Hutch Mansell, that prototypical family man with a secret assassin past, has been punching, exploding, shooting, and makeshift-weaponing his way through the bad guys for a long time now. He’s staying out late, missing dinner, coming home with bruises and scabs galore, and is losing touch with his wife and teenage kids. And because of how the last film ended with a bunch of gangster money burned up, Hutch can’t quit his job until he’s paid it all back. What to do but take a family vacation to the one place in the world he was happy as a child: Plummerville, home of the world’s oldest water park, and carnival rides and arcade games besides.
Naturally, because of Hutch’s anger management issues, and because Nobody 2 is a satirical action movie and not a happy-go-lucky vacation film, things don’t quite go as planned. Not by a long shot. Bob Odenkirk plays Hutch’s everyman with a hyperactive violent streak (but reserved only for bad people) to the hilt. He’s very good at it, and a pleasure to watch onscreen as he improvises his way though hordes of minions who are armed with assault rifles and machetes. Think The Equalizer or John Wick (and sharing screenwriter Derek Kolstad with the latter), but much more chaotic and much less self-serious.
Returning from the first movie in a much smaller role is RZA of the Wu-Tang Clan as Hutch’s adoptive brother Harry, who’s a fan of samurai swords, and a larger role this time for Hutch’s elderly and addled ex-assassin dad David, played by Christopher Lloyd at his loony best. Hutch’s wife Becca (Connie Nielsen), who knows about Hutch’s double life—and, in fact, met him during his assassin days—is given a bit more to do in the sequel as her patience wears thin at Hutch’s many late nights and broken promises. The kids, too, are important to the plot, especially the older brother Brady (Gage Munroe), a dead ringer for a young Justin Bieber and smooth enough with the ladies that it gets him instantly into trouble.
I like that Hutch and Becca are constantly worried about passing along Hutch’s incredible propensity for punchy and shooty to his children, which his own father passed along to him and his brother. “Do what I say, not what I do” is clearly not working in this family’s case. Parents worrying about breaking the cycle is a universal concern and doesn’t just apply to assassins.
Nobody 2 attempts to answer the question of whether it’s possible to hold together a family when your day job involves racking up an enormous body count of henchpeople. You know, that old chestnut. It helps to listen to old love songs while in the car: Spiral Starecase’s “More Today Than Yesterday” is used diegetically throughout the film to great effect. The song’s message of enduring love is one that the family tries very hard to take to heart, even as explosions and shots ring out all around them.
