#then these two serve as a nice baseline bc theyre not really that hard to understand

[kavalyera]

“There are three types of men in this world: those who have something to live for, those who have something die for, those who have something to kill for. John Wick is none of these things.”

— Marquis de Gramont to Chidi

And you see, John is all three. He lives for Helen, for her— for his freedom from the underworld. To leave the past behind him. And he dies for Helen and for himself. He dies because he knows that is his peace he will finally achieve. And of course, he kills for his freedom. And in a sense, Helen was his freedom.

The irony is that the Marquis is none of these things at all. You can argue that oh, he’s an autem imperator but there is not much to his character. He is shallow and we see that so easily. There’s literally only one thing that makes him interesting, or even gives him purpose and it’s place directly elevated by all twelve members of the High Table. He kills just for something so shallow as power and to exert his dominance over a dominion. He lives because he’s clearly scared of dying himself(he even holds back tears when he knows John is not dying any time soon at the 222 steps) and he dies that directly contrasts how John does. Unlike John, Vincent dies suddenly— he barely has time to register because he remembers the rules of the duel. Unlike John, Vincent doesn’t know peace. He is in an aimless direction.

In my opinion, the Marquis de Gramont serves as an excellent antagonist and villain due to being a foil character. He contrasts John in every single way and how the two were written were amazing.