Nobody 2 (2025) * * *

Directed by:  Timo Tjahjanto

Starring: Bob Odenkirk, Connie Nielsen, Christopher Lloyd, Sharon Stone, Colin Hanks, John Ortiz, RZA

I was prepared to write off Nobody 2 as an uninspired sequel which nobody (no pun intended) asked for.  I'm glad I was wrong.  Nobody 2 proved that Hutch Mansell (Odenkirk) still had some energy left in the tank for this sequel, which is pure action and more proof that Hutch is not a guy to mess with despite outward appearances.

Picking up from where the surprise 2021 hit Nobody left off, Hutch has returned to a life of black ops missions to pay off a debt to a Russian mobster.  If I recall correctly, he torched this man's money in the first film and it proves the rule that you don't burn money, which Hutch also ignores in Nobody 2.  Following a particularly daunting mission, Hutch takes his family on a much-promised vacation to a lakeside resort Hutch visited often as a kid.  Things don't stay peaceful or relaxing for long, as Hutch soon finds himself in the middle of a crime ring run by the mysterious and cruel Lendina (Stone), who has affection for her dog and nothing else and rules the town ruthlessly.  She'll kill cheating gamblers right at the blackjack table, one-upping Robert DeNiro in Casino (also starring Stone) who merely broke a cheater's hand with a hammer.

Hutch disrupts operations and brings in his brother Harry (RZA) and his retired father (Lloyd) to help destroy Lendina.  One thing about Hutch, like in the first movie, is that he can take a licking and keep on ticking.  In Nobody, there was humor in learning that an ordinary schmoe like Hutch is actually a trained John Wick-style assassin.  In Nobody 2, we come to accept that Hutch will eventually come for you if you cross him, and the results are rarely pretty.   Nobody 2 isn't original nor does it expound upon the genre, but it works on its own merits.