Great news for John Wick fans. A TV series based on this popular action franchise is in the works on the Starz network. Titled The Continental, the series will focus on the Continental Hotel from the movie franchise, where assassins come to seek rest and refuge. Chris Collins (Sons of Anarchy, The Wire) will come on board as writer and showrunner, while Keanu Reeves and the rest of the John Wick crew including the director Chad Stahelski will serve as executive producers. Stahelski is also attached to direct the pilot.
“This series is truly unlike anything else on TV,” said Chris Albrecht, President and CEO of Starz about the series. “The Continental promises to include the thunderous fight sequences and intensely staged shootouts between professional assassins and their targets that fans have come to expect in the John Wick movie franchise as well as introducing some new, darkly compelling characters who inhabit this underground world.”
Albrecht also added that the TV series will exist “side-by-side” with the movies, which gives us hope that we might see some of our favorite characters from the movie in The Continental.
The idea to do a TV adaptation of John Wick which focuses on the Continental Hotel has been teased for some time now. Previously Stahelski talked about studio’s wish to explore this part of the movie’s story.
“They’ve got a really good structure.” said Stahelski a few months ago. “It’s very tied to the film [in that] it’s about the Continentals all over the world, how certain people come into that world, and what happens in relation to those people, which is cool. I think the world is very vast, and everything I’ve heard from it is very positive. […] It’s something that studio seems very, very intent on [making] and very, very behind… You can be with the consigliere, concierge, the sommelier — you can be with all these different characters and walk through the world in different aspects; ones that I’m a little limited [from exploring] by staying with my lead guy.”
