The Accountant 2 plus Short Takes on a cluster of other cinematic topics
Reviews and Comments by Ken Burke
I invite you to join me on a regular basis to see how my responses to current cinematic offerings compare to the critical establishment, which I’ll refer to as either the CCAL (Collective Critics at Large) if they’re supportive or the OCCU (Often Cranky Critics Universe) when they go negative. However, due to COVID concerns I’m mostly addressing streaming options with limited visits to theaters, where I don’t think I’ve missed much anyway, but better options are on the horizon. (Note: Anything in bold blue below [some may look near purple] is a link to something more in the review.)
Here’s the trailer:
(Use the full screen button in the image’s lower right to enlarge its size;
activate the same button or use “esc” keyboard key to return to normal.)
If you can abide plot spoilers read on, but this blog’s intended for those who’ve seen the film or want to save some $ (as well as recognizing those readers like me who just aren’t that tech-savvy). To help any of you who want to learn more details yet avoid these all-important plot-reveals I’ll identify any give-away sentences/sentence-clusters with colors plus arrows:
⇒The first and last words will be noted with arrows and red.⇐ OK, now continue on if you prefer.
WHAT HAPPENS: (If you haven’t seen The Accountant [O’ Connor, 2016] I’ll encourage you to look at this short video [3:59] where you’ll see some characters who carry over to this sequel, although there are few significant plot points brought in from the original so if you don’t want to know about Spoilers in the older one you might want to watch the whole thing first [as I did, where Amazon Prime Video subscribers can get it for free, although it also seems to be rentable from Amazon for $3.99]. In that earlier movie we meet Christian Wolff [Ben Affleck], a high-functioning autistic, also a math savant [martial arts master too, due to his Dad’s insistence when he was a kid] who does money laundering and theft uncovering for various criminal organizations; he’s also being pursued by U.S. Treasury honcho Ray King [J.K. Simmons] and his assistant Marybeth Medina [Cynthia Addai-Robinson], which leads to lots of killings and the re-appearance of Wolff’s brother, Braxton [Jon Bernthal] before this plot finally wraps up.) In the sequel, King is semi-retired (Medina now has his official government job), meets with mysterious assassin Anaïs (Daniella Pineda), seeking her help in locating a missing Salvadorian family (sounds like something from our current headlines, yet this story was filmed before Trump’s return to the ‘throne”), but he’s suddenly killed as he leaves their meeting, with a message for Medina, “find the accountant,” written in ink on his arm.
She manages to locate Wolff, asks his help in finding this family, he agrees, tracks them to L.A. Then we find that Cobb (Grant Harvey), working for Burke (Robert Morgan)—no relation, I hope—is the killer tasked with obliterating (in this context, unlike possibilities about Iran, an acceptable word) both King and Anaïs. Wolff recruits brother Braxton to help him, even as Medina discovers Anaïs is actually the mother, Edith Sanchez, of the missing Salvadorian family from one of King’s photos. We also learn she was a captive of Burke’s, lost her memories, learned combat skills, escaped, finds out later Burke killed her husband in Juarez. ⇒More learning occurs as the Wolff brothers discover Anaïs’ autistic son, Alberto (Yael Ocasio), is in a Juarez prison camp with other kids of trafficking victims, separated from their parents (again, sound familiar?) As events wrap up in violent fashion the Wolffs manage to save these kids from being buried alive, killing their captors—including Cobb—in the process, while Anaïs learns Burke’s whereabouts in Prague so she can kill him, Alberto’s welcomed into an autistic facility in NH, while the Wolff brothers simply head off on a camping trip.⇐
SO WHAT? Last week when I wrote about Eephus I noted that I kept the comments short (for me, not normal humans) as I had several other obligations to take care of as well as not having a lot to say about that film because its simple, touching, melancholy presentation (all 4 stars worth) is something you need to see rather than elaborately read about to fully appreciate. Well, this week’s posting will be short also, but because I really don’t think it deserves all that much attention. Sometimes my COVID-resurgence-based avoidance of what’s currently playing in theaters, leaving me dependent on what may be available on streaming, pays off (as with Eephus and a bunch of 3½ stars-cinematic encounters in the weeks before that), but other times I get interested enough in the praise offered for something like The Accountant 2 (which, oddly enough, has some commentary claiming comic aspects, which I found to be essentially nonexistent), so I make that my review choice for the weekend only to discover there’s little going on there for me to care that much about.
It’s mildly interesting to watch Medina take over the agency formerly headed by King, it’s a bit of a surprise to learn Anaïs’ true identity, and it is somewhat fascinating to see how effective the Wolff brothers are in decimating much larger opposing forces, but the longer The Accountant 2 pursued its goals, the more I was convinced that the previous tale of Christian Wolff was more than enough of this material—which leaves me stunned O’Connor’s already in development for a third episode, presumably again with Affleck and Bernthal, but at least Anna Kendrick’s supposed to reprise her role from the original movie also. Obviously, the critical establishment is considerably more enthralled with The Accountant 2 than I am, so you might want to read some of their reviews in making a decision about seeing it for yourself, but I just found it as an ongoing set of excuses for additional bloodshed fueled by variations on motives for revenge (my wife, Nina—no shrinking violet—finally gave up during the climactic battle scene, having seen more than enough killing by then).
BOTTOM LINE FINAL COMMENTS: So, noting the CCAL, you’ll find they’re basically in support of The Accountant 2 (sometimes written as The Accountant2) with the Rotten Tomatoes positive reviews at 77% (53% for the earlier one), the Metacritic average score at a notably-lower 58% (51% back in 2016) leaving me at odds with all of them concerning both movies, as I’d probably give #1 my 3½ stars, based on the intriguing aspects of its plot (works better for me in balancing out the gore plus the presence of Ms. Kendrick and the appearance of a Jackson Pollock painting [he's one of my favorite artists]), leaving me with 70% approval for The Accountant, only 50% for this new one. To get some sense of what separates me from them here’s Alan Ng of Film Threat in support: “The Accountant 2 is a pleasant surprise. It scratches that crime procedural itch, along with paramilitary-style gunplay, for a winning combination. Affleck and Bernthal need to keep making movies together. Better yet, Jon Bernthal needs to shed his underrated status and become a real movie star.” Still, there are others more in league with my sour response, such as Brian Tallerico of RogerEbert.com: “The truth is that pacing often trumps realism, and ‘The Accountant 2’ just doesn’t build enough momentum. I think one of the reasons for that is that O’Connor is far more interested in the brother buddy comedy [?] than the human trafficking action film, and never quite figures out how to blend the two. The film about two very different brothers who try to bridge the chasm of personality between them? Almost completely works. Everything else? Total hokum. Merging the two becomes an assignment too difficult for even The Accountant to decipher.” Fierce!
It opened in domestic (U.S.-Canada) theaters on April 23, 2025, has grossed $65.5 million since then (globally, $102.1 million), but now your best option is streaming where Amazon Prime Video subscribers can see it for free (or sign up for a month for $8.99) if you so choose to explore it. Alternately, I’d recommend listening (maybe more than once ... or even twice) to my usual ending element of a Musical Metaphor, this one addressing the monetary impetus for all of the troubles that occur in these movies, “Money” by Pink Floyd (on their famous 1973 album The Dark Side of the Moon), found here at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kjgwjh4H7wg&list=RDKjgwjh4H7wg& start_radio=1, a rare 2005 live performance by the original quartet (and a couple of other supportive musicians) where we join in with these movies’ underlying premises of “Money, it’s a crime / Share it fairly, but don’t take a slice of my pie” and "Money, so they say / Is the root of all evil today.” For me, you can keep the Pink Floyd tunes playing all night while The Accountant 2 quietly fades away.
SHORT TAKES
Related Links Which You Might Find Interesting:
Some options: (1) What's new on Netflix in July 2025; (2) What's new on Amazon Prime Video in July 2025; (3) What's new on Hulu in July 2025; (4) What's new on Disney+ in July 2025; (5) What's new on Max in July 2025; (6) New York Times 100 Best Movies of the 21st Century (so far, of course [I’d put their #2 as my #1; the rest of the list is too long to deal with right now, but within this fabulous collection a quick skim of the titles tells me I’d rank some of them higher than they did]).
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