Keanu Reeves Officially Finds His Next 'John Wick' Replacement

mpi099/MediaPunch/INSTARimages Published Sep 9, 2026, 1:23 PM EDT Ryan O'Rourke is a Senior News Writer at Collider with a specific interest in all things adult animation, video game adaptations, and the work of Mike Flanagan. He is also an experienced baseball writer with over six years of articles between multiple outlets, most notably FanSided's CubbiesCrib. Whether it's taking in a baseball game, a new season of Futurama or Castlevania: Nocturne, or playing the latest From Software title, he is always finding ways to show his fandom. When it comes to gaming and anything that takes inspiration from it, he is deeply opinionated on what's going on. Outside of entertainment, he's a graduate of Eureka College with a Bachelor's in Communication where he honed his craft as a writer. Between The IV Leader at Illinois Valley Community College and The Pegasus at Eureka, he spent the majority of his college career publishing articles on everything from politics to campus happenings and, of course, entertainment for the student body. Those principles he learned covering the 2020 election, Palestine, and so much more are brought here to Collider, where he has gleefully written on everything from the SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes to Nathan Lane baby-birding sewer boys. Sign in to your Collider account This article covers a developing story. Continue to check back with us as we will be adding more information as it becomes available.Keanu Reeves has spent the last decade and change becoming synonymous with John Wick. Across four films and an Ana de Armas-led spin-off, the franchise rose from low-budget indie darling to one of the most beloved blockbuster franchises on the planet, with the action star at the heart of the antihero's growth into a billion-dollar icon. John Wick: Chapter 4 appeared to finally bring his story to a close with a climactic final confrontation with his old friend, Caine (Donnie Yen), and the Marquis de Gramont (Bill Skarsgård), but CinemaCon in 2025 confirmed that there was still life in the series and a fifth film was on the way after Reeves and Chad Stahelski found an idea they liked for the sequel. That said, it'll be a minute before everything comes together, and in the meantime, the Baba Yaga is eyeing other roles. Now, Reeves has officially set his next big action thriller that could take him into the foreseeable future. The Arena has preemptively acquired the rights to Oliver Lowe’s upcoming novel Kill Current: A Jon Hendricks Thriller for an adaptation starring the Matrix lead as the titular CIA burnout. Described as "a globe-spanning, edge-of-your-seat action thriller about shifting alliances and the race for the world’s most precious and valuable assets," the novel is designed to be the beginning of a series centered on Hendricks and, if it's successful, could be the beginning of a new franchise for Reeves on-screen. In addition to leading the cast, he's also producing alongside Alexandra Grant for Two Dragonflies. Alongside the announcement was a trippy first teaser showing Hendricks walking through a cybernetic corridor. Publishing in May 2027 through Zando, Kill Current will be a revenge thriller in a similar vein to Wick, introducing readers to Hendricks as he's pulled back into the world of espionage to get the vengeance he desires. It'll follow the beaten-down CIA officer as he seeks those responsible for the death of the protégé he trained and lost. His path will be anything but straightforward, though, if the promise of a more globe-trotting political thriller is any indication. In an official statement, Molly Stern, CEO and founder of Zando, hyped it up as a very contemporary story shaped by issues affecting the globe, from the economy to the technological race, at this moment in time. “Oliver Lowe’s masterful story, the first in his upcoming Jon Hendricks series, is poised to reinvent the geopolitical thriller for the modern era. Kill Current is rooted in the issues shaping today’s world—semiconductors, global supply chains, technological and information warfare. It delivers the fast-paced, globe-trotting read and complex, intriguing characters that thriller fans of any era crave.” John Wick