Ben Affleck has a huge hit on his hands with The Accountant 2, which has now landed in a major top 10 chart following its streaming release. The sequel to 2016’s The Accountant brought Affleck back together with director Gavin O’Connor and co-stars like Jon Bernthal. After the original’s $155 million box office performance, expectations were high for the follow-up.
The Accountant 2 got better reviews than the first film, but the box office results did not reflect that. The sequel finished its theatrical run with a $102 million worldwide total. That drop led to some uncertainty about whether Amazon MGM would consider Ben Affleck’s action movie a success. That’s no longer a question, thanks to streaming.
It was recently revealed that The Accountant 2 is Prime Video’s second-most-watched movie ever after accumulating 80 million viewers worldwide in its first 28 days of release. That performance is notable on its own, but now additional streaming data has arrived that reveals how the sequel stacks up against all streaming movies this year.
According to Nielsen (via Puck), The Accountant 2 is the tenth most-watched movie on streaming this year. Affleck’s movie has 3.031 billion minutes viewed so far, which is notable considering it only came to Prime Video on June 5, or 40 days ago. The top 20 streaming movies can be seen below:
What This Means For The Accountant 2
Affleck’s Sequel Can Climb Higher
The Accountant 2 earning a spot on this top 10 streaming chart so quickly is rather impressive. It is the second newest streaming release to be featured on this top 20, with Netflix’s Straw coming out one day after Affleck’s film went to Prime Video. While Straw dominated Netflix’s charts upon its release, The Accountant 2 has nearly an extra half-billion minutes viewed.
That puts The Accountant 2 in a great spot to keep climbing up this chart as the rest of the year unfolds. It’s still the #2 movie on Prime Video as of this writing, which indicates that plenty of subscribers are still discovering and watching the movie after likely missing it in theaters.
Amazon MGM may now be in a position where they can watch The Accountant 2 continue to surge on Prime Video for the foreseeable future. That development could bolster the chances that Affleck, Bernthal, and O’Connor reunite for The Accountant 3, which was teased ahead of the sequel’s release.
Our Take On The Accountant 2’s Streaming Success
It’s Finally Getting The Attention It Deserves
Although The Accountant 2 got off to a decent start at the box office, it was disappointing to see audiences not rush to theaters to see a great sequel. I always liked the original movie, and the new film’s choice to embrace more comedy, lean into Affleck and Bernthal’s on-screen dynamic, and still deliver thrilling action scenes made the follow-up thoroughly enjoyable.
It didn’t seem fair to the movie that audiences weren’t turning out for it on the big screen, but at least that’s started to change. I’m glad people are finally checking out The Accountant 2, enjoying the experience, and turning it into a bigger success. Hopefully, that means The Accountant 3 happens sooner than later, even if it goes straight to streaming to build on this momentum.
Source: Nielsen (via Puck)