I Can’t Stop Laughing at This Plot Twist

Suspension of disbelief is a tricky factor in movies and television, and it’s easy to sit on the sidelines and point to something that isn’t quite factually correct, accurate, or realistic. The bottom line will always be the same: it’s a movie (or show). Chances are, it was created by people who specialize in making those things, not people who are experts in whatever topics the movie’s plot covers. We give a bit of grace when we sit down to watch a film like The Accountant 2, because we know that it’s not actually about a super genius and his team that can perfectly calculate in their heads what a pizza place’s cost of goods are against their declared earnings (this scene happens, and it’s silly, but it’s also fun).

Sometimes, though, a line is crossed that forces audiences out of the reality of the movie. In the case of The Accountant 2, which stars Ben Affleck alongside Jon Bernthal, it’s a combination of a plot device in conjunction with the tone of the film. This is how the music supports or contrasts with the reveal. The wrong choices take you into parody territory. They bring out the “bad laugh.”

Why That Twist in ‘The Accountant 2’ Was So Funny

The Accountant 2

1.5
/5

Release Date

April 25, 2025

Runtime

124 minutes

Director

Gavin O’Connor

Writers

Bill Dubuque

Producers

Ben Affleck, Kevin Halloran, Matt Damon, Jamie Patricof, Lynette Howell Taylor, Scott LaStaiti, Michael Joe, Mark Williams, Alison Winter

Read Our Review

The plot of The Accountant 2 is built around a missing person case that led to a string of crimes and murders. It also involves a family’s border crossing and a series of injustices they suffered on their journey. This all works until we are told, in a series of dramatic flashbacks during the big reveal section of the film, that a super assassin is one of the missing persons. Things start to get weirder. Apparently, a head injury led to memory loss and the development of super-chess-playing abilities, which led to violent tendencies, which led to a formerly regular mom becoming an assassin nobody can take down.

To make matters worse, she also had to have reconstructive surgery that made her look like a supermodel/actress with no evidence of facial reconstruction at all. It’s just too much of an exposition dump, happening with melodramatic music, without any of it fitting into any recognizable set of rules for our world. The only way the movie doesn’t lose audiences here is if they don’t care or aren’t paying attention until the next fight scene, which is entirely possible.

It’s always a shame when a movie sets up a plot that seems complex and interesting and wraps it up haphazardly. It cheats us, especially when there are so many genius-type characters unraveling the various threads to get answers. It’s just one big silly reveal so we can get to the gunfights.

Related

‘The Accountant 2’ Stars Ben Affleck, Jon Bernthal, and More Discuss the Differences of the Sequel

Ben Affleck, Jon Bernthal, Daniella Pineda, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, and director Gavin O’Connor discuss ‘The Accountant 2’ in this press conference.

What makes certain leaps of faith too much for an audience to accept? It’s tricky. For some audience members, surely this sequence won’t be an issue. Maybe it’ll even play as a solid reveal. I suspect that for most it will not, however. In a big twist or reveal that works, like the ending of The Usual Suspects, all the pieces fit together perfectly. The breadcrumbs have been left out over time, and nothing about the reveal leaves us asking questions. It fits.

The hard part is when the audience could never have pieced it together, because there is a leap too far. For example, facial reconstructive surgery that leaves no scars. Or a woman who goes from being a chess ace in a hospital to being an unstoppable, trained killer. These things jump just a bit too far. Maybe one or the other would be fine, but both, at the same time, take us out of it completely. The Accountant 2 is in theaters now.

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