If there’s one actor in Hollywood who constantly subverts the expectations of everyone from audiences to film executives to film critics, it’s Keanu Reeves. I remember back in the old days when the joke was that Keanu Reeves was not a good actor because he always had the same expression in every movie. Speed is one of my favorite action movies of all time, but even when I watched that movie I understood the joke. However these days he seems more beloved than ever by both men and women. In a way, the John Wick era kicked off a sort of “Keanu-ssance.” Although even before that, Reeves has never really let himself be pigeonholed. I made a list of eight Keanu Reeves films, each one different than the last, to illustrate this point further. All eight of these films either represent an evolution, a career pivot or an adventurous new direction he hasn’t explored before.

Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure (1989)

The Canadian actor made his feature film debut in the American hockey drama Youngblood (1986), had his first lead role as a nerdy high schooler in the comedy The Night Before (1988), and he even played Uma Thurman’s suitor in the Oscar-nominated period drama Dangerous Liaisons (1988), but his fame reached another level when he starred opposite Alex Winters in the 1989 time travel comedy Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure. Some people were turned off by the film’s sheer celebration of stupidity, but like Beavis and Butt-Head years later, I felt the stupidity of Bill and Ted was offset by their charm as characters, and it also helps that this film’s writers know exactly what kind of audience they are targeting, and therefore they are able to lean into the ridiculousness in a refreshingly earnest way. The fact that the film got a legacy sequel decades later speaks to its resonance, as well as Keanu Reeves’ early impact on pop culture.

My Own Private Idaho (1991)

After Bill & Ted, Reeves continued having mainstream success with such films as Ron Howard’s Parenthood (1989), Kathryn Bigelow’s Point Break (1991) and Francis Ford Coppola’s gothic horror Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992), but less conventional was Gus Van Sant’s avant-garde indie drama My Own Private Idaho (1991) loosely based on Shakespeare’s Henry IV and Henry V and co-starring River Phoenix. Reeves played a man on a journey both physical and mental in a film involving trauma, class and unrequited love that received critical acclaim for its very un-Hollywood story which featured subject matter that was pretty taboo for the time, but it is now considered a cult classic and a landmark film in queer cinema.

Speed (1994)

Director Jan de Bont, who was impressed by Keanu Reeves’ performance in the action film Point Break, ended up giving Reeves his biggest action blockbuster yet when he gave him the lead role in Speed (1994). The success of the thriller about a runaway bus was the biggest of his career and he received praise as a credible action hero alongside the praise of his co-stars Sandra Bullock and Dennis Hopper. For a long time this was the movie I always associated Reeves with when I heard his name.

The Matrix (1999)

If Speed kicked open the door for Reeves to be an action hero, the anime-inspired sci-fi action film The Matrix (1999) gave Reeves the highest possible credibility in the nerd sphere. The Wachowskis’ cyberpunk tale which introduced the concept of the “red pill” and broke VFX ground with things like “bullet time” impacted pop culture in a much bigger way, with some critics calling it one of the best science fiction films of all time and a once-in-a-generation action movie while everyone from Quentin Tarantino to James Cameron to Christopher Nolan praised it. Reeves reached a whole new level of cool with this movie and he would go on to reprise the role of Neo in The Matrix Reloaded (2003), The Matrix Revolutions (2003) and The Matrix Resurrections (2021).

Side by Side (2012)

Reeves did something unexpected in 2012 when he produced and narrated the documentary Side by Side which investigates the history and process of both old-school photochemical filmmaking and digital filmmaking and their effect on cinema as an art form. Prominent filmmakers like James Cameron, Martin Scorsese and David Lynch weigh in on the conversation as well. This was the first time I saw Reeves as someone more than just an action star and as a film geek I can also tell you that this was the first time I’ve ever been interested in Reeves’ opinion about anything.

Man of Tai Chi (2013)

The 2013 martial arts film Man of Tai Chi marked Keanu Reeves’ directorial debut and he also played the lead role while earning critical praise in the process. Most who saw the film called it solid if not groundbreaking, but despite the well-earned praise, the film was ignored at the box office and bombed. Although it still proves that Reeves has talents that extend beyond just his acting skills.

John Wick (2014)

The 2014 action film John Wick was a gamble in the eyes of many Hollywood execs who still had recent box office failures like Man of Tai Chi fresh on their minds and assumed Reeves was a has-been, but Lionsgate decided to roll the dice and it paid off well with an absorbing neo-noir revenge tale about a man on the hunt for the Russian gang who assaulted him in his home and killed his dog. The film outperformed expectations and each of its sequels commercially outperformed the last one, which made this one of the most financially successful film series of all time. Evidently audiences were no longer tired of Keanu Reeves and all it took was a consistently entertaining series of good vs. evil action films with quality fight choreography.

Always Be My Maybe (2019)

The sharpest career turn Reeves made during the John Wick era in my mind was when he made an appearance as himself in Nahnatchka Khan’s 2019 romantic comedy Always Be My Maybe starring Ali Wong and Randall Park. I mean I know he wasn’t the star of that film but his scenes were some of the most hilarious and most memorable, and it was a nice change of pace seeing him do something so fun and light compared to John Wick. By the way, he continued down the fun and light route when he took the role of Canadian daredevil Duke Caboom in Toy Story 4, a god-like tumbleweed in The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run, Batman in DC League of Super-Pets and Shadow the Hedgehog in Sonic the Hedgehog 3. Reeves even lent his voice and likeness to the 2020 role-playing video game Cyberpunk 2077. For a guy who critics used to decry for being one-note, Keanu Reeves sure has proven to be versatile.