The Accountant came out way back in 2016. Directed by Gavin O’Connor, written by Bill Dubuque, and starring Ben Affleck, the film was a tense mixture of action, suspense, and the odd accounting. I enjoyed the cat-and-mouse game played by Christian Wolff (Affleck) and the financial crimes unit led by Raymond King (J. K. Simmons). And as the credits rolled, I was content with the story told and didn’t think it needed a sequel, nor did it really set itself up for one. So I was very much surprised when I saw that they were making a sequel, and it has a larger focus on the dynamic between Wolff and his brother, Braxton, played by Jon Bernthal. Does this sequel live up to its nearly 10-year-old big brother, or should they have just let it rest?
The Accountant 2 once again follows neurodivergent accountant Christian Wolff as he uncovers a new mystery. This time, it involves the death of Raymond King, the former FinCEN Director. After Raymond met with the assassin Anais, he was killed after a bar fight. With his final moments, he writes on his arm, “find the accountant”, which his protégé, Marybeth Medina, reluctantly does. After informing Wolff of the situation, the pair begin retracing Raymond’s steps to figure out what he was searching for. But when things start to get a little out of control, Wolff brings in his brother Braxton, a trained hitman, to aid in the investigation. With clashing personalities, an ever-deepening mystery, and time running out, can they figure out what led to Raymond’s death?
Going into this film, I didn’t really have any expectations outside of hoping the plot would have a similar vibe to the first film. And while this film is still somewhat enjoyable, I was severely let down. Everything that made the original unique was stripped away in favour of making a buddy cop film with two brothers. Instead of following money trails and dealing with corporate espionage, the film instead focuses on a child trafficking ring and an amnesiac assassin. It’s not terrible, but it now just feels like Generic Action Film 27, which is a shame because I really liked how the first film differentiated itself with the main character being a little OCD with numbers. It added an interesting dynamic to an otherwise okay story, and with that aspect now gone, I was left underwhelmed by the time the credits rolled.
While I was let down by the story, at least I enjoyed the main duo. Ben Affleck returns as Christian Wolff, and while I did find his character funny at some points (to the detriment of his character in others), the general vibe from the first film remained. In the few serious moments in the film, Wolff is very entertaining to watch, with one scene in particular towards the beginning giving me hope that the rest of the film would match that tone. Unfortunately, that was not the case, but Affleck was able to make those small moments work. Jon Bernthal as Braxton, though, was the star of the film. Where the comedy felt cringeworthy from Wolff, Braxton was effortlessly funny. Bernthal is perfect as Braxton, and the way he interacted with his brother and dealt with his enemies was entertaining. I think if they toned down the comedy a little bit, both brothers would’ve shone brighter.
I can’t give the same praise to the rest of the cast because, outside of Raymond and Medina, I barely remember anyone else. Raymond is only in the opening sequence, but J. K. Simmons is still phenomenal. Cynthia Addai-Robinson does decently as Medina, but her character takes a back seat after the halfway point, and she doesn’t do much from then on besides being attacked. I would’ve loved to see her character given more to do, but I understand they wanted to focus on the brothers instead.
The villains, though, are laughably cliché. It’s the most generic evil guy does evil thing, so good guys need to stop him. There’s nothing special about them or their motivations. The only interesting part about them is how they relate to the assassin Anais, but even that feels half-baked. Daniella Pineda does ok with what she’s given, but it’s not enough. If it weren’t for the chemistry between Affleck and Bernthal keeping me engaged, I would’ve mentally checked out so many times (and I still did once or twice).
The Accountant 2 ramps up the action compared to its predecessor. While the first had a handful of shootouts, the sequel has multiple gunfights and even concludes with a massive battle in the middle of a desert. But instead of getting hyped for these sequences, I was bored, like I had already seen these types of action set pieces a million times before. It’s because I had. They’re well put together, but they didn’t bring anything new. The only time I was engaged in the action was the hand-to-hand fight between Wolff and a factory worker who was helping the villain. It was visceral, and I loved how it was shot, with Wolff remaining emotionless throughout the entire encounter. I wish the rest of the action had that same style, but alas, it did not.
All of this added action, while making things a lot faster paced, came at the cost of the slower moments that I enjoyed in the original. There are no scenes of Wolff going over numbers or finding patterns in corporate spending, or avoiding the cops. Those scenes were a great source of tension that is nowhere to be found here. That’s probably the film’s biggest misstep; there was no tension. I never feared that one of the main characters was going to die, and I wasn’t invested enough in the overall plot to care what the bad guys were doing. The film needed to have those quieter moments outside of the brother bonding time to make me care, but it just didn’t.
The Accountant 2 is a serviceable action film. The relationship between the brothers is great, with Affleck and Bernthal giving strong performances, but the rest of the film just doesn’t reach that level. It doesn’t do anything bad, as it is well put together with action set pieces that are good, just nothing special. Hopefully, with a third film already announced to be happening, they can go back to what made the first such a uniquely enjoyable experience.
Have you seen The Accountant 2? What did you think? Did you prefer the original? Let us know in the comments where we can talk about how great Jon Bernthal is.
