Ballerina Can’t Escape John Wick’s Shadow

Ballerina was never going to outgun John Wick. From the moment it was announced, it felt like a spin-off trying really hard to prove it belongs at the cool kids' table. And while it throws a flurry of high kicks, headshots, and a decent dose of ballet-core brooding, it never quite escapes the long, gunmetal-gray shadow cast by Mr. Wick himself.

Ballerina is not a bad time. If you’re here for bullet ballets and revenge-fueled rage wrapped in leather, you’ll be satisfied. Ana de Armas brings a fierce, almost haunted energy to the role, doing her best to channel grief into violence. But let’s face it: Ballerina is basically John Wick on pointe shoes, minus the mythic cool. It’s the little cousin wearing big brother’s hand-me-downs and pretending they fit.

The thing is, John Wick redefined modern action. It didn’t just raise the bar — it slow-motion backflipped over it with a puppy and a pencil. That series built an entire aesthetic, one that felt fresh, sleek, and oddly poetic. The Continental, the gold coins, the unspoken rules — it all oozed style and restraint. Ballerina tries to plug into that same universe, but it feels more like cosplay than canon.

You can feel the Wick-isms dripping off every frame: the dim lighting, the neon signs, the slow-motion gun-fu. And while it checks all the boxes, it never quite captures the why behind them. Wick fights because he’s got nothing left to lose. Our ballerina fights because… well, mostly because she’s angry and sad and someone said “let’s make a spin-off.”

And that’s the other problem: Ballerina doesn’t really have its own voice. It’s loud, sure. It’s stylish enough. But it doesn’t have that quiet sense of doom, that mournful elegance that made John Wick feel like Shakespeare with Glocks. It’s more like Black Swan meets Call of Duty — which sounds cool on paper, but in practice, feels like an identity crisis.

Still, I don’t hate it. In fact, I had fun. There’s a kind of gleeful absurdity to the film that reminds me why I fell for the Wickverse in the first place. The no-apologies violence, the operatic stakes, the over-the-top choreography — it’s all there. It’s just not... transcendent. Ballerina wants to dance, but it never quite finds its rhythm.

Maybe it’s okay that Ballerina lives in John Wick’s shadow. Some shadows are cast by giants — and if you’re going to be stuck in one, it might as well be one with a killer suit and a body count. Just don’t forget: wearing black and shooting people doesn’t automatically make you John Wick. That takes a special kind of heartbreak.