Ballerina review: Does the John Wick spinoff hit its target?

There’s an exciting 20-minute stretch midway through Ballerina — or From the World of John Wick: Ballerina — that expands the John Wick mythos. These scenes swerve past the series' expectations and break new ground in delightful ways. Unfortunately, what comes before and after is a Wick facsimile through and through, even though the film repeatedly insists it's showing you something novel.

This is the key issue with the Ana de Armas-led action spinoff. For most of its 125-minute runtime, Ballerina remains torn between adhering to the tenets of its franchise mothership and charting its own course. Th...