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Taking on the might of the John Wick franchise at its own game is one thing, but beating it is something else entirely. With that in mind, there’s a good reason why Ballerina has been one of the biggest hits on Netflix ever since it premiered almost two weeks ago.
Carrying an identical title to the incoming spin-off to the billion-dollar action saga directed by Len Wiseman with Ana de Armas in the lead role – never mind a guest appearance from Keanu Reeves himself – the baton hasn’t been so much thrown down as used to pulverize the competition after writer and director Lee Chung-hyun’s revenge thriller took the nomenclature and basic narrative thrust to deliver a brutal rampage of retribution that carries a perfect 100 percent approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
Having one killer track down another for wronging them does open the doors to certain moral quandaries, though, but when asked in an interview with Variety how they sought to straddle that line between having audiences rooting for Jeon Jong-seo’s Jang Ok-ju and against Kim Ji-hoon’s Choi Pro despite their similarities, the latter didn’t seem all that interested.
“Well, firstly, this is not a court hearing. It’s a film. So, let’s keep things in perspective. But having said that, when you look at the nature of the crimes committed by Choi, they are obviously terrible, difficult for the public to forgive. Choi did not actually kill anyone, however, when you look at him you may see him as worse than those who did kill people. We actually had this conversation among ourselves. If you put Ok-ju and Choi together in a court room, Ok-ju might get a longer sentence because she killed so many people and Choi didn’t kill anyone. However, if you look at the weight of the crimes, you still know that he is way worse.”
Regardless of how you feel about Ballerina playing in morally murky gray areas, one thing that can’t be denied is that John Wick has a hell of a mountain to climb in order to claim the title of being the best movie bearing that moniker when the spin-off hits theaters in June 2024.