‘Nobody 2’ Movie Review: A Less-Inspired Throwaway Sequel
Photo from Universal Pictures
From Jeremy Kibler
When audiences weren’t quite back to theaters yet in 2021, Nobody was a like a shot in the arm with an against-type Bob Odenkirk kicking ass and taking names. Lean, brutally violent, and wickedly funny, it was more than just a Mad Libs version of John Wick (suburban dad + retired assassin), being made with some wit and inspiration. Whereas that first film was a pleasant surprise and the ultimate Dad Movie™, Nobody 2 is the obligatory, less-inspired throwaway sequel. It should be a lark that slightly ups the ante, but it’s closer to being a nothing burger that rests on its laurels.
Hutch Mansell (Odenkirk) has become a workaholic dad cliché, always at the office (read: taking hit jobs to pay off his debts to the Russian mob), always missing dinner, and always missing his son’s hockey games. His wife, Becca (Connie Nielsen), is getting tired of this new normal, but as summer break is almost over, Hutch decides to take the family (and Grandpa, played by Christopher Lloyd) to his old childhood vacation spot, the resort town of Plummerville, complete with Wild Bill’s Majestic Midway and Waterpark. He wants to make it up to Becca and the kids, but once daughter Sammy (Paisley Cadorath) and son Brady (Gage Munroe) have an encounter with some less-than-welcoming locals, the shady sheriff (Colin Hanks) and mayor (John Ortiz, always compelling) learn the hard way that Hutch is not just some mild-mannered family man. Just wait until the real mastermind, unhinged drug and bootlegging boss Lendina (Sharon Stone), hears about it all.
Nobody was like the more crowd-pleasing, kick-ass version of David Cronenberg’s A History of Violence. Nobody 2 was welcome to lean even more into being a National Lampoon’s Vacation riff with more bone-crunching, punched-out teeth, and a severed finger, but it’s just more of the same and simultaneously less of the same. Bob Odenbirk is still very likable, even when Hutch reaches his breaking point and delivers the pain when there’s injustice. Hutch’s constant attempts to “de-escalate” a situation and pleas to get “a fucking break” can be amusing and cathartic for a while. Everything else just reeks of a rehash with a different location, different bad guys, and very little of the novelty that made the first film so much fun.
Indonesian director Timo Tjahjanto, taking over for Ilya Naishuller, and writers Derek Kolstad and Aaron Rabin don’t really have a story here that needed to be told. It very much helps that most of the action sequences are still well-staged, like a one-on-four fight aboard a tourist duck boat (where the tour guide and two patrons are oblivious to the mayhem behind them), even if none of them are as memorable as the first time. The whole waterpark-vacation setting isn’t much more than window dressing, aside from a few violent pleasures on the carnival side of the park and a waterslide kill. RZA also returns for one terrific katana-slicing moment as Hutch’s Zen-like brother, while Christopher Lloyd (who was such a great surprise to see last time) just gets sidelined too often, playing the grandpa shtick in summer gear and later shooting a machine gun.
The one delicious jolt of unpredictability comes from Sharon Stone chewing scenery like it’s her last supper as an icy, ruthless super-villain. Stone has such an electric, commanding presence, and there’s no way she’s not relishing every unsubtle minute, however, one wishes there was more of Lendina opposite Hutch. It’s not the same as giving a great performance, but Stone definitely understood the assignment, strutting around with slicked-back hair and wearing designer suits while threatening everyone when she isn’t petting her spike-collared Frenchie.
Armed with perhaps too much lame comedy and too much noticeably sloppy ADR, Nobody 2 is just never as cute or as slick as it wants to be. As the first Nobody actually made good on some ironic music cues (which was becoming a rather stale choice to bring personality to action comedies), this one’s use of Céline Dion’s “The Power of Love” just falls flat. Like Clark Griswold with a heavy fist, Hutch keeps saying he wants to make memories with his family, but nobody will remember this brief, middle-of-the-road, occasionally diverting sequel by the time summer ends.
Rating: 2/5
Nobody 2 hits theaters on August 15, 2025.
