The freshly released film from the John Wick franchise, Ballerina, is the fifth film in the series. Starring Ana de Armas as the lethal assassin Eve Maccaro, her story lies in the middle of the timelines of the third and the fourth films of the franchise,

In contrast, “Ballerina”—like the four John Wick films that it’s spun off from—is, strangely, far better at story than at action. The first John Wick film is the weakest, because the framework for the franchise was still unformed: a retired hit man (Keanu Reeves) gets back into action to respond to a mobster’s attacks.

Lionsgate was always going to need to take the John Wick franchise in a new direction if it wanted to keep the film series going after the inevitable exit of its central star. A spinoff series came and went with a telling lack of fanfare that spoke,