The Accountant Sequel Seems To Be Happening With Ben Affleck And Jon Bernthal Returning
"The Accountant," a wildly silly movie that's also surprisingly fun, is getting a sequel. This isn't exactly new news – the sequel was first announced back in 2017. However, last year we got word that the sequel might not actually happen, but a TV show spin-off was a possibility. Now, it looks like the sequel is happening after all! During a recent podcast appearance, "Accountant" director Gavin O'Connor revealed the deal for the sequel was just finalized, and that stars Ben Affleck and Jon Bernthal were both likely to return.
The Accoun2ant
Released in 2016, "The Accountant" starred Ben Affleck as Christian Wolff, a man with autism who is very good at both accounting and murdering people. That's right: Christian is an accountant by day, assassin by night. The film finds him mixed up in a comically convoluted story with about ten different subplots. And you know what? The movie was fun. I won't sit here and tell you "The Accountant" was a legitimately great movie, because it wasn't. But it was fairly entertaining for what it was, and it was also a surprise hit, hauling in $155.2 million on a $44 million budget.
That's the type of haul that gets studios thinking "sequel," and sure enough, in 2017 word broke that Warner Bros. was developing "The Accountant 2," or "The Accoun2ant," as I would call it if I were running Warner Bros. But by 2020, the story had changed. Director Gavin O'Connor revealed that a sequel might not be happening, but a TV show was a possibility:
"We've talked about it. There seems to be a debate whether or not to do a TV series version of it. The scriptwriter [Bill Dubuque] has become quite successful and busy, so he's off doing his thing. And somebody said to me, 'Well if we could find a script that we could retrofit and make into a sequel'... But that's sort of tricky because the personality of the character is so specific, that doesn't really work to just say, 'Well, we used to call this script Action Movie Shootout, and now we're going to call it The Accountant 2."
But now it seems things have changed yet again! Appearing on the ReelBlend podcast, O'Connor dropped the news that the deal for "The Accountant 2" was complete. "We are doing an 'Accountant' sequel," O'Connor said. "We literally just closed that deal. We're doing 'The Accountant' again." O'Connor added that he wanted to do not just one sequel but two, making a full "Accountant" trilogyL
"So, I've always wanted to do three because what, the second one's going to be more with — we're going to integrate his brother into the story. So there'll be more screen time for [Jon] Bernthal in the second one. And then the third movie's going to be, I call it, 'Rain Man on steroids.' The third movie is going to be the two brothers, this odd couple. The third one is going be a buddy picture."
You know what? I hope this happens. If the sequel ends up being as goofy yet entertaining as the first, I'm sure it'll be a good time at the movies. Bring on "The Accoun2ant"!