People like Hutch Mansell (Bob Odenkirk) never retire. They choose violence early in their life, and then violence continues to choose them. In Ilya Naishuller's Nobody, Hutch (initially) tried to suppress his violent instincts so that he could be a good father, a good husband, but, unsurprisingly, he succumbed to them inside a bus. In Timo Tjahjanto's Nobody 2, Hutch no longer subdues his primal nature. He kicks, stabs, and shoots his opponents with a spring in his step and a gleeful smile, and with blood on his fingers, he texts his wife, Becca (Connie Nielsen), that he will be late for dinner. Sure, Hutch picks up assignments for The Barber (Colin Salmon) to pay off the debt he owes after destroying a Russian obshchak. But it's also quite clear that Hutch enjoys doing these brutal, bloody assignments. There is a twisted ecstasy in him when he slices bad guys like a butcher — a freedom he can't find elsewhere. Hutch gets so involved with his work that he forgets to be a father, a husband. Becca feels lonely without her husband, and the kids — Brady (Gage Munroe) and Sammy (Paisley Cadorath) — get so detached from their father that they barely acknowledge his presence. Like the bodies of his victims, Hutch's family life seems to be falling apart.
To rejuvenate his personal life and himself, Hutch plans a family trip to Plummerville, whose main attraction is apparently a water park. What about all those familial cracks? They almost disappear when the family goes on vacation. Brady, for a while, remains a bit distant from Hutch, but the gap between them is hastily closed once the bodies start piling up. Becca stops Hutch from committing acts of violence, and things threaten to turn sour between them when he refuses to listen to her advice and stirs up mayhem at an arcade store, but Nobody 2 has no interest in its drama. The sources of domestic conflicts are crushed whenever they reveal themselves. What's funny is that it's Becca who ultimately encourages Hutch to "wrap things up," and she herself brings a tranquilizer gun during the film's climactic battle. The implication seems to be that strong, macho men don't need to listen to their wives or be too concerned about their children. Pick that hammer, smash that head. The wife might complain or feel disgusted, but she will eventually come around on her own, and it's possible that she, despite her complaints, likes to see her man all fired up. So what if your child ends up being influenced by your violent behavior? He will still turn out to be a better person.
There's something offensive about such an implication. Then again, it's impossible to take Nobody 2 seriously or be influenced by anything it shows for 1 hour and 30 minutes. Writers Derek Kolstad and Aaron Rabin have no interest in seeing what they have written. The whole filmmaking team is just preoccupied with the slick execution of action sequences. Yet, the action barely registers. Tjahjanto tries to do something exciting with that scene where Hutch decides to rescue Wyatt's son, Max (Lucius Hoyos), from Abel (Colin Hanks) and other men (Max and Wyatt [John Ortiz] have a strained relationship, much like Brady and Hutch — a better film would have explored that parallel). The director also tries to infuse some fun into a duck boat fight and that face-off with Lendina (Sharon Stone) at the water park, but the choreography is little more than competent, earnest, and functional. They simply get the job done. Nothing in this film is as thrilling as what Tjahjanto achieved in The Big 4. Compared to the energy and inventiveness of that Indonesian action comedy, Nobody 2 comes across as tame and forgettable. It also suffers from the classic "villain problem": a villain who is hyped as the most ruthless in the world goes out with a whimper (think Galactus in the new Fantastic Four). Stone revels in the opportunity to act demented, but it's more show than substance. The actors who play Lendina's bodyguards — Rochelle Okoye and Megan Hui — look more intimidating than Lendina. Christopher Lloyd, as David Mansell, brings some nasty good cheer, but it's completely wasted thanks to Tjahjanto's single-minded obsession with action sequences. Nobody 2, in the end, is like its prequel: it keeps you occupied while it lasts, but fades from memory the moment you leave the theater.
Final Score- [4/10]
Reviewed by - Vikas Yadav
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Publisher at Midgard Times