Many kids thought Keanu Reeves was a "Fortnite guy," not realizing that he was already a famous actor.
Epic Games creative director details the hilarious story behind the Fortnite x John Wick collaboration becoming a reality.
So far, 2019 has been heavily rooted in big-time collaborations for Fortnite. For the second time in two years, and to coincide with the release of Avengers: Endgame, it rolled out an LTM and limited edition skins in conjunction with Marvel. Shortly after that, Fortnite allowed its players to assume the identity of John Wick and take part in the Wick's Bounty LTM.
Fortnite has now teamed up with Marvel twice and it is well documented how the collaboration came about. Anthony and Joe Russo, the directors of Infinity War and Endgame, admitted to being huge Fortnite fans. The movie makers then got the wheels moving on the project. However, the story behind how John Wick became a character in the Fortnite universe has remained a mystery, until now courtesy of The Independent.
Donald Mustard, Epic's creative director, revealed how the crossover event came about at this year's E3, and we love it. "I happened to end up in a spot where Keanu [Reeves] and I were together, talking about some stuff, and we were like, 'What if this kinda made sense,'" Mustard explained. The reason it definitely "kinda made sense" is due to Reeves' resemblance to a pre-existing Fortnite skin.
We don't know why we had never noticed it before, but Reeves looks remarkably like The Reaper. Mustard assured fans at E3 that the likeness was unintended. However, Reeves told Mustard that kids had been approaching him asking if he's "the Fortnite guy." Since Reeves is usually recognized in public enough since he is a big-time Hollywood star, being mistaken for someone he isn't was probably pretty strange and maybe even a little annoying.
What must have made the situation even more confusing for Reeves is the fact that, apparently, he didn't even know what Fortnite was when he was first called out as being "the Fortnite guy." However, now he really is the Fortnite guy. Plus, and we didn't put this together ourselves when we saw it, John Wick squares off against The Reaper during the Wick's Bounty launch trailer. That's some rock solid symbolism right there.