Summary

Collider’s Steve Weintraub sits down with the team behind The Accountant 2 at SXSW 2025.

The Accountant 2 stars Ben Affleck and Jon Bernthal and sees math wiz Christian Wolff teaming up with his estranged brother, Drax.

Director Gavin O’Connor and co-stars Cynthia Addai-Robinson and Daniella Pineda discuss filming fight scenes, the potential for a trilogy, and The Rings of Power Season 3.

After a long eight years, Ben Affleck returns as Christian Wolff, the brilliant mathematics wiz who cooks the financial books for dangerous criminal organizations, in the upcoming sequel, The Accountant 2, which premiered at the 2025 South by Southwest Festival.
A solid box office hit in 2016, the crime thriller from director Gavin O’Connor emerged as somewhat of a cable classic, and its cult status has culminated in a sequel that finds our protagonist teaming up with his estranged and lethal brother, Drax (Jon Bernthal), to track down mysterious assassins. The film’s plot has mostly been kept under wraps, which is exactly what the filmmakers intended. Returning from the original film are Affleck, Bernthal, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, J.K. Simmons, and screenwriter Bill Dubuque, and brings on Jurassic World’s Daniella Pineda as Anaïs.
Celebrating the World Premiere for the film, O’Connor, Addai-Robinson, and Pineda stopped by the Collider Media Studio at the Cinema Center to chat with Steve Weintraub about The Accountant 2’s changeover from studios, filming fight scenes, a potential trilogy, and the future of Prime Video’s hit series The Rings of Power.
‘The Accountant 2’ Bends the Genre With a “Lot of Left Turns”

Director Gavin O’Connor also explains the nearly decade-long wait for the sequel.

COLLIDER: I’m here to talk with the fine folks behind The Accountant 2, which is a film I cannot wait to see. This is one of those films that, after it came out, I wanted a sequel, and it just took forever. What took so long?
GAVIN O’CONNOR: There were just obstacles in the way, and then we had COVID and then the strike and then Ben [Affleck] started a studio. We had to figure all that out. Once we worked out a plan and worked out a plan with Ben and Artists Equity, we found a great partner with Amazon, and we were off to the races.
A lot of people will remember that the first one was Warner Bros. Now you’re at a different studio. How does that work in terms of IP leaving the studio like that?
O’CONNOR: You could ask Warner Bros. that question. I think part of it had to do with a lot of regime changes going on. We had written the script at Warner Bros., and that was in 2018 when we finally got a deal to write a script. I think there were some regime issues going on over there. I think they may have wanted to [co-produce with another] studio like Artists Equity because Ben has a deal with his financiers. I don’t know if Warner Bros. wanted to do it, but I’m speculating.

Image by Photagonist

A lot of people who read Collider want to know the nerdy stuff of what exactly went on behind the scenes. Listen, the fact is, I’m just happy you got it made and that it premieres tonight. There’s a trailer out there, but I do like asking, what do you want to tell people about the sequel?
O’CONNOR: I had a couple of rules going in. I built the plot around a very specific subject matter, which is human trafficking, but then the challenge was, “How do I deal with such a heavy topic and make an entertaining and fun movie?” It was important to bring the two brothers together. It’s very much, in essence, a buddy movie with the two brothers. Chris is still searching for love and connection, and I very much was very intentionally bending the genre. There’ll be a lot of surprises. We made a lot of left turns.
DANIELLA PINEDA: I feel like Gavin always makes a movie that has heart. It’s an action film, but it’s not just an action film. People are going to laugh. People are going to cry. They’re definitely going to laugh. Even reading the script that was written by Bill [Dubuque], it was very apparent that this is so inclusive for everybody. I mean, it’s an R-rated film, so maybe not for the kiddies just yet, but for mom, dad, cousins, friends—there’s something in it for everybody.
CYNTHIA ADDAI-ROBINSON: I feel like the less you know going in, the better. It’s like the first one; there’s a bit of this puzzle in this mystery. This time around, you’re invested in these characters, and we’re seeing them so many years later, but the audience will still be following along as these clues unfold and unravel. You’ve got the trailer as a little bit of a tease, but just go in with an open mind and just let the movie whisk you away.

Image by Photagonist

How much time has passed from the first film to the sequel?
O’CONNOR: Eight years.
So you’re using real-time?
O’CONNOR: Oh yeah.
What do I have to do to get you to make more movies? Because I’m a fan of your work.
PINEDA: Yeah, Gavin. Why are you sleeping on that?
O’CONNOR: I guess if I lose my wife and children, then I’ll be able to make more movies. But I spend a lot of time with my family, and that’s the most important thing to me. When COVID happened, I took four years off to be a dad and husband.
Honestly, that’s awesome for your family and your kids. Not awesome for me, but I do respect putting family first.
O’CONNOR: I appreciate that. I’m going to make a couple in a row. As I told my wife, I’m going to go on a little bit of a run. I’ve got a few things stacked up, so I’m going to do a few in a row.
This is what I’m talking about. This is the news that I want.
There Will Be a “Meeting of the Minds” in the Sequel

Daniella Pineda teases her “dangerous lady” addition to the franchise.

Image by Photagonist

One of the things about the first film is that your character was against The Accountant, not understanding the relationship of J.K. Simmons’ character. How does she feel about him in the sequel? Is she willing to put up with him?
ADDAI-ROBINSON: I almost feel like you’re going to see all of that play out in the film. The audience, in real-time, is going to be along with Marybeth as she finally comes face to face with The Accountant because, really, in the first movie, I never got to work with Ben—I just got to stare lovingly at his photo a few times. I only met him a couple of times when we were doing the first one. I didn’t actually know what the story of the sequel was going to be. I remember reading the script and being like, “Oh, okay, we’re going to be working together. I’m very excited at this prospect.” It’s like two meetings of the minds, but it’s a very reluctant partnership, certainly on her part. I think it’s just a matter of different methodologies to try and achieve the same goal represented in the three of the characters.
O’CONNOR: We throw a bomb between the two of them when Brax shows up, and there’s a lot of conflict.
ADDAI-ROBINSON: The humor comes from the conflict.
O’CONNOR: You’re sort of the straight man in the movie.
ADDAI-ROBINSON: Which is probably true in my life.

Related

‘The Accountant 2’ Outpaces the Original With Impressive Rotten Tomatoes Score

The film stars Ben Affleck and Jon Bernthal.

I don’t actually know much about your character. What can you tell people?
PINEDA: She’s a dangerous lady. She’s incredibly intelligent.
O’CONNOR: She’s the mystery of the movie. Anaïs is the key in the ignition of the plot. Then there are a lot of landmines.
PINEDA: I’m a bit of a beating heart. I do feel that my character is a little mix, in a sense, of both Christian and Brax. I feel like there are little bits of those characters in mine. I can’t say too much.
I understand. It’s the dance we all play.
O’CONNOR: There are some twists in there and things that we don’t want to give away.
‘The Accountant 2’ Is a Tale of Two Brothers

“I’m much more interested in the emotional line.”

Image via Amazon MGM Studios

I completely get it. The characters are really good in the first film, but the action set pieces are pretty fucking awesome. Talk a little bit about what you wanted to accomplish in the sequel. How did you work with your stunt coordinator or second unit to pull off what you wanted to do?
O’CONNOR: There were two tracks running in this one because we had the action sequences with Anaïs and Marybeth, and then we had the action sequences with Chris and Brax, and the emotionality of the story of these two guys slowly coming together. Then, once we get into the third act, where they actually have to go execute a mission, they’re now glued together. In putting a microscope on the action, there’s the choreography, but I’m much more interested in the emotional line between the two characters inside of that. That’s really what I was tracking. I knew what we had to do in regard to where A to B to C and how to execute all that, but what’s happening between the two brothers is really what was most important to me.
I’ve said this 1,000 times, but if you don’t care about the characters, then the action’s meaningless. Jon [Bernthal] and Ben together have really great chemistry, and they’re both also really good at killing people. Can you talk about working on the screenplay? Were you thinking about some of the action set pieces? Were you thinking about innovative ways to “off” people? I don’t know what the right terminology is.
O’CONNOR: That’s a fair way of saying it. It’s done in stages. With Bill and I, we were getting it on the page to meet certain intentions, and then I brought in my fight guy, Fernando Chan, who I’ve worked with on many films now. He’s a very close friend. What I love about Fernando is that he’s always coming from character. We started to take what Bill and I had put down in the script and then started to just keep lifting it and lifting it and breathing new life into it.
Cynthia Addai-Robinson and Daniella Pineda Tease Their Epic Fight

“How often do you get awesome girl fights?”

Image via Amazon MGM Studios

You see the shooting schedule in front of you. What day do you have circled in terms of, “I cannot wait to film this,” and what day is circled in terms of, “How the F are we going to film this?”
PINEDA: Our fight scene!
ADDAI-ROBINSON: Which I think was both. What you hope for, and occasionally you actually get, is something to be working toward. Thankfully, this is both towards the end of the story but also towards the end of our shooting schedule. We had the maximum time to prepare, and because you want to do it justice, you’re like, “I want to use every moment I have to make sure that this is going to live up to what it is on the page.” I feel like a great action sequence transcends the dialogue. You’re able to use the movement and the action and everything to be this extension of what these characters want and what they’re expressing. How often do you get awesome girl fights, and not just silly ones, ones that you’re feeling every punch and kick?
PINEDA: Or not one where a human being that looks like they weigh 50 pounds is throwing 300-pound men. How is that physically possible? The way that Gavin helped construct this fight, it was very grounded and real. Man, it was a lot of work.
How long did it take to film your sequence?
PINEDA: Two days.
O’CONNOR: Two full, long days. I have to emphasize, I very intentionally built the schedule to do the action at the end so these guys and Ben and Jon had the time to keep working on the choreography and the training. These guys, starting from early prep, were working on the fight scene, and not only the choreography of it, but working out, training, making sure you can throw punches correctly and kicks, martial arts, and just doing all that training to get to those two days.
PINEDA: I’d had some fight experience before, but shoutout to my stunt lady, Bronte Coluccio, because she also picked up where I left off in the best way. She’s an athletic freak. Someone needs to hire her again because she’s really talented.
‘The Accountant’ Has Always Been a Trilogy

“You keep climbing inside of it. It becomes your own aesthetic and sensibility.”

Image by Nimesh Niyomal
 

With this being the sequel, how much are you guys thinking about whether this is a franchise? Can we continue? What are you thinking?
O’CONNOR: There’s always been three. Since post-production, since I started editing the first one. I didn’t know Bill [Dubuque]. We met on the first movie. I got the script from Lynnette Howell [Taylor], and then from the script that I initially got, I started working with Bill. I think any filmmaker’s going to do it. You get a script, you respond to it. How does it affect you personally? But then you keep climbing inside of it. It becomes your own aesthetic and sensibility. Bill was a great partner in allowing me to start taking it in directions. Once we started working together, and we became really good friends. I love Bill. He’s just the greatest. We started talking about, and I said, “We should be doing three of these, so what’s the interstitial movie?” Which is two, which is now, exactly what we talked about. And we have three. We’ve been now kicking the tires on what that story is. So, we’ll be doing that next.
You said you were developing a few things and you’ve warned your wife. What can you tease about what you’re developing? What can you reveal?
O’CONNOR: I’m writing something. It’s not set up anywhere. I just don’t like to set things up. I just write it on my own so I’m moving at my own pace. The thing that’s sitting right in front of me that I feel the most passionate about is a script that, actually, Bill [Dubuque] is writing. It’s an original story that I had that I have Bill writing for me. We just started to have this great relationship, so he’s writing it. It’s called Running. I set it up at Apple.
One of the things I’m doing now, very intentionally, is I’m using my platform to make cinema that can explore subject matter that is important to me, social commentary, and shine a light on certain things. So, we’re writing a movie about a boy who’s homeless, 17 years old, who’s a once-in-a-generation runner. That’s what I would say about it.
Cynthia Addai-Robinson Confirms ‘The Rings of Power’ Season 3 Time Jump

“We’ll be moving forward.”

Image via Prime Video

I am a fan of Rings of Power, and you got picked up for Season 3. What can you tease people about the upcoming season? When do you start filming? What can you say?
ADDAI-ROBINSON: If someone has information for me, I would be asking the same thing. I can’t tease much. I’m excited to get back to Season 3. There’s a time jump—I know that that’s been publicly said—with how we left off in Season 2. When we return in Season 3, we’re going to be moving forward, and that’s all I know. I don’t know much else, but I am definitely excited to return to Middle-earth. It’s obviously this weird shift to go from that to this, a contemporary story back to that. But yeah, I’ll be excited to go back and see what they’re up to over there.
One of the things about that show is that each episode looks like a movie. There’s so much incredible production design and costumes. It’s all just incredible craftspeople who work on it. What is it actually like being in the middle of that? What can you tell people and fans about making a show that takes that much care?
ADDAI-ROBINSON: For me, what’s always interesting is there’ll be this giant scope to something like that, but at the end of the day, you’re still responsible for being in service to the character and the story. So, there’s the intimacy of looking across at your fellow actors and actresses and working with the director and working with the crew. That all feels familiar to me, whether it’s a giant set piece or a windowless room. In the end, we’re just trying to tell the best version of that story, and thankfully, we have incredible artists and resources behind it because it’s a huge production and one that I’m very proud of being a part of.
PINEDA: Will they continue to have pointy ears in the next season?
ADDAI-ROBINSON: Well, my ears are normal, but yes, I still got the pointy ears. All the characters you know and love are still part of Middle-earth.
Special thanks to our 2025 partners at SXSW, including presenting partner Rendezvous Films and supporting partners Bloom, Peroni, Hendrick’s Gin, and Roxstar Entertainment.

The Accountant 2

Release Date

April 23, 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