Film Theory: John Wick Literally CAN’T DIE!

this video contains spoilers for John

Wick chapter 4. at the end of his latest

movie we see the death of John Wick but

is everyone's favorite puppy-loving

assassin really dead what say you John

you're dead right Emily no he's alive

and I'm about to prove it Long Live John

Wick

hello Internet welcome to film Theory

the show that knows that no business can

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videos instead oh boy loyal theorists

today we're talking about one of my

favorite franchises to pop up over the

past decade John Wick you ready John in

case you missed this one John Wick is

about a legendary assassin seeking

revenge against the entire criminal

underworld known collectively as the

high table after they kill his dog later

movies are less about the dog and more

about just leaving the organization but

regardless these films have a pretty

simple premise what follows then are

four films of incredible action in a

super stylish neon lit world all

directed by stunt professionals who make

sure you see exactly what's going on and

I think the results speak for themselves

John Wick is one of those rare

franchises where each sequel is arguably

better than the entry that came before

with box office numbers to match not

that much of a shock when it's clear how

much love is put into these things but

you know what was a shock John Wick's

death at the end of chapter four after

months of running and fighting his way

through endless armies of faceless goons

Jon is forced into one final duel

against his old friend Kane in it he

shot three times and although he manages

to survive long enough to kill the big

boss and win his freedom minutes later

he takes a seat and peacefully succumbs

to his wounds to say that literally no

one saw this coming is putting things

mildly as I was walking out of my

showing in the movie I heard multiple

people asking each other he can't be

dead right I mean it takes a lot to

surprise me in movies at this point and

even I gotta admit this one got me John

Wick is a huge franchise there is a

hunger from fans for more of these

movies and now at the height of their

success they kill off the main character

no I don't think so it doesn't matter if

we saw a grave because John Wick isn't

dead when you actually look at this

franchise and examine the type of

injuries that Wick sustained throughout

his quest to escape the high table

things do not line up here there is no

way that the wounds that he takes on

this Final Duel kill him in fact not

only is John Wick not dead but after

watching these movies again I am almost

100 convinced that John Wick literally

cannot die and there's a secret reason

for it so put on your magic bulletproof

suit loyal theorists we've got a death

to disprove so to do this analysis we're

gonna be lumping the movies into two

groups John Wick chapters one through

three and John Wick chapter four why

well it has to do with the time frame

where the movies take place according to

franchise director Chad stilleski the

first three John Wick movies take place

in like a week week and a half somewhere

in there so all this fighting all the

goons he kills all the damage that he

takes across those three movies yep all

of that's apparently happening in just

under two weeks meanwhile here I am

weeping on the floor every time I step

on a Lego on the other hand chapter 4

apparently takes place like six months

later enough time that John will have

had himself a chance to rest heal and

refill his tank additionally we're only

gonna be looking at the major injuries

here sure he sustains plenty of punches

and falls through glass but we're gonna

be focusing on the moments that stand

the best chances of kill killing him and

it seems to me that the best starting

point is actually the End by taking a

closer look at the wounds that do wind

up quote unquote killing him during this

final shootout Kane grazes Wick's right

arm hits his left shoulder and then

shoots his lower abdomen the resulting

blood loss then seemingly causes Wick to

die shortly thereafter but hold on for a

second there why does that wound pattern

sound so familiar well because this

isn't the first time that we've seen

someone shot in these places in the

franchise in chapter 3 John is forced to

shoot a friendly doctor in order to save

his life it's complicated but trust me

it works anyway week asks where the

doctor would like to be shot and the

doctor points to two specific locations

that'll hurt so it won't be fatal where

here just below my floating rib oh wait

one may not be enough you should not to

graze Mike good luck Mr Rick the first

is in his lower abdomen side and the

second is through his shoulder the exact

same parts of the body where Kane hits

Wick during their shootout at the end of

chapter four and remember the doctor

chose those spots specifically because

they wouldn't be outright fatal that

right there that is highly suspicious

not only that but Jon also shot Kane in

the same part of the abdomen and we see

him able to make a full recovery by

chapter 4's post-credits scene so

already we have ourselves two solid

points of evidence indicating that Jon

shouldn't be dead at the end of this

duel and all of that is without saying

that these guys are trained

professionals they can get a head shot

in their sleep the fact that they're

only grazing each other and hitting

non-essential areas that right there is

a dead giveaway that something else is

afoot but let's just talk for a second

about blood loss according to the

National Library of Medicine healthy

adults have an average of four and a

half to five and a half liters of blood

circulating through their bodies at any

given time obviously everyone's gonna

react to trauma differently but as a

general guideline most adults can lose

up to 15 percent of that blood volume

without any sort of physical symptom

this is known as a Class 1 Hemorrhage

anything above that though symptoms get

progressively worse between 15 and 40

blood loss can result in nausea fatigue

and hallucination it isn't until you get

to 40 or more blood loss where things

start to become seriously deadly these

are the class IV hemorrhages they're the

sorts of wounds that have high risks of

organ failure coma and death so how much

blood does John lose well to calculate

that we need to know how badly he was

injured according to the Internet movie

Firearms database the guns used in the

duel appear to be a pair of engraved

Thompson Center Arms Encore pistols with

nickel plated or silver cast 44 magnum

cartridges how powerful is a 44 magnum

cartridge in the words of Dirty Harry

powerful handgun

blow your head clean off these should be

doing some significant damage emphasis

on should but now just take a look at

the wounds on Jon's stomach and arms to

lose 40 of his blood John Wick would

need to bleed out about two liters and

thanks to the white shirts we can see

how much blood he's actually losing and

it's not enough this is merely a pint or

two of blood it's not enough to cause

him to die like this this also checks

out with the statistics according to an

annals of surgery study 88.3 percent of

people who get shot in the abdomen area

survive lastly we've seen him survive

this exact set of injuries before in

Chapter 2 John is shot twice in the

right side of his abdomen while fending

off one of the Assassins though it

clearly hurts Jon and causes him to hold

his wound and stumble about he does

survive it just fine so in John Wick's

final death scene he actually survives

but what about throughout the rest of

the movie could his injuries have just

added up what about getting hit by a car

John is hit by several cars throughout

these films which obviously can result

in a lethal injury 9.1 percent of

pedestrians hit by vehicles are killed

another 21.8 percent are severely

injured the big X Factor there is

ultimately how the hit occurs and how

fast the car is going in John wake

chapter 4 for instance we see him hit by

a car during his battle in the middle of

traffic notice though that this fight's

happening on a very specific Road the

Champs Lisa that circles around paris's

Arc to Triomphe a massive 12-lane

roundabout where the speed limit is 50

kilometers an hour or just over 30 miles

an hour on other streets in Paris where

we also see him get hit the speed limits

lower restricted to 30 kilometers or 18

miles per hour but here's the thing the

odds are in John's favor with all of

these cases only 33 percent of

pedestrians hit by Vehicles traveling 25

miles per hour are severely injured and

only 10 percent hit at 35 miles per hour

die these hits at those speeds while

they certainly look painful they're

likely some of the least dangerous

things that we see Wix survive

throughout the films so if cars aren't a

threat and bullets aren't a threat what

about Falls chapter 4 features an

incredible top-down fire fight looking

like it was ripped straight out of

Hotline Miami a firefight that ends with

him jumping out of a fourth story window

don't worry there's a conveniently

placed van that's going to break his

fall

four stories converts to roughly 43.3

feet or 13.2 meters and according to

various health and Medicine textbooks

just 50 of people who fall for stories

are actually able to survive so John

here is just flipping a coin with his

life but it's worth noting that that one

is actually one of his lower Falls

during a fight with a member of the high

table John falls from a balcony hits a

beam on the way down and then Falls flat

onto the concrete floor below this scene

was shot at a space called craftwork

Berlin and estimating from the

information that's available on their

website the total height of this fall

was roughly 50 feet or 15 meters what

are the odds of Jon surviving this

higher fall well believe it or not but

the beam actually helped his odds Keanu

Reeves is six foot one inch and we see

that he's falling about twice his body

height or 12 feet before he hits that

beam yes he's landing hard on his back

but it's enough to slow him down and

restart his fall at a lower level where

now he's only falling an additional 38

feet or 11 and a half meters according

to this scientific study the odds of

dying from a fall at that height is only

18 so it's likely that he's gonna

survive but shouldn't his back be broken

no actually Studies have shown that to

fracture a cervical spine you need a

force of about 3 000 Newtons that's

equal to the impact created by a 500

pound car crashing into a wall at 30

miles an hour so how close to this

number does John Wick get very you see

you can actually calculate Free Fall

energy as mass times gravity times

height of fall Keanu Reeves weighs in at

175 pounds and we know that he's falling

about 12 feet that gets us to

2847 joules of energy when he hits the

beam almost the 3000 Newtons to break

him but just not quite enough which

brings up an interesting point for as

painful as all those back-breaking Falls

look they seem to be there intentionally

the filmmakers are ensuring that they

never cross the four-story rule which

would then put Jon's odds of survival is

extremely unlikely and in moments when

he is falling from greater than four

stories like in here they try to make

sure to break his fall and is back with

a couple of painful stops on the way

down that puts Jon's scientific odds of

survival just on the right side of

believable while still looking

viscerally painful in the process but

just how far can they push these physics

case in point the mother of all falls

from John Wick 3 when he shot off the

top of the Continental true to form on

his way down he hits a slanted roof

bounces off a fire escape railing

crashes into another awning and then

smashes into the pavement the real world

location used as a stand-in for the

Continental Hotel here is one Wall

Street Court in New York City which

stands at a staggering 205 feet tall

more than three times taller than the

tumble that Jon takes off that nightclub

in chapter four and while that would

certainly be a fall that's impossible to

survive that's not actually what we're

seeing happen well yes one Wall Street

Court was visually what we see when Jon

actually falls he's falling from a much

smaller height if you count the floors

as Jon falls down he's actually tumbling

eight full stories and considering a

typical story in New York is 10 feet

tall that translates to a whopping 80

foot or 24 meter fall still His Highest

by a wide margin that said what damage

would we expect to be done here well not

as much as you might expect the slanted

Surface Two stories down would actually

help dissipate most of his initial

falling energy resetting him largely

back to zero the last part of the Fall

would also be survivable as the awning

catches him about 30 feet down the

biggest issue as you might expect is the

fire escape here John is falling a

little over two stories to land right on

his back on a thin metal rail that would

almost absolutely break his back again

plugging into our handy equation energy

equals mass times gravity times height

he's landing on that railing with nearly

4 750 joules of energy to put it another

way he's falling at a speed roughly

equivalent to 36 miles per hour and then

coming to a dead stop on that railing on

his back the fact that Jon is able to

walk away from the Continental fall at

all let alone continue his Rampage six

months later in chapter four yeah

nothing short of impossible but perhaps

John's most serious injury is the first

that he sustains in the entire franchise

towards the start of the very first

movie one of the goons takes an aluminum

bat to the back of Jon's head he's then

kicked in the gut in the face struck

across his left arm by the bat and then

punched in the face again rendering him

unconscious now the hits to the gut in

the arm could have easily left him with

internal abdominal injuries or broken

bones but those are far from the most

concerning thing to happen here the fact

that John's hit in the head multiple

times hard enough that he's knocked out

that would give him a Grade Three

concussion that is serious according to

the CDC that should have given Jon

slurred speech decreased coordination

confusion intense headaches nausea for

weeks if not months after this injury

now this is an important fact because we

see Jon get hit in the head multiple

times throughout the series even knocked

out again after getting hit with a car

but he shows no signs of any lingering

or life-threatening symptoms from all

these concussions he's still able to

carry on conversations immediately after

waking up

settle down oh you manage that anyways

anyways look

in short over the course of two weeks

from chapters one through three John

Wick is shot stabbed hit by cars

dangerously cauterizes a wound been

close enough to an explosion that he's

thrown by it and fall in a distance that

breaks his back all of these wounds are

far worse than what finally quote

unquote kills him at the end of chapter

four it can only lead me to conclude

that John Wick just isn't dead at the

end of the latest movie the name is dead

the legend of John Wick is dead but the

man no he's still alive and out there

but that still doesn't answer the

question of how not how he survived

chapter four I think we've covered that

fairly well but how he survived chapters

one through three that is a brutal two

weeks that should have killed him

multiple times over but you know what I

think I have an answer loyal theorist

see in a short that we released a few

weeks ago we proved that the blind

assassin Kane has to have himself

superpowers it is the only way that he'd

be able to feel what cards he's dealt

during the chapter 4 poker game and I

don't think that he's the only super

powered assassin that we're seeing in

these movies Jon has powers too

specifically a healing Factor akin to

Wolverine or Deadpool now that might

seem like a bit of a leap but we see

evidence of Jon's healing factor in

action during the films in chapter one

John gets this cut on his nose and yet

it's completely gone when chapter two

begins this is supposed to be happening

immediately afterwards and even a

superficial cut like this could take a

few days to heal completely want a more

serious wound that gets magically healed

remember John getting shot in his

abdomen twice during chapter Two And yet

when a stab wound on his shoulders being

treated in chapter three we see that

those gunshots on his abdomen have

completely healed over no scars no wound

dressing no stitches no nothing chapter

3 takes place immediately after chapter

two and the filmmakers cared enough

about continuity that Jon is wearing the

same shirt with the same blood stains

from those gunshot wounds and yet no

actual evidence of those wounds on his

body exist all because John Wick has a

super healing Factor that's why he's

able to keep going and going and going

throughout these films getting up every

time he's knocked down killing every

assassin that gets sent his way John

Wick isn't dead because he is literally

Immortal thematically it works real well

Jon and Kane agree before their Final

Duel those cling to death

live for those who are cling to life die

and no one clings to death more than

John Wick it's also worth noting that

the John Wick franchise was born during

an era where superhero films dominated

the box office I suspect that this one

might just be a sleeper superhero film

grittier more realistic but still

starting someone with Larger than Life

special abilities and now what do we see

as I record this they're already

announcing a John Wick chapter 5. so

when it's revealed that John Wick has

faked his death because he's a man who

literally can't die remember where you

heard it first but hey all this work

taken down the Assassin sent by the high

table couldn't be easy on an empty

stomach thankfully for Mr John Wick it's

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