More often than not I’ve found that sequels largely have a hard time of living up to their predecessor’s mainstream introductions the more years there are between movies.
However, I can gladly say that “The Accountant 2” is on the short list of exceptions to that experience.
If you were a fan of 2016’s “The Accountant” I can tell you that this flick uses a lot of the same dark humor while unrepentant bad guys shuffle off their mortal coil.
But, I think this movie really shines as it gives estranged brothers Chris and Brax a much-needed chance to reconnect and shows that they can come together despite being almost a decade apart.
As someone with younger siblings, watching the sibling chemistry on screen is both hilarious and cringe in all the best ways.
Accountant 2 is an action thriller film directed by Gavin O’Connor and written by Bill Dubuque.
Ben Affleck, Jon Bernthal, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, and J.K. Simmons reprise their roles from the previous film, with Daniella Pineda, Grant Harvey, Andrew Howard, Allison Robertson, and Robert Morgan joining the cast.
The movie clocks in at 132 minutes long and is rated R for strong violence, and language throughout.
Former FinCEN director Raymond King (Simmons) meets with the mysterious assassin Anaïs (Pineda) to ask her help locating a Salvadorian family.
However, the only thing he has to offer is a dated photo of the parents and their young son.
Anaïs doesn’t respond to the offer, but warns King he’s been followed.
After successfully defending himself in a bathroom scuffle, King is assassinated in the ensuing gunfight chaos while Anaïs walks away unscathed.
King’s protégé and current director of FinCEN Marybeth Medina (Addai-Robinson), identifies his body and sees “find the accountant” written on his arm and decides to take up the case.
Medina, despite being mistrustful of Christian Wolff’s (Affleck) illegal activities, asks him for help finding the family in the photo.
Wolff organizes a collage of information which shows that the family in the photo fled from Salvador to Los Angeles, encountering various hazards along the way.
Cobb (Harvey), the man tasked with killing Anaïs and King, informs his supervisor Burke (Morgan) who tells him to continue pursuing Anaïs lest she realize what Burke did to her.
Christian invites his estranged brother and current assassin Braxton (Bernthal) to help with the case.
Justine (Robertson), still residing at the New Hampshire compound where she met Christian, works with a group of other autistic children to hack into different technology to help Christian.
Their group manages to find a photo of Anaïs, but are unable to identify her.
Uncomfortable with their illegal methods, Medina breaks from the group to continue on her own.
She visits a hospital mentioned in one of King’s reports, where she discovers Anaïs is actually the mother from the photo.
Anaïs was involved in a critical accident and after losing her memories, she developed intense combat skills before escaping.
Assassin contractor Batu (Howard) sets a contract for Medina which Braxton rejects but fails to tell Chris about.
Unfortunately, Medina is critically injured and that only spurs Chris into a more aggressive mode which is predictably bad for the villains in this story.
Overall, I found the movie quite enjoyable and am always on board to watch bad guys get their just desserts.
Check out “The Accountant 2” in theaters now!
