A new report claims that reshoots on the John Wick spin-off Ballerina have been far more drastic than publicly announced.
We’ve known for some time that Lionsgate’s The World Of John Wick: Ballerina has been undergoing some changes. The John Wick spin-off film was delayed by a year, with the publicly-stated reason being reshoots of action scenes.
Chad Stahelski, director of the mainline John Wick films and overseer of the wider franchise was drafted in to help Len Wiseman (the film’s director) give those scenes the kind of bite and style that fans of the series are used to.
That’s what we were told anyway, but a new report over at The Wrap claims that the reshoots have gone far, far deeper than just reshoting some key action beats. The story claims that Chad Stahelski has actually had to reshoot most of the film and when you look at some of the ongoing details, there’s certainly elements there that could lend this story some credence.
Ballerina was delayed by a full year, from June of this year to June 2025. Reshoots have been ongoing for several months, enough time to essentially shoot another film. The report even states that ‘a “significant portion” of Ballerina was reshot in Prague, with Wiseman not present on set.’
The stakes are significant for Lionsgate here too. The mini major has reshuffled its resources of late, spliting its film and TV arms into two seperate entities in an ongoing struggle to find some kind of stable economic footing.
On the film side of things, the John Wick series is perhaps its biggest and most valuable franchise alongside The Hunger Games. The studio simply cannot afford to put out a bad Wick movie, even a spin-off that could damage the brand and limit the future earnings of one of its few reliable sources of income.
The report also suggests that the prolonged reshoots are the reason that Henry Cavill has signed up for the Voltron movie for Amazon MGM, with that project set to go before cameras imminently. Cavill should have been busy in pre-production on Highlander, polishing his swordplay and practicing his Scottish accent for the upcoming Highlander remake which Chad Stahelski is directing.
However, should this report prove to be accurate, Stahelski has been rather busy fixing Ballerina and hasn’t been spending time on the pre-production for Highlander. There’s a chance then, that the long-delayed remake – which was set to shoot in January – could yet face more delays.
Anyway, The World Of John Wick: Ballerina can hopefuly overcome its problems and silly title to continue the fine form of the John Wick movies.
The film, which stars Ana de Armas as the titular assassin trained in both ballet and stylish violence, will now be released on 6th June 2025. Along with de Armas, we’ll get Keanu Reeves making a cameo as the mighty John WIck alongside Anjelica Huston, Gabriel Byrne. The late Lance Reddick, Catalina Sandino Moreno, Norman Reedus and Ian McShane also feature.
The action is set to take place between the events of the third and fourth Wick films. Unless they’ve gone and changed that too…
