John Wick Director Says Only Three People Died In The Original Script

One of the directors of the original John Wick film starring Keanu Reeves has revealed the original screenplay only had three deaths in it, instead of the 80-or-so the final product featured.

If there's one thing that you can be certain of when heading in to watch a John Wick movie, it's that there will be blood.

The action films - of which the fourth is due out in 2022 - are renowned for being kill-heavy and featuring all manner of gratuitous violence from start to finish.

However, Chad Stahelski, who directed the first Wick outing alongside David Leitch, has now admitted that the original script didn't feature as many fatalities as you'd think.

According to him, he's the one who is responsible for the amount of fighting and bloodshed that was to ensue.

Speaking to ComicBook.com, he explained: "I think he [Reeves] sent it to me on a Friday and I read it maybe that day and thought about it over the weekend.

"It was much more contained. I think only three people died in the original script, two were in a car crash. It was very, very minimal, and it was slightly different.

"I read it, and I'd always had this idea about Greek mythology and how to tell more a fable-istic kind of story, make a surreal action movie so it wasn't so grounded and grey, just something different."

If you go back and attempt to count the number of bodies left lifeless during the first film, it's likely that you'll get upwards of 80.

Move on to the second film - John Wick: Chapter 2 - and it's more like 128.

Then, in John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum - they opted for a more dialled-back kill count, coming in at just (seriously, just?) 94 kills.

Who knows how many innocent lives the next chapter will consume?

Despite this, Stahelski maintains they've never thought about the kill count properly, and says they didn't discuss increasing it.

He continued: "People joke about it [the kill count], but the way I choreograph with my guys and stuff, we just choreograph motion and set pieces and we try to get this balletic kind of dance, live performance feel to everything.

"It's just when you shoot people in the head, they can't get back up so you can reuse a stunt guy. Every time Keanu moves, he does two half circles. He's killed five guys. So I got to keep using more and more stunt guys.

"I think, just by nature, because Keanu's gotten so much better with the choreography and the martial arts and the motion and we change weapons so much and we get bigger set pieces, that, just by its very nature, because the scene grows, the body count grows.

"But we don't start off going, 'Okay, what was in number three? How do we beat it for number four?' We just choreograph and it happens."

Featured Image Credit: Lionsgate

Topics: TV and Film, US Entertainment, john wick

Tom Wood

Tom Wood is a LADbible journalist and Twin Peaks enthusiast. Despite having a career in football cut short by a chronic lack of talent, he managed to obtain degrees from both the University of London and Salford. According to his French teacher, at the weekend he mostly likes to play football and go to the park with his brother. Contact Tom on [email protected]

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