John Wick doesn’t come by allies easily, but Ian McShane’s Winston is one who’s been consistently in his corner since the John Wick film series began in 2014. As such, McShane has seen a lot of characters come and go from this world of assassins and other colorful criminals, most of whom departed at the lethal hands of Keanu Reeves’ protagonist. However, one above all has made Shane the angriest, and I got a kick out of his reason for why.
McShane is back as Winston for Ballerina, the first theatrical John Wick spinoff, with Ana de Arias leading as Eve Macarro. Ahead of Ballerina’s release on the 2025 movies schedule, the Deadwood alum looked back on his time in the John Wick saga with CBR and revealed that he’s still pretty pissed off at Alfie Allen’s Iosef Tarasov from the first movie. As McShane explained:
[I’m] still angry at Alfie Allen. Well, Alfie, oh, I know he’s a lovely kid, but he has the most slappable face in the world, you know, as he said to himself originally, so ‘I’ve got a very slappable face,’ you know, well.
Any John Wick fan can tell you that if it hadn’t been for Iosef Tarasov, Keanu Reeves’ character would have never returned to this world of bloodshed. The son of Russian crime boss Viggo Tarasov made the stupid decision to steal John’s car and kill his new dog in the process. The latter in particular was especially egregious, as the dog was a final parting gift from John’s late wife, Helen.
As such, John wasted no time in exacting revenge of Iosef and eliminating anyone who stood in his way, including Viggo, who sealed his fate when he had John’s mentor Marcus killed. That in turn paved the way for all the trouble that unfolded in the later John Wick movies, including, in a way, Ballerina given John’s involvement in the spinoff. But most importantly of all, Ian McShane still takes issue with the slappable face of Game of Thrones’ Alfie Allen. I’m so glad he has his priorities straight. Frankly, Iosef’s arrogance just increases the level of slappability.
But hey, what’s done is done, and at least in real life, Iosef Tarasov’s idiotic actions gave us some of the best action movies. As far as Ian McShane’s Winston is concerned, Ballerina will check in on him between the events of John Wick: Chapter 3 and Chapter 4, when he was still running the original version of The Continental’s New York branch with the late Lance Reddick’s Charon as his concierge. This story will see Ana de Arias’ character using the assassination skills she leaned from the Ruska Roma to seek revenge against the people who killed her father.
Ballerina opens in theaters on June 6, and de Armas, McShane, Reeves and Reddick are joined Anjelica Huston, Gabriel Byrne, Norman Reedus, Sharon Duncan-Brewster, Choi Soo-young, Catalina Sandino Moreno and David Castañeda. Len Wiseman directed the spinoff and Shay Hatten wrote the script.
