I suffer from what I call an Afflecktion: a love for Ben Affleck that’s also just a little apologetic, as if I know there are classier actors out there—Cillian Murphy, Adam Driver, Josh O’Connor—who are of course all great, but who just don’t ring the same bell. Affleck has one of those “Sure, why not?” faces. Play an eccentric sneaker mogul, an alcoholic construction worker who finds redemption coaching high school basketball, a tortured actor who played Superman on TV but longed for meatier rules? How about the most somber, miserable Batman ever? Sure, sure, sure, and sure: why not try it all? In 2016 Affleck accepted, probably with pleasure, the challenge of playing a neurodiverse hit man who lives out of a weapon-filled Airstream trailer and has trouble forging meaningful relationships with other humans. The Accountant—directed by Gavin O’Connor and written by Bill Dubuque—was a surprise hit. For all kinds of reasons, including a pandemic, it has taken nine years to get a sequel, but at last, The Accountant 2 is here; written and directed by the same duo, it builds on every promise of the first movie, even as it’s also—mostly—jauntier, looser, more entertaining. Affleck once again plays a guy more comfortable with infinitely complex mathematical equations (and firing automatic weapons) than he is with talking to a beautiful woman in a bar. Because—sure, why not?
The story begins reasonably enough before dissolving into something almost unapologetically unfollowable. Ray King (J.K. Simmons, returning from the first film, albeit briefly), having retired from his job as Treasury Director and now moonlighting as a private detective, meets with a mysterious, affectless young woman, Anaïs (Daniella Pineda), in a cheerfully seedy Los Angeles bar. He shows her a picture of a small family from El Salvador, father, son, and mother, imploring her to find them. She has no idea what he’s asking her to do, or why; she looks at him blankly as…
