He simply wants to know if John is there to kill the Pope. When he hears he doesn’t, things are all good.
These coins are weird. They can buy you a pack of smokes or a yacht, apparently. He suits up, literally. Getting a bunch of weapons and a sweet body armor suit. Once he gets to where he’s suppose to be, Santino’s sister just slits her wrists and dies in a hot tub, going out her way. Once he leaves her, it’s on. We get classic John mobbing through a club, blasting folk left and right in glorious fashion. He attempts to escape through the catacombs, but down there Santino’s right-hand woman is waiting, as Wick realizes that they gotta get rid of him now so he doesn’t come for Santino. It’s at this point that John kills like half of Italy down there, with hand guns, AR15s, and shotguns. It’s fucking brilliant. Once he’s done with that, he then has an awesome fight scene with Santino’s sister’s bodyguard, played by Common.

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For a martial arts nerd like myself, it’s awesome watching them use legit Judo & Jujitsu. I practice Jits myself. It’s a great brawl, and they end up back on Continental grounds, and as all real men do, they have a drink after a hearty brawl.
Once they part ways, Santino puts out a hit on John for 7 mill, so now he’s a marked man, and practically everyone within a 10ft range of him is a paid assassin, which results in some awesome ass-kicking. We even get the privilege of watching him kill people with a pencil.

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This ends with a rematch with Common, which ends with a sweet knife-fight. We don’t get nearly enough of those, so this was awesome. He even stabs him in the heart and is like “Ay, bruh, you pull it out, you die” and lets him live. After this he meets up with…I dunno, some King of the Homeless that aren’t really homeless, or something, I dunno. But it works. This guy gets John to where Santino is, a museum, in order to finish business. After another thorough shoot-out, John cuts through what’s left of Santino’s crew, including his kinda-hot #2, who really didn’t put up that big of a fight. There is a great moment though where he stabs her in the same place as Common, but he pulls it out, and lets her die.

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Well, Santino feels he’s plum out of options, so he heads to the Continental, as there is no fighting on thBOOM! Right in the middle of Santino speaking and gloating, he catches a bullet to the head, courtesy of Mr. Wick.
Now, of course, this is a huge no no, so he’s in big time trouble, and basically pushed out of the life and services offered by the Continental. Oh, and the contract on his life is now world wide. The movie then ends with John running for his life.

MAN MOVIE TALLY:
1-Liners: 0
Guys Beat Up: 10
Guys Killed: 117
Swear Words: 2
Boobies: 0
Explosions: 3
Chase: 1
Broken Bones: 1
Fight/Shoot-Out At Motel?: Yes
Guy Get Girl? No
Guy Smoke?: No

MAN FACTS:
Reeves did all of his own stunts with 2 exceptions: Getting hit by a car, and falling down the stairs.

The film takes place less than a week after the events of the first.

The director was Reeves’ stunt double in the Matrix.

C’MON BENNETT, LET’S PARTY!:
John Wick 2 is fucking great. That’s all there is to say. While it isn’t as solid as the first one, it’s as close as something can get without being as good. The movie is literally just all action. You get a sweet, simple story, and then it’s off to the races from there. I love how the movie just throws you into it in the beginning, giving you a heaping helping of everything you loved about the first one in short order. There’s beautiful scenery, great characters, the best action out of any movie series today, and John Wick killing people with a pencil. Fucking brilliant.
****1/2 Head-Butts out of 5

Any questions, comments, drunk-ramblings, feel free to send them my way, I always dig hearing from you, the beautiful people.
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