Nobody 2 (2025)

Everybody loves a good vacation, right? From the office worker to the corporate mogul, the banker to the academic. But what about assassins? Yes, assassins! From writers Derek Kolstad and Aaron Rabin, and director Tomo Tjahjanto, Nobody 2 kicks off by reintroducing us to the overworked assassin Hutch Mansell (Bob Odenkirk). On the surface Hutch seems like your typical overwhelmed and overworked husband and father of two teens. Up too early, home too late, he can’t seem to balance his hectic life at all or to prioritize his family enough. This guy can’t even get home for dinner on time! But as the opening sequences unfolds and we follow him “on the job” it becomes crystal clear that Hutch is no ordinary working man. He’s some kind of spy who moves about a lethal underworld, routinely dispatched to kill people. But even professional killers need time off, no?

That’s the main premise of Nobody 2 that reunites Odenkirk with Connie Nielsen who resumes the role of Hutch’s frustrated and perpetually disappointed wife Becca Mansell. Hutch’s earnest proposal to make things right with the family he is perpetually disappointing, is to take them on vacation. And not just any vacation, but back to the place where he once made unforgettable childhood memories alongside his African America brother Harry Mansell (RZA) and his off kilter, military veteran white father David Mansell (Christopher Llyod).

Although it takes some convincing, once Hutch gets the wife, teenage kids Sammy (Paisley Cadorath) and Brady (Gage Munroe), and dad onboard, it’s off to Wild Bill’s Majestic Midway and Waterpark, a spectacularly outdated and rundown theme park that is clearly a shell of its former glory. But as you might guess, in this film that is part dark comedy, part action movie, things do not go as the planned and the dilapidated park soon becomes the setting of an obscene array of spectacular violence as the corrupt local police officer, Sheriff Abel (Colin Hanks), and drug kingpin Wyatt Martin (John Ortiz), do the bidding of a diabolic and eccentric queenpin Lendina (Sharon Stone).

First brought to their attention by what should have been a minor beef between Max Martin (Lucius Hoyos), Wyatt’s son, and Brady, Abel, Martin, and Lendina all come to see Hutch and his family as obstacles to their otherwise efficient drug dealing enterprise. And obstacles need to be dealt with. This is the premise for the unfolding of the action sequences in which Hutch and his very capable wife (she ends up saving his life) must defend and protect their family from the depraved and violent criminals. As you might guess, Wild Bill’s theme park becomes the backdrop for most of the gun-fuelled showdown between the corrupt police and Lendina, and Hutch, his brother, father, wife and Wyatt (who switches sides after the sheriff almost kidnaps and kills his son).

Nobody 2 is not for everyone. The violence is graphic and the humour is dark. But if you love films in the style of the John Wick or Bad Boys franchises, pull up a chair and get comfortable. Odenkirk’s everyman assassin is a welcome departure from the younger, fitter, brawn over brains, action heroes that typically dominate the genre. Nielsen’s intelligent, beautiful, and blessedly age-appropriate wife is an unexpected departure from the endless array of vapid, too skinny, too-young female sidekicks that are normally cast in this genre.  Plus, Hutch has to get the job done while worrying about school drop-offs, dinner times, not embarrassing his teenage kids, and pleasing the wife. Definitely another level of difficulty!