John Wick star Laurence Fishburne has teased the quality of the upcoming sequel, John Wick: Chapter 4. Speaking with Variety, Fishburne, who is due to reprise the role of The Bowery King in the fourth outing, calls John Wick 4 “the best one” and applauds the addition of several “fun” characters amid some “incredible” action set pieces.

The recent trailer for John Wick: Chapter 4 revealed just a little of what death-defying challenges will befall Keanu Reeves’ Mr. Wick this time around. After surviving a great fall at the end of John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum, John Wick: Chapter 4 will see the dog-loving hitman take his revenge against the High Table.

“Number four is gonna be … honestly, when I read it I was like, this is the best one … it just was. From the way that it opens, there are like 3 or 4 really incredible set pieces that are just like, woah. There are new characters, one, in particular, that’s so much fun. Well, actually three are crazy fun, and yeah, you know, I got to be in it again. I come back from the dead.”

How Can John Wick 4 Top What’s Come Before?

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The question remains, how can John Wick: Chapter 4 top the sheer level of action movie glory that has come before? Well, adding action movie star Donnie Yen should certainly help. Director Chad Stahelski has teased what’s to come between Keanu Reeves’ John Wick and Donnie Yen’s character Caine. And it sounds like nothing short of action movie brilliance.

“So, I’m standing in between, you’ve got Donnie Yen and you got Keanu Reeves, and you’re touching hands with all of them, blocking out stuff. And you’re like, ‘Holy shit. Those are really real,” Stahelski explained. “So, it always comes down to, I can do the Donnie Yen triple kick. I can do all this, but you also want to do something different. So, you start sitting, you come at it from character, and you have a lot of discussions with the guys going, ‘Okay, Donnie is amazing at this. Keanu is amazing at this. They’re both great actors, so let’s lean onto that, and let’s do something we haven’t seen before.’ So now, that Donnie Yen with a sword and a pistol and Keanu with a samurai sword and a couple of pistols and throwing an AR-15 and a glass mirror room with Japanese artifacts. And yeah, throw in a couple of dogs, and let’s see what happens."

Stahelski has also revealed how John Wick 4 will add to the ever-growing mythology, adding ninjas. Another element that should enable the sequel to surpass its predecessors. “I love mythology. I love a good myth,” the filmmaker said. “I don’t really believe — at least for the ‘John Wick’ movies — in a three-act structure. I believe in storytelling and leaving it. You know, we’ve always seen John Wick as Odysseus. So we take the time we need to tell the story. As long as we don’t fall asleep watching it, we keep it going. But I guess there is a bathroom limit.”

After being delayed from a 2021 release date, John Wick: Chapter 4 is now scheduled for release on March 24, 2023.