The Accountant 2 (2025) * *

 

Directed by:  Gavin O'Connor

Starring:  Ben Affleck, Jon Bernthal, JK Simmons, Daniella Pineda, Cynthia Addai-Robinson

The reason The Accountant (2015) was successful was its mystery surrounding Christian Wolff (Affleck), the autistic accountant who infiltrates criminal organizations ostensibly to cook their books and winds up declaring war on them with help from federal agent Ray King (Simmons).  We see flashbacks to his upbringing by his strict military-officer father and in the end is reunited with his long-lost brother Braxton (Bernthal) while bringing down the client who tried to kill him and his co-worker he grew fond of. 

The Accountant unfolded like an enigma wrapped inside a riddle and was thrilling to watch.  The Accountant 2 no longer contains any surprises.  It is a buddy action picture which never needed to be made.  It's competently produced and Bernthal provides the most energy whenever he's on screen, but Affleck affects a distracting Irish/Puerto Rican accent as Christian Wolff.   He doesn't sound like himself.  

The plot:  A mysterious woman (Pineda) is killing off human traffickers and is tracked by the now-retired fed-turned-private-eye King to a dive bar where he is killed by the woman's targets.  He scrawls "Find the Accountant" on his forearm before dying and his replacement at the agency (Addai-Robinson) does indeed locate Christian and asks for his help.  Christian recruits his long-lost (again!) brother Braxton, whom we assume he hasn't seen since the last movie.  Braxton reluctantly helps Christian, mostly because it gives him another chance to be close to his brother.  They are an effective action team, but aside from buddy movie cliches, there isn't much here that stands out.

There are callbacks to the first film, including the New England institute where Christian's non-verbal, but brilliant assistant can provide any information he needs at a moment's notice.  She now has a team of savants who can hack anything at any time.  The NSA and CIA have nothing on this group.  It's a pity the accountant of the title is the least interesting part about its sequel.