John Wick: Chapter 2

Essential, and the hinge of the whole series. Everything the first film left as atmosphere becomes a rule here: the marker is a physical object with an obligation attached, the High Table gets named, the Continental's single prohibition on conducting business on the premises is stated out loud so that it can be broken, and the bounty network turns out to run on an analogue switchboard staffed by clerks.

The plot is a trap and the film knows it. Santino D'Antonio holds a marker Wick cannot refuse without being killed for refusing, and the job he calls in will make Wick a target however it goes. His position never improves. He executes the contract flawlessly and is immediately worth seven million dollars to anybody in Rome, and the last half hour is a man discovering that competence is not an exit.

The craft is a clear step up. The Rome catacombs sequence is the best sustained gunfight in the series, and the finale in the mirrored gallery is its one piece of real visual invention. Common is the only opponent who ever reads as Wick's equal, and their two fights, one down a staircase and one through a crowd of commuters who never look up, do more character work than any of the dialogue.

Watch it directly after the first. It ends with Wick excommunicado, a one-hour head start and a bounty going global, and Chapter 3 resumes at that minute. The two do not separate.