Lionsgate greenlights animated John Wick prequel with Keanu Reeves

Lionsgate has approved an animated John Wick prequel, with Keanu Reeves returning as the assassin known as Baba Yaga. The studio announced the green light Thursday during its quarterly earnings call.

Jon Feltheimer, Lionsgate's chief executive, said in comments after the results that the film is in preproduction. Adam Fogelson, chair of the studio's Motion Picture Group, announced the project in 2025.

The movie will move backward in time to the years before the first John Wick film, following Wick as he carries out the Impossible Task to release himself from his obligation to the High Table and earn the right to be with the love of his life, Helen.

Fogelson said when the project was announced that fans had not clamored for any John Wick story more than the Impossible Task, and called Tindle's approach to it an incredible one.

Shannon Tindle will direct. His 2024 Netflix feature Ultraman: Rising, which he directed and co-wrote, drew on 1960s-inspired visuals and manga and anime influences, with animation by Industrial Light & Magic, and won three Emmys. Tindle also created and co-wrote the Netflix series Lost Ollie, also animated by ILM, which won five Emmys. Earlier credits include creating Laika's Kubo and the Two Strings, on which he has a story credit, and character design for Coraline, DreamWorks Animation's The Croods and television series including Samurai Jack, The Proud Family and Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends.

Ryan and Kaz Firpo are writing the screenplay. The brothers wrote Marvel Studios' Eternals with Patrick Burleigh and director Chloé Zhao.

Producers are Thunder Road's Basil Iwanyk and Erica Lee, 87Eleven Entertainment's Chad Stahelski and Reeves, with Point Grey joining the team. Nathan Kahane is an executive producer. The animation house that will handle the film has not been announced.

Fogelson has said the possibilities are endless in both animation and the John Wick world.

The prequel lands as Lionsgate widens the franchise beyond the films built around Reeves. Ballerina, set in the same underworld and featuring an extended cameo by Reeves, was released last year.

A separate film centered on Caine, the Donnie Yen character introduced in John Wick: Chapter 4, shot from April to July this year, with Yen directing and co-conceiving the story and Rina Sawayama returning as Shimazu Akira. Its story takes place after Chapter 4.

A television series, tentatively titled John Wick: Under the High Table, is in the works as a joint venture between Lionsgate Television, 87Eleven Entertainment and Thunder Road, with Robert Levine serving as showrunner and executive producer.

A fifth John Wick movie is also in development. Fogelson has said Stahelski and Reeves have an idea they find exciting, and Stahelski has described the script as a work in progress. He told The Hollywood Reporter that he and Mike Finch, who wrote Chapter 4 and is writing the fifth film, have a story he considers cool, and that they will sit down with Reeves once they have a 50-page book. "Everybody seems to want it. It's a matter of whether we crack it," Stahelski said.

Reeves will also play the character in a video game from Saber Interactive headed for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC. An official description said the game would include a gun fu combat system, cinematic camerawork and environments built to make players feel as though they are inside a John Wick film.