Lionsgate Greenlights Animated John Wick Film With Keanu Reeves Returning

Lionsgate has officially greenlit an animated John Wick film, and Keanu Reeves will reprise his role as the hitman at the centre of the franchise. Deadline broke the news on 5 November 2026.

The new film is a prequel. It is set before the first live-action movie and shows John Wick completing the Impossible Task, the test he must pass to be freed from the High Table, the crime organisation that controls his world, so he can be with Helen.

Shannon Tindle will direct. Ryan Firpo and Kaz Firpo wrote the script. The producers are Basil Iwanyk and Erica Lee, Chad Stahelski, who directed the live-action films, Keanu Reeves, and Point Grey.

Lionsgate chief executive Jon Feltheimer said the film is in preproduction, the planning stage that comes before any animation or filming begins. No release date was given in the announcement.

Reeves's return to the series was flagged well before this news. At the cinema owners' convention CinemaCon in April 2025, Lionsgate said Reeves would come back for the next live-action film, John Wick 5. Lionsgate's franchise page lists John Wick 5 as being in early development, so the live-action and animated projects are separate efforts moving along different timelines.

The series has grown steadily since the first film, and a prequel gives the studio a way to explore a part of the story the audience has only glimpsed. Each new project still starts with a long chain of decisions: who writes it, who produces it, who signs on to return, and when the studio commits to making it. This announcement is one link in that chain, and the next links will come later.