The Most Brutal Action Sequel Of The Year Just Manages To Surpass The Original

The action comedy Nobody 2 — in which Bob Odenkirk reprises his role as a family man with violent secrets — improves on its predecessor, but that’s a low bar to clear. Incoming director Timo Tjahjanto adds flair to the action scenes, which have a bouncier and more comedic verve than Ilya Naishuller’s Nobody, while taking some amusing character-centric swerves. It’s fun, until it isn’t. The longer the sequel goes on, the more it comes apart, thanks to physical and emotional setups that aren’t adequately paid off, and a tale of fatherhood left in suspended animation.

Penned by Nobody scribe (and John Wick creator) Derek Kolstad, along with co-writer Aaron Rabin, Tjahjanto’s sequel spends the first half hour of its scant 90 minutes re-treading familiar ground, albeit with a purpose. Like the first entry, Nobody 2 opens in medias res, during the police interrogation of bruised and bloodied Hutch Mansell (Odenkirk), priming us to expect brutality once again. This time, there’s a dog present for his questioning. It’s another distinctly Wick-like flourish, in a series that already feels like an alternate-take on the material — What if Keanu Reeves’ Baba Yaga had a family? — but don’t expect the movie to fulfill its canine promise.

Rather than being in a markedly different place in life, Hutch still has trouble connecting with his wife Becca (Connie Nielsen) and his teenage son Brady (Gage Munroe), though his adolescent daughter Sammy (Paisley Cadorath) is just naive enough to not notice his emotional absence. However, where the first film framed this distance as the product of suppressed secrets, Nobody 2 finds Hutch paying off his eight-figure debt by returning to work as an underground contract killer, albeit one who can’t find the right work-life balance — which Tjahjanto and editor hammer home in the form of a slick domestic montage.

Before his family life is irreparably damaged, Hutch plans a vacation to a rundown Wisconsin waterpark he remembers from his childhood, in an attempt to make new memories with his wife, his kids, and his former-FBI agent father David (Christopher Lloyd), who tags along, but does little for most of the film. However, when Brady gets into a scuffle at a local arcade, Hutch’s uncontrollable temper comes roaring back, causing an escalating series of grievances, and drawing the ire of everyone from the town Sheriff (Colin Hanks), to a violent businessman (John Ortiz), to a crazed drug kingpin (Sharon Stone).

A remarkable semblance of soul emerges some 30 minutes into the movie’s hour-and-a-half runtime, when it becomes clear that the movie’s work-life metaphor isn’t really a metaphor at all. Rather, Nobody 2 is just a heightened and cartoonishly violent depiction of men trying desperately to break cycles of anger, while being restrained by both financial and emotional debts. This leads to not only quiet dramatic moments (especially between Hutch and Brady), but some rip-roaring action-comedy too, when goons are sent to attack Hutch and his family, and he has to not only keep them in the dark so they keep having fun, but fights reluctantly, rather than willfully. This is perhaps the movie’s biggest departure from its predecessor, as Tjahjanto’s approach trades its moroseness for violent slapstick, with moments like Hutch yelling at a henchman to “USE [HIS] WORDS” mid knife-fight.

Unfortunately, this hilarious and meaningful central story — of a man being roped into action scenes as he tries to leave behind his violent ways — is very quickly shoved into the background, in favor of a more traditional man-on-a-mission saga. However, the film’s family-centric nature keeps rearing its head in awkward ways, peeking through the corners of the screen and practically begging the camera to acknowledge it. The back half of Nobody 2 suffers from some awkward assemblage, as though numerous reshoots and ADR had been used to paper over enormous gaps in the plot, the emotions, and even several half-formed jokes. At one point, it seems like Becca’s past might soon be of vital importance as she takes on a greater role in the action, but if this was ever planned or shot, it’s curiously missing. (There were also reports of Chris Pine and McKenna Grace appearing in the film, though if there was any truth to them, something appears to have changed).

Similarly, for a tale of fathers and sons — and about family at large — the plot seems intent on scattering its characters to the wind, and it seldom brings them back together for any catharsis or reconciliation, leaving a gaping hole. Its water park-set finale plays out more like connective tissue rather than the main event, despite some inventive, Home Alone-style booby traps. The RZA shows up once again, for an extended cameo as Hutch’s brother Harry, and although the Wu Tang Clan frontman is allowed to be far more “RZA” this time (which is to say: far more influenced by classic martial arts cinema), the film doesn’t take any advantage of his or David’s family ties to Hutch when crafting its action or its story. You could swap them out for hired guns, and little would change.

Whenever a major action scene reaches its fiery denouement, the result is always adequately framed (and backed by a semi-winking soundtrack choice), but it lacks the kind of cheer-out-loud emotional context that would’ve made Nobody 2 feel like a bonkers family saga. Instead, it ends up just another John Wick clone, where a family happens to be present — usually just off-screen — and the ideas are all far better in concept than in execution.

Nobody 2 opens in theaters August 15.