397: 28 Years Later (2025)

SPEAKER_03 0:04

This movie might as well have been called 28 Inches Later because it was huge, okay? It was huge.

SPEAKER_04 0:16

Greetings and salutations, and welcome to Hackerslash. If you're joining us again, welcome back. Boots, boots, boots, boots, moving up and down again. If this is your first time listening, welcome to the party. We are a horror movie review podcast dedicated to telling you whether a movie is a hack.

SPEAKER_00 0:35

A total joke? A waste of time.

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Or a slash. Totally killer. Pun intended. We believe horror is for everyone, and as such, we're rating these movies with the perspective we've gained from our varying walks of life and the flavors of fear we fancy most. My name is Chris, I'm your friendly neighborhood slasher enthusiast, and this week I'm joined by the classic horror connoisseur Sean.

SPEAKER_00 0:54

I'm sure there's a lot of inbreeding around these parts.

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The paranormal paramour Binks, the magic of the placenta. Is your dad silly with you? This week we're back in theaters to check out the latest entry in a franchise that follows the continued devastation of the rage virus.

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And if you support the show, you'll also get to hear our B side at the end of this episode, where we get into what it would be like to be stuck in 2002 and exactly what makes us rage out of control.

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Before we get down to business though, we have some follow-up.

SPEAKER_01 1:27

Let's follow up on some stuff. We've got some exciting updates from our premium tier patrons. First up, Hackerslash on Air is officially here. This new perk gives you access to lightly edited video versions of our podcast recordings. Even if you miss the stream, you still catch every chaotic moment, behind the scenes reactions, and unfiltered takes.

SPEAKER_04 1:50

I am so excited about this. The people have been wanting this for a little while now. Let's do it. Shout out to y'all who keep missing the streams. I'm so sorry that we can't schedule within your availability. I know it's late.

SPEAKER_01 2:01

Next up, the crypt has reopened. As we record this episode, it's officially Summer Ween. So we've brought the Crypt back to our third ever podcast, the comparison of the original Halloween to its 2007 remake. Our back catalog will continue to release the crypt every Sunday. Our historian and crypt keeper Nathan, my best friend, will be back soon for another session exploring how the show and our horror taste have evolved over time.

SPEAKER_04 2:29

Hell yeah. I cannot wait for this. Folks, sorry that it took so long. I know that you all have been clamoring for it. It's very weird to hear those old episodes.

SPEAKER_00 2:38

It's awesome.

SPEAKER_04 2:39

Yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 2:41

Yeah, it's meanwhile, we're like, we love it.

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We love it. It's so generous of you.

SPEAKER_01 2:45

All right, we got some new patrons. Finally, we want to welcome a few new members to the Patreon family. Jordi, Voodoo Magic Swamp Player, Gary, Marcos, Heidi, and Alex. Welcome, y'all.

SPEAKER_04 2:57

Jordi, we love you. Also, shout out to Voodoo Magic Swamp Player for being part of the family. I just love the energy you're bringing to the function. Honestly, with that name, that's pretty great.

SPEAKER_00 3:07

Hell yeah.

SPEAKER_04 3:08

Awesome. Well, welcome to the party, folks. But as for now, in this episode, a few weeks ago, we explored how the rage virus continued to plague nations in 28 weeks later. 18 years after that movie expanded the scope of a rage-fueled outbreak, the creative duo behind the original film, Danny Boyle and Alex Garland, reunited to tell the next chapter. Now, the third film was originally discussed as far back as 2007 and actually spent years in development limbo before being officially announced in 2024 as the beginning of a brand new trilogy. While 28 days later was shot on an accessible, lightweight camera that gave it a lo-fi feel. This latest film was shot primarily on iPhones with a mix of specialty cameras like drones. They did this for both light footprints while traveling and to honor the instinct and the spirit of the original film to use ordinary technology in extraordinary ways. And the end result was a blockbuster that made headlines as the largest theatrical release ever captured on a smartphone. The story picks up decades after the initial outbreak, following a group of survivors who have managed to endure on a remote island. But when one member sets out on a mission to the quarantine mainland, they discover that both the infected and the uninfected have evolved in unexpected ways. This week we're talking about 28 years later. What were you all expecting going into this?

SPEAKER_00 4:30

We were just talking about this in the B-sides for 28 weeks later. We had so many expectations and theories going into this one. And you know, I'm expecting that chaotic film style, the rage of it all just spinning out of control and really building those really intense moments. But I also had so many questions going into this one. Will we get any references to previous installments in the franchise? Will we see anything about previous characters specifically? I'm looking for like what happened with Andy. I know there were controversy around Killian Murphy, but I'll obviously with that emaciated, infected zombie from the previews, but we know that that was pretty much confirmed it's not going to be in the movie or he's not going to be in the movie, but remains an executive producer, and we hope to see him maybe in a future installment. We can be hopeful.

SPEAKER_04 5:23

Cough, cough, nudge, nudge, wink, wink.

SPEAKER_03 5:25

All of the things for sure. Even the little kiss with the wink afterwards. No, all of it. Absolutely. But listen, I agree. We we just talked about this, and I was really hoping to see like an expansion of the world and determining what came of the rest of Europe because of how 28 weeks later ended. You know, so was this going to be set in a different area, or were we going to at least see glimpses of different countries impacted by the virus? I don't know. I wanted something that kind of took us out of the UK just a little bit. I was hoping definitely some Easter eggs, because of course, at this point we've waited so long for this movie. I want a little bit of a callback, nothing too cheesy, but just enough. And yeah, maybe Killian Murphy would have been a little bit too much of a reach, so that's fine. But any little anecdote would have been so, so great. My biggest expectation and hope and pray was that they were going to develop these characters well enough because that was my biggest gripe for the previous film.

SPEAKER_01 6:23

I wasn't expecting a real connection between the movies because I didn't feel it from the first to the second. Like I obviously we know the virus is a thing, but I didn't feel the characters really kind of connecting. So I was prepared for that. I'll say that. But it did leave me with more questions than the first and the second one. It left me more like, why didn't they do this? Could they have done this? Why did this happen? So there was a lot of unanswered things. So I went in completely excited because I love the franchise. But yeah, I was I was left, I was gonna say unsatisfied, which is kind of not the right way of saying it, but I don't know. I needed a little bit more. So I went in expecting nothing and kind of left with nothing.

SPEAKER_04 7:11

Hmm, interesting. Okay. I disliked 28 Days Later and I enjoyed 28 Weeks Later, which I know is not the common or popular way to look at this franchise. But I did expect this movie to continue the trend and be even more enjoyable. What I did not expect was the scale to which it did that for me. But man, what an emotional roller coaster and a journey that this movie took me on. I think, in a word, I would describe this movie as super somber. It just feels very somber. And this movie really stressed me out, but in the best way, because I was completely invested in our characters that hooked me every moment, right? So I had every high moment of insane anxiety, every gut-wrenching moment of emotional devastation, uh, every comedic beat that felt both like a moment to exhale, but also the movie's way of giving me permission to just laugh a little bit and release some muscles that I subconsciously was tensing.

SPEAKER_00 8:17

Yeah, I think it's interesting to Vero's point. Like, it is true this franchise so far does not like to really play off of each other that well. So, like, why would you expect that? But I think that what this movie does is create some characters that make you want to see what the fuck happens to these characters, you know what I mean? And we've gotten that from all the other films, and so I think that's where you're just kind of like hoping. I was definitely immediately drawn into the atmosphere in this movie. Just the look of this movie, the shots that we get, especially some of the shots that we get in like nature, in the woods, on the mainland, super, super fucking good. Everything just looked so damn good. I will admit though, I was kind of struggling to find the same level of feelings that I got in 28 days and 28 weeks later. I think that some moments definitely shined through better than others, but in many ways, it didn't feel the same. Like I didn't feel the same chaos that I felt in previous films. It wasn't the same. There was an emotional punch. It packed that emotional punch in this movie the same way that I kind of felt in 28 weeks later, if not even for just a moment that we get in this movie. There's a lot of family trauma, loss, different things like that in this movie. But the chaotic intensity that I get from like the previous installments, I feel like this movie tried to get there, but didn't really do that thing. And I'm not even sure that this movie was trying to do that thing. It felt different watching this one than I was watching previous films because I I think the feelings you get are completely different. Like there's a lot less of the intensity of like chaos and just like everything just going a mile a minute. There's a whole lot more of the feels.

SPEAKER_01 10:03

Yeah. I mean, if you know me, you know that I like like the goofy, funny zombie movies. So I was not expecting to be a sad panda during this movie. And some of the things really got me to where I was like, fuck this. I'm sad. I don't want to be sad in the movie theater. We all know I want to like giggles, but then there was some comedic relief that I was like, that's unnecessary. I don't want that in there. So for me, that there was definitely a roller coaster of emotions to your point, Sean. And I think seeing the first two movies, you repeat those movies often because you get that, like, you wait for the score, you wait for the sounds, and the music is such a key factor in these movies. But I will say this one, you still get that heart pounding kind of feelings where you're like, get it over with. Can they just fucking kill this person? Because the music is stressing me out. There's so much like, you know, when is it gonna happen? The buildup is there. So there was a lot of feelings while watching this one. I will say that.

SPEAKER_03 11:03

Yeah, I think that we can all universally agree that stressed is going to be like the key word or the key takeaway from this film. And that's good because that's kind of what Danny Boyle does with all three of the films, right? Even though he didn't do 28 weeks later, like that's what his intention is is the way that it's filmed, the way that it's edited, it's to make you feel stressed and unsafe. And this is no different. I watched it in Dolby, like a crazy person. And those sounds were in the eardrum, very unsettling without a doubt. And to take it back to what you had said, Veto, in terms of like the film itself and you expecting that it was going to be different. It's true that what's great about these movies is that they are standalones. Like a lot of my friends were saying, Oh, I want to see this movie, but I hadn't seen 28 days later or 28 weeks later. I was like, you don't necessarily need to. It's just to kind of build an appreciation for the world. So I appreciate that, and I like that we can watch each one as a standalone, but get a glimpse of what the surroundings are. But I gotta be real, and it's time for the hot take, because I already knew that I might be the one that's gonna be like very different opinionated about this film. And I feel like for a while there on the internet, I was being gaslit into thinking that I'm crazy. You guys are saying a lot about in terms of intense emotions, and the only one that I really felt was stressed, yes, but a majority of the time, from like the first maybe 15 minutes, give or take, I was like, oh, I'm not aside from that feeling, sure, I'm not really impressed. And I almost feel disillusioned because I was really looking forward to Boyle and Garland, like getting back into the game. You know, they're at the helm, like, let's go. I've waited so long for this movie. And I felt extremely, honestly, like disappointed. And the big biggest reason why is because it felt really ridiculous, absurdist, and overall felt like they were just throwing in all kinds of tropes and facets to this world all in one movie that have no real like canonization to it. Like it felt out of place, it felt out of nowhere. You've had two movies where you've kind of dug a little bit deeper into this world, and right from the start, it almost felt like they were backtracking and erasing 28 weeks later. Like, this is the I don't know. Don't people feel this way about Star Wars and like The Last Jedi? And I don't know, Chris, I I I turn to you. I'm looking at you because maybe you might speak to that a little bit.

SPEAKER_04 13:30

But people feel a lot of things about Star Wars, but I've always been the Star Wars fans who just fucking like Star Wars and I don't get too angry about the twist and turns because they are the storytellers, and who am I to fucking, you know, I'm just along for the ride. I could be disappointed and not like burn the house down.

SPEAKER_03 13:46

Absolutely. But you know the kinds of fans that I'm talking about, though. You know what I mean? Like how they're how they started to say that they were just like erasing part of the lore, the canon when they're like going back and forth in terms of the last Jedi Rise, whatever. This isn't a Star Wars review member, but I'm just trying to give a comparison a little bit, right? And so I just felt like in terms of a disappointment, it was really that I felt like we were getting an opportunity to elaborate and continue just a smidge on 28 weeks later to build the world. Again, I like that it's a standalone, but to build the world just a little bit off of what 28 weeks later set up. And in the first minute or two, they basically said, no, no, forget forget about that. This is how this is what actually happens, and then we're just gonna start to throw in all kinds of other things that felt a little cliche and felt like a lot of other zombie films that we've seen.

SPEAKER_04 14:35

Okay, I have many things to say on this topic.

SPEAKER_00 14:37

I want to unpack this further.

SPEAKER_03 14:39

Yeah. I knew that this would happen.

SPEAKER_00 14:42

I don't necessarily think I disagree on everything. I do think there were moments of emotion in this movie. I don't think it was jam-packed like the entire way through. I think there's dynamic relationships between the father and and the son and the mother and the son that I think hit harder, but I definitely want to unpack where you're going with that.

SPEAKER_01 15:00

I also I'm gonna say it, Binks. I think I'm on your side. Legit, I'm on your side. My biggest disappointment was there's pointless characters. Like, why are you just putting that in there for no goddamn reason? Like, I didn't need a lot of the people in this movie. Here, I'll say this. And then the ones that you really want to get to know, they fucking rushed it and they gave you just a little bit. And you're like, wait a minute, you're a fucking tease. Give me more of that dude. Give me less of that other one, and let's actually like get to know the characters. Could this have been, and I know it's a joke, the 28 months later, like, where the fuck did that go? Because that could have been like it could have been over months. Yeah, we didn't have to be in the years because it was there was a lot of things that I was like, you this is disappointing. I didn't need to see all this other like fluff in it. But I will say, then the surprises and you know, just a little bit of the things that I was like, oh, I think I'm okay with it actually ended up being a disappointment. The way that it was shot, and the reason why I truly love days and weeks, just call it that, is because of it being shot in film, the score, this the the actual like scene, how they break up the scenes, and this one felt too modern for me. So I'll just say that. It was a disappointment for me. I'm an old hag, you know what I mean? I'm an old hag. So I'll just say that. But I'm on your side, Biggs.

SPEAKER_04 16:24

Okay, there's so much to unpack here, and we're gonna spend a lot of time unpacking it in the spoiler zone. I know that, but I think what this movie does really well is position itself as the contemporary continuation of that. So yeah, it feels modern, but also it's also how incredibly modern our technology has become. When the original film was made and the Canon XL1 is the most accessible camera that's lightweight that they can rely on on the go. Look at just how incredibly vast that difference in technology is, and I think that is such a fucking cool way of capturing the spirit of the original and continuing it in our modern day. But listen, I love the direction this movie takes, and I'm so pleasantly surprised by the direction they took. We're gonna unpack more of this in the logistics because I don't obviously want to spoil it for anyone who hasn't seen it yet. But let's acknowledge for a moment that the last thing we saw was the rage virus reaching Paris. This story could have done a million different things, but instead of overwhelming us with scale, it gave us a more personal, more intimate setting. And that made everything so much more effective. And when you peel back the layers on this story and you dig into what this movie says because of the choices it made with its narrative, holy shit. I could not be more pleased with the direction that this went. And I'll also say I'm not surprised how vicious the movie is for sure, but I'm pleasantly surprised it did one specific thing that gave me a feeling similar to something I felt in Terrifier 3.

SPEAKER_00 18:03

Interesting. That is interesting for sure. I think something we have to keep in mind here is that a lot of maybe what we're feeling with the characters and things like that, and you know, the story as a whole is that this is a trilogy. It's a confirmed trilogy. It's the first of a trilogy, the second one's already filmed, it comes out potentially in six months. You know what I mean? So, like, there's more to the story, which wasn't necessarily the case in previous films. So we also have to understand that aspect while we're thinking about like how this all played out. There's a lot of surprising elements to this film. Like, there's without giving anything away, in you know, until we get to the spoiler zone, there's some new elements to the infected and what's happening to them, right? I think that was something that was uh a little bit surprising and interesting that I wasn't really thinking about going into the movie. I was thinking about like, okay, how are these people living 28 years later? I wasn't even thinking about what the infected were doing, to be honest with you. I think the biggest surprise of them all, no pun intended, is some of the fucking long flying schlong that we get in this movie. I'm just gonna go out there and fucking say it right here, right now, because that was wild.

SPEAKER_04 19:12

Yeah, it was a lot. Was it? And she's smiling about it.

SPEAKER_03 19:16

No. When I left that theater, all of my friends looked at me and they said, Are you gonna say it? And I was like, No, I'm not. I'm gonna wait for someone else to bring it up first because I will not live up to that stereotype.

SPEAKER_04 19:28

But I will support it with follow-up commentary.

SPEAKER_03 19:31

Now that we're here, now that we're here, let's talk about what's scary about this film. It's not the quick shots and the overall editing film style. Yes, we've talked about it. It'll stress you out, it'll make you anxious. Same as the other films. The sound design, absolutely, I jumped out of my seat. There's like the smallest of things will scare the shit out of you, for sure. But nudity, the amount of nudity in this film, but particularly the overwhelmingly large amount of genitalia or the large genitalia is a little distracting in a bad way. Can't believe I'm gonna say it. Um it's a lot. It felt like I was watching Attack on Titan, if you know that that anime, it's like Attack on Titan, but huge schlongs. Absolutely. Yeah, it didn't it didn't do it for me. It was very scary, actually. I didn't think I would be scared, but I I was terrified.

SPEAKER_01 20:19

Can I just say that I turned to my husband, my sweet, sweet husband, and I said, I think I like alphas more than lichens.

SPEAKER_00 20:28

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_03 20:30

It might as well have been a lichen. This movie might as well have been called 28 inches later because it was huge. Okay, it was great, it was perfect.

SPEAKER_00 20:40

Cornhub.com, folks.

SPEAKER_01 20:42

Not everybody had a large slong. There's there was big, big lady hoo-haws.

SPEAKER_00 20:48

That's true.

SPEAKER_01 20:49

Let's be real. It was big, it was big in every aspect. It was great. Whatever your flavor is, you would have enjoyed it.

SPEAKER_04 20:58

I didn't enjoy any of it, but that's cool.

SPEAKER_01 21:00

I will say though, I I think if you're thinking of this being a fright, apart from that, I I would say that was a delight, Binks. I would not say that was a fright.

SPEAKER_00 21:08

Was it a frightful delight? It was a frightful delight.

SPEAKER_01 21:12

But there's not that many jump scares. And I I want to say the thing, I guess it wasn't scary for me. I'm demented, so I can't really, you can't take my word for it. But I was cheesing on some of those gore scenes. I was smiling because they were so perfect. But if you are not somebody that enjoys gore and slush and all brains and everything that comes with an amazing zombie movie, this might be a little scary for you. For me, though, I was smiling like a psychopath that I am.

SPEAKER_04 21:42

Oh man, okay. I can't okay. Sean, I can't wait to hear your take on this because this is going in a direction that is um it's two ends of the spectrum here.

SPEAKER_00 21:51

Two ends of the spectrum.

SPEAKER_04 21:53

I think somebody was like, I loved it.

SPEAKER_00 21:57

I think somebody was mentioning the Is like the music and the score adding to like the stress of this movie and while you're watching it, right? And I think the score really did help to add the tension in a lot of the moments, and you know, I think even silence in the movie, both the score working in tandem with like moments of silence and things like that, that all helped to build, I guess, some kind of fear in the movie. Overall, I didn't feel the same, like I said, the same level of chaos that I did from the first two films. So, like, that intensity wasn't there for me. But I think I think that the music definitely added, like, there were just moments where I felt like shit was gonna hit the fan because the music was just getting overwhelmingly like you know what I mean? Like, I was just like here for it. But I think it was just like maybe smoke and mirrors from a fear standpoint, right? Purely from a fear standpoint. Because when we get to like some of the action and the zombies and the carnage and the gore and things like that, and we'll talk more about that later. It wasn't really scary. It was kind of action-packed, it was kind of fun to watch. There were some cool moments, there were some kind of cheesy moments too. There were some moments where I felt like I was watching another video game replay, but overall, not really that scary of a film.

SPEAKER_04 23:15

Man, okay. Well, I dare to differ just a little bit. I think this movie was threatening, and there's a lot of stuff in here that made me is not scary in the traditional horror sense, but it is brutal, it is incredibly violent, and there are plenty of moments where I wasn't certain if some people would actually make it, even though I went in perceiving them to have thick ass plot armor. But I think what's really scary about this movie is the existential dread of this film. The scariest thing about this is actually what sets it apart from its companions in its franchise, right? This movie holds up a mirror to our faces and it subconsciously asks us to consider the world around us right now as it exists. And it goes back to its roots, but expands the world in a way that feels even more horrifying because this isn't just about the rage virus. This is about how we respond to the rage virus. This is about how you navigate life and generations through a virus when the world is also reacting around you. We're gonna get into these details in just a bit. I have more about it to say in even my rating, but we have so much to unpack there in terms of layers. This movie went such a different direction than it could have been from what it was set up on. But again, I think it made the smart choice in doing it.

SPEAKER_03 24:43

And I agree with you to an extent because those are the key elements of the story that I was hoping that we would get, but I think where I struggle is the other sides of the world building that kind of took away the excitement or made it more difficult to buy in in terms of like the details of this world. So we start to see different types of infected, we start to see other elements to those infected that I can't reveal yet, but things that aren't really canon or just don't quite make sense. There's a lot of irrationality here. And that's where I struggle because although, on the one hand, I love the analysis of like communities and I mean, I studied sociology. I love people and societies and how they manage and struggle, especially in a post-apocalyptic world, the relationships between parents and just friends, those dynamics, relationships amongst partners. All of that stuff is in this movie, and it is very interesting, sure. But I just couldn't get over a lot of the ridiculousness that happens in this film. And some moments that felt like, I think you said it, Veto, like some comedic moments that had the theater laughing in a weird, weird way. Like we shouldn't really be laughing at this, but we can't help it. Because again, we've already said it, like a huge schlong is whipping around the screen. Like it's a little hard to not chuckle a little bit. It's distracting, all right? So it's those things that like it's hard for me to just sink in and let myself feel those emotions. And I struggle with that being said, saying that this film is original because to me, it's almost like the first two films created a different sub-genre when it comes to quote unquote zombies. It's almost like we've shared before, it's not even really a zombie film, or is it, right? The whole shtick is it's a rage virus. So everyone has always kind of debated, is this really a zombie film or is it not? Like it it kind of looks at that genre in a different way. But by adding the elements that they did in this world with this movie, it just becomes another version of The Last of Us to me.

SPEAKER_00 26:56

I mean, I I'll I mean you can play devil's advocate and say that a lot of like what they chose to try to incorporate from storytelling could also just be Walking Dead. You know what I mean? Because like absolutely then that's what I think I was making a point, like even a couple episodes back on some tangent about some at some point when you do post-apocalyptic movies and you have to depict a world, you know, removed from the outbreak, like it's all gonna kind of start to feel monotonous. You have to look out for crazy ass fucking people that have to deal with this and they're living out in the wild, right? You gotta deal with people trying to take control. You got, you know, your little faction over here, you got different forms of zombies or what have you. And that's just playing devil's advocate, but I do feel like this movie also had to take whatever it had from previous installments in this world that was already built. We're now 28 years removed, right? We're we're skipping over, like you said, months, right? So we're 28 years removed, which is a pretty long time. We went from 28 days to 28 weeks, right? We're still within like a year or two in the second installment. Now we're 28 years, right? So what does that look like? Needing to create what this world looks like, knowing that there would be people now that have grown up in this world, never knowing a world before this, right? You have to have that kind of storytelling. And I think that they definitely tried to incorporate a lot of different ideas that may again not be completely flushed out because the story's not done yet. The story's not done yet. So I do give this movie credit for like how it approached 28 years later, because I think they did have to try to come up with something in there, whether we agree with everything or not is another story.

SPEAKER_01 28:37

I would say if I have to look at this in a bundle, I have to look at it as the franchise to say that it's original for what it is. Because let's say it's 18 years since 28 weeks later came out, 23 since 28 days later came out. That's a really long time. Those were like the first zombie movies that truly kind of sparked all of these other zombie movies to come. So they started it, right? They're a TS, they're a trend starter, not a trend follower, but this one felt like they just were pulling for what they had when it comes to being original. The they kept a lot of the elements though that truly make me love the franchise and make me love the first two movies. So they can do no wrong from that perspective. They're gonna be original. They were the first fast running zombie rage zombies ever. And that is the true, like the thing that I remember so clearly from all the movies, and they stuck to it, right? There's always gonna be that scene that is a huge field, and that one kid running or somebody running and somebody that is infected behind them. So they kept all of those elements that made it originally from the beginning. So original for what they had, Sean, to your point. You can only, after 23 years from the first movie, it's tough to pull. You're not gonna get surprised. You're not gonna go into this movie thinking, oh, I'm gonna see something that I've never seen before, because you won't. We've seen it before. So still great though.

SPEAKER_04 30:12

And yeah, I was surprised. Wow. Really? Look at that. Yeah, listen, we're gonna talk more about it. I don't know. I feel like maybe I was watching a whole different movie from y'all based on how you're describing these reactions. I don't know. But one of the biggest things that's surprising about this movie is the weird fucking turn it takes at its ending. And its ending is something. It's something, it's uh it's a tonal shift, that's for sure. I know I've said a lot of things about this movie. I don't know that they continue all the way to the final moments of the film, but I think one of the things that is interesting is it pulls you out of those somber feelings that you've been lingering in the whole time, and I'm not mad at it. I expect that it probably sets up the next film. I expect it's changing the tone for the next film, but it is something that I'm dying to talk about in the spoiler zone because two things struck me as we were watching the movie. One was that I realized someone was someone different the entire time, but then also I was in this chat in our Discord server, and I had a realization I'm like, holy fucking shit, they were wearing blank, and it just started me down a rabbit hole, but we'll get there.

SPEAKER_00 31:26

Dang. It was a very grind house ending, you know what I mean? Like it was definitely a tonal shift to say the least. Like, we definitely get to see a certain character that maybe we got in the beginning, which is kind of cool, but was it cool? You know what I mean? Like, I have some thoughts on this. I think there's an interesting point. I definitely cannot wait to unpack the final moments of this film a little bit later because I have some thoughts. It might be a stretch, but you know, you gotta find an answer for something, you know what I mean? And I I can't give anything away. The ending, I don't know if I'm mad at it. It's such a change in tone that and it's so ridiculous. It's so ridiculous.

SPEAKER_04 32:11

What I have heard is that if you are from the UK, the ending will mean something very different to you, and it will mean literally nothing to any fucking one else in the world.

SPEAKER_00 32:22

It's very strange. It feels like some weird, deranged clockwork orange bullshit.

SPEAKER_01 32:27

That's it. It and I I will say though, it it kind of starts. If you've seen this movie, I want to say it so bad, so I'm gonna leave it in the no spoilers, but the beginning, you're like, what the hell? Right? The first scene, you're just like, what am I watching? Why am I watching this? Um, and there's characters and joyful, and it starts really like, you know, really kiddish and happy, and then it kind of ends that way. So it like starts with a like, this is what brings me joy, if you think about it. And then at the end, that's what brought me joy. I loved the scene that really truly ends it. I did not know it was gonna be a trilogy until Nathan. So it makes way more sense. I think I left being like, what the fuck just happened? Why was that so rushed? But now it all makes sense. So I kind of love it. And I'm a fan of all of those quirky UK just nonsense movies. So I'm excited. I'm excited.

SPEAKER_03 33:28

Listen, I have a feeling I know what the correlation is with the UK. I don't want to say it right now, so we'll save it for the spoiler zone. But I have an idea because when it ended, I literally looked to my friends and I said, this is the way that they are handling that political situation. So there's that. But how do I even express what I felt during that ending? I full on laughed because it was it was the most absurd thing in the whole movie, and that was already topping a lot, right? I had the biggest head scratch, like, what in the whole hell? And quite frankly, it was the most obvious way to say we're no longer going to be standalone films. We're going to create our own little 28 days like trilogy segmented away from the others. So fine, I suppose. But a couple things, they bring in an actor that is having quite the fucking year that I didn't realize was in it, so that was a big shock on my part. But then I also was like, wow, this is like a a Twilight cameo. So that more to say on that later, but it was a very mixed bag of feelings in just a short amount of time. So yeah, absurd, entertaining, weirdly enough, for sure. To Vito's point, like if you're gonna laugh at something and have a good time with something, it's probably gonna be this ending, despite it being absolutely ridiculous.

SPEAKER_04 34:50

Well, I can't wait to see how all this shakes out into our ratings. But before we get there, Sean, how would you describe the gore score?

SPEAKER_00 34:57

You know, I think it's interesting because this one definitely doesn't shy away from the gore, but it's not all about the gore in this movie. It's not all about those intense moments of just infected shredding people apart and just brutal violence, right? As violent as this movie is, because it's also got those emotionally charged and raw moments that I think hit you, maybe in some moments just as hard as some of the gore. And I think the sound really helps and it partners well with those gory scenes. I think it's makes the gore in this one feel probably higher than it really is. And then there's those moments where like they're kind of cool, like the shots that you get in some of these infected kills and things like that, but then the way they're cut and edited, it almost feels like I'm watching like a video game like scene play out or something like that. So it takes you out of the gore a little bit. So you're like kind of like going in and out of like how intense this gore really is, but there's a lot of things that's really adding to the feel of this movie. And then again, you got some really graphic shots of people actually being eaten alive by infected and people getting eaten alive by animals and shit. So like the violence is raw and graphic, and with that emotional weight that this movie kind of brings in in some moments, I think backed by the sound and the score, it feels like a high gore score when you put it all together.

SPEAKER_04 36:21

And what about the animal report?

SPEAKER_03 36:23

Y'all. I don't know how else to say this, but I'm pretty sure, very confidently feeling like this is probably going to be the worst animal report of the year.

SPEAKER_04 36:36

We don't even have Bambi the Reckoning out yet.

SPEAKER_03 36:38

I guess that's true.

SPEAKER_04 36:40

Almost one Bambi versus this entire fucking movie, you know?

SPEAKER_03 36:43

Yeah, it's a toss-up still, because it's up close and personal, the kind of carnage that you witness to an animal in particular, but a few, but like this animal in particular. Not a good time. Not at all.

SPEAKER_04 36:57

Well, let's go ahead and get into our ratings then. 28 years later from 2025, now showing in theaters. Was it a hack or a slash?

SPEAKER_03 37:06

How about I go first? Because I feel like, truth be told, I'm gonna see how I feel at the very end, because I'm actually surprisingly very on the fence about my scoring with this. Cause on the one hand, it feels like the biggest fall from Grace this year in terms of new releases and maybe like franchises. I was really looking forward to this movie. I love 28 Days Later. I've said this multiple times. I love it a lot. So maybe it's my fault that I had my expectations extremely high. And like I said at the beginning of the episode, when I left that theater, I thought, I must be fucking crazy. I must be infected with the rage virus because everyone is loving this movie. And Chris, you said it yourself. I felt like I was the one that watched a different movie, and everybody else was having a good time. And from the start of the film, I felt a little disappointed. Whereas my other friends, like, sure, as the film went on, like, all right, they were starting to buy into something's weird here, something's quirky, but they were having a good time with it. However, there was still enough of the film that was entertaining and effective. The stress, the tension, the sound effects. I think overall, on a technical level, the film does hit its marks and it tracks with the other two films and how it's edited. Like it still feels, on a technical level, like it belongs in this franchise. I can tell it's a Danny Boyle film, etc., right? But on the other hand, I felt like I waited too damn long for this movie to get all kinds of ridiculous tropes from the zombie genre thrown at the wall that it didn't need. I felt like the rage virus was enough. And we could have still gotten a lot of the community and the relationships and those kinds of dynamics with that existing world. We didn't need all these other weird fluff pieces on the side to expand that. But all that being said, at the end of the day, I would still recommend this to people to watch. Just really don't watch the other two, if that's the case. Like I would really recommend maybe just watching this movie. It probably should have been titled something else entirely, quite frankly. Maybe like not even 28 inches later, like I joked about, maybe just something else all together. A full-on like spin-off. That would be great. But although I wouldn't necessarily like rewatch this movie, I would recommend it to others. So I'm going to, on a whim, reluctantly slash it. I'm going to reluctantly slash it, but goddamn, it barely makes the crossing line. And if you catch me at the end of the year with each passing day, I may get a little frustrated and annoyed, but who knows? We might get six months from now, twenty eight days and weeks or months or years. Who the fuck knows anymore? Who knows what it's gonna be called? But maybe I'll change my mind then.

SPEAKER_04 39:58

I'm sorry, there's just no way that you should feel about this movie what I felt about Fear Street Prompoin. We're living in a weird time. Two different leagues of quality.

SPEAKER_01 40:07

I feel like I should go next. And the only reason why is because I'm on Binx's side again. And this is fucking crazy coming from me, y'all. We literally, yeah. I literally would live with the dead. I want to be more with the dead than I want to be with the ones alive, truthfully. But for me, let's just say the feelings were there. I also went, and I should have learned this from my past relationships, to not have any expectations because then you don't get disappointed. I've learned this. But the reality is it left me with so many questions, and I hate that. I don't like leaving the theater not feeling full and happy and joyful. And I will say it was a great movie to watch. It was beautiful. The score was there. The the I love the gore, and there was gore, and it was amazing to see. And some of those shots, I was like, oh shit, that was kind of cool. But then it was like on an iPhone. I'm like, no, dude, I want a 35 millimeter film. I wanted to be like, I want to feel like I need to redo my eye prescription because this looks so shitty. Like I legit needed those from this movie. And it felt too recent, it felt too new. It felt like I wasn't, I don't know. It felt like I wasn't watching the movie that I needed to see. Now, every other movie sucks in this last, well, not every other movie list, but most of the movies coming out, I don't even want to go to the theater. I wait until it's streaming for free because I don't want to waste my time or money. Um, but I did with this one because I truthfully would re-watch this almost every year. I rewatch the first and the second almost every year. Now, will I watch it again? I have to, right? And there's gonna be, if now that we have more coming out, I'm gonna do what I do all the time and watch this one before I go see the other one. And it's something that I'll do and I'll keep rewatching. But for me, it's a low slash. It's a little really little low slash, not a paper cut, like an actual slash, but it's a low vibration. It's not something that'll kill you, it's just gonna make you weak.

SPEAKER_04 42:15

Hello, um, it's giving paper cut by cardboard box.

SPEAKER_01 42:18

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It stings.

SPEAKER_04 42:20

Like I just did to my finger earlier. Like it's there, it breaks the skin, it's deeper than it probably should be, and you're still a little punk for getting cut by it. Yeah, I got you.

SPEAKER_01 42:29

Yeah, I I mean I would watch it. I'm not gonna put it on for a background movie. Like, I'll sit down and watch it. You know what I mean? I'll I'll I'll actually watch the whole thing if it's on TV. But will I own it? Will I will it be one of my staples? I don't think so. But it's still a slash.

SPEAKER_00 42:45

I'm honestly shocked that both of you gave it a like a low slash. Honestly.

SPEAKER_03 42:50

This is what's gonna keep me up at night because I I had a strong feeling that if I did this, this is gonna go in a direction that is gonna give me sweats. Like I can't.

SPEAKER_01 42:59

It's okay. I got you though, Binks. We're both low slashers in this point.

SPEAKER_04 43:03

You could have just hacked it, Binks, if you're so unhappy with it.

SPEAKER_03 43:06

No, no, I know, I know. But I no, but I can't I can't lie either. You know what I mean? Like it's it's a whole thing. I'm having you know, like that in turn in the B sides, again, shameless plug, folks. Go, you know, upgrade your your prescription, your subscription to for this episode specifically, because in the B sides we talked about how like maybe I'm internalizing some rage, and this is a perfect example of that.

SPEAKER_00 43:29

You're not wrong, right? Your feelings, because if you look on the internet like this movie, it isn't everyone saying this movie is great. There's actually a lot of people saying that they dislike this movie. So there's there is actually kind of like this I don't know, it's I don't want to say 50 50, but there's a lot of people that have some passionate feelings about what this movie did wrong in their eyes, and then there's a lot of people that really loved this movie, and then there's some people that are kind of in the middle. It's interesting because I feel like the infection in this movie has really evolved in twenty eight years later, but I I also think the storytelling has evolved in 28 years later because I feel like while it doesn't quite recapture the frantic chaos and the raw energy of 28 days later or that explosive horror of 28 weeks later, right? With especially with that opening scene, that opening scene in 28 weeks later is amazing. But it but 28 years later does have something very emotional and deeply unsettling about the storytelling, right? And it isn't just a spring through abandoned cities. It's like this slow, it's this slow and almost sorrowful story of grief, of loss, the burden of like survival. And it does feel like I'll play devil's advocate, it does feel very walking dead in that way. But the gore is still there, and in some moments it's very intense, but it's the family trauma that I think, and that quiet dread that leave the deepest cuts, the deepest scars in this movie. I think Jody Comer and Alfie Williams give some incredible performances, and I can't wait to talk about that a little bit later. And I feel like this one leans into some folk horror, which I really love. It's got that culty goodness, which I really love, rather than just a pure outbreak horror movie. And I feel like while some may find the third act, especially the ending of this movie's like tonal change pretty jarring, there's no denying that there's some bold ambition that they're playing on here, right? Like they've got something in the works. It's a bit less of the rage and a little more of the heartache in this one. And I think because of that, this one cuts deeper than those infected teeth do. You know what I mean? And I feel like it's a haunting evolution in the franchise. And I think it proves that you don't really need to run full speed to leave a mark. And I feel like it might not feel as intense as the previous two installments. And I think it's interesting because you know, Binks, you love 28 Days Later, didn't like 28 weeks later, Chris, it was the opposite. I like both of the films leading up to this one, but I think, you know, even if it's not as intense as those previous two films, 28 years later still bites, and I think it's a slash, a solid slash.

SPEAKER_04 46:20

I don't know why this direction you were going. It was giving a lot of Goldilocks, it was giving a lot of my porridge is just right, no matter what movie it is. And I love that for you, Sean. Listen, this is a story about survival. Yeah, but it's also about how people compartmentalize suffering, and that's what I think this movie does better than its predecessors. If this movie wanted to be the same level of intensity and brutality and violence, I don't think there'd be a story to tell because the infected would just run the fucking planet and we'd have nothing left. But instead, this is about conflict and it's about the cyclical nature of conflict and how often that has been repeated throughout history on our planet. This is a movie about the human experience of war, whether that's between a virus, each other, or even internally within ourselves, and it doesn't try to top its predecessors and scale. That's what this movie does well. Instead, it zooms in on the psychological and emotional toll of living in a quarantine nation that feels like it's been abandoned and left behind. The story doesn't just expand the world of the rage virus, instead, it deepens it. It reflects on societal coping mechanisms and honestly took a lot of inspiration and influence of Brexit. There's a sense that this movie is asking us what it means to move on and whether that's always the right thing to do. I like this movie a lot when I walked out of the theater. I went to see what Allie and her son, we all had a good time, and I enjoyed it, but the more I've chewed on it, the more I've processed it, the more I've had boots just playing over and over and over in my brain, the more I've come to actually love it. And it may actually be enough for me to see the original film in a new light, and I didn't think that was possible. This movie is is brutal. Yeah, sure. It's gory, it's got like a mortal combat level fatality, but it's also earnest, it's also vulnerable, it's painful, but it's also incredibly satisfying and cathartic, and it is undoubtedly a slash, and I can't wait to get into it more. Now, with that, 28 years later from 2025 has earned a universal slash, although seems like the record is a little tainted. Seems like it wasn't a super passionate slash, but we'll cut there. You can find this movie in theaters, stick around for just a bit. In the spoiler zone, we're gonna unpack all the layers to this story. We'll see you in a bit.

SPEAKER_00 49:07

Are your post-apocalyptic travel plans ruined by the threat of a sudden blood-spewing rage? Tired of friends turning into feral maniacs just because someone forgot their hazmat etiquette? Introducing Rage Away, the iodyne salvation! It's the only iodine-based topical ointment clinically untested, but spiritually endorsed by survivors of the outbreak. Just lather this shit on and you'll be 28 steps ahead of the infection. Bitten, rage away. Blood vomited on, rage away. Used a public toilet in Manchester? Double dose that rage away. With our patented iodine-based formula, rageaway creates a dermal barrier tougher than a military quarantine. It's the ointment the infected rage about. Literally. So don't wait 28 days or even 28 weeks. Act now before your Uncle Steve turns into a blood-eyed berserker and ruins family dinner. Again. Rageaway! Because some infections need more than just hope. They need ointment. Warning. Side effects may include vomiting, diarrhea, headaches, nausea, in some cases the urge to run into a horde of infected screaming like a wild banshee. Don't use rageaway if you are pregnant or looking to become pregnant. Consult your doctor before using rageaway. So I have a fairly accurate death toll of 40 in this movie, give or take. And I know there are some really like important deaths in this movie that I know we're gonna talk about, but the problem is that a lot of these kills happen like really quickly and in the same exact way. But listen, let's get into them. Which one of these kills released your inner alpha?

SPEAKER_04 51:25

I just want to share, and I'm actually gonna hold back on my favorite kill for just a second, but I want to share that I went into this movie and this theater was fucking packed. And I felt so self-conscious being on my phone to take notes. I don't even really look out and like look down at my phone, and I'm never really like not paying attention. But I was so concerned about the guy next to me being distracted that I looked at Allie and I was like, all right, I'm not taking notes this time. I'm just not gonna do it. I'm just gonna vibe with the movie. I'm gonna capture my feelings after I'm gonna like talk about it, and then I'll see it a second time because I'm sure it'll be great. When I tell you that that opening scene happened, and I immediately pulled out my phone to say, Fuck dep kids talking real strong.

SPEAKER_03 52:14

Yep, yep.

SPEAKER_04 52:15

Damn, what a what a fucking way to go.

SPEAKER_03 52:17

No, I mean that definitely was the sentiment, especially the fact that they were watching the Teletubbies. That also might have been one of the scariest things on that film for sure.

SPEAKER_05 52:26

Dude.

SPEAKER_00 52:26

One of the realest moments of the film right there.

SPEAKER_03 52:29

Absolutely. I felt very seen with that. There's a lot of kills while 40. Yeah, I guess that makes sense. Uh, it's hard to decide on one. I gotta go with potentially the guy with the bag, like the bag head. I feel like that kill was extremely effective in terms of like building up that tension and that anxiety.

SPEAKER_00 52:48

Waiting for him to see if he's gonna like rage out of control, you know? You never know what's gonna happen. Is he dead? Is he not?

SPEAKER_03 52:55

Yeah, that kind of sentiment was like, oh boy, just do it already. And then the other tie with that is that alpha rate like racing behind them in that water. I was like, bitch, if you don't move, kid, if you don't get the fuck up right now, that was a lot. That alpha ran through water like it was nothing.

SPEAKER_04 53:13

He was walking on water.

SPEAKER_03 53:14

Absolutely. You kind of look like Jesus too, it's nice. So interesting. Why do alpha all the alphas have long hair?

SPEAKER_00 53:20

I mean, whatever.

SPEAKER_03 53:20

We're gonna get into it later.

SPEAKER_00 53:21

I'm just running wild, man.

SPEAKER_03 53:23

Feral, feral. No, but both those are like a tie for like kills that really like made me extremely anxious. I think it made the whole theater fucking anxious.

SPEAKER_04 53:32

Oh, okay. I'm sorry. We didn't have the same favorite kill. I know. Whoa, wait, you're right. I you said those kills, I'm like, oh, those were fine, I guess. How the fuck did you not pick Eric, dude?

SPEAKER_03 53:45

Uh yeah. Yeah, I suppose.

SPEAKER_02 53:48

The ambivalence of the fucking spine coming in. Here's the thing. The thing with the spinal cord and all that was that we saw so much of that already that I was desensitized.

SPEAKER_00 53:58

I was like, all right, yeah, it wasn't the first head ripoff, you know. We'd seen so many of the head ripoffs.

SPEAKER_04 54:05

And it came right in the moment of the holy fuck, they're gonna kill a baby.

SPEAKER_00 54:10

I also thought Eric was gonna stick around a tad longer, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_03 54:14

Yeah, yeah, I thought so too. Especially with the funny commentary and the banter about the girlfriend. That was savage.

SPEAKER_04 54:20

Oh my god, that was savage. So so so so so good. I loved Eric's kill specifically because A, I really thought he was gonna stick around a lot longer. I didn't think he'd make it to the end of the movie, but I thought he'd last longer than he did. So it was a shock to see him go so soon. And then for him to have get gotten in that brutal way, I just absolutely loved it because he did not get to fulfill the idea of becoming an alpha.

SPEAKER_03 54:53

Everything that you just said could be taken out of context so severely, and I love that. If that whole moment was just an after dark situation, and I was just me here laughing on mute, like no big deal. Don't mind me. Don't mind me.

SPEAKER_01 55:10

My favorite part definitely was when the slow is it slow lows?

SPEAKER_00 55:15

Are those the names of the the slow lows, the the like bloated like baby zombie things?

SPEAKER_04 55:20

Is it slow lows? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Also, shout out to that man just trying to live his life and eat worms. Like, he's probably a vegetarian.

SPEAKER_00 55:28

A vegetarian zombie is ridiculous.

SPEAKER_03 55:32

He was suckling on those shoelaces, okay? Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it's it's a lot.

SPEAKER_00 55:39

They're eating a lot of fucking worms, man. Or either that or the worms ain't sitting right because you're bloated as hell. So we gotta figure something out here because your diet, it's not working for you, my friend.

SPEAKER_03 55:49

Not the post-apocalyptic world still having IBS. Like, it's just it's tough out here. It's real. You can't win out here. But to your point, in terms of like the epitome of rage, like mom rage, I will say that the film does a really good job of the dichotomy between like human day-to-day rage that we feel, right? And then the actual rage virus, because even this isn't a kill, but just a quick moment that made me think of it. It was like the dad when he gets really pissed and he just like punches the wall. I was like, there we go, like human rage. I hope we see a little bit more of that. But yeah, unfortunately, that that uh little new bloater zombie, whatever the fuck he wants to call those. I don't know what I don't know, I don't even know what to call them. Did they have a name? I don't even remember. He got got is this moral of the story.

SPEAKER_00 56:40

I mean, it doesn't look like these things are really getting much of anybody, they're too slow, you know what I mean? You can see them coming from like a mile away for most of the time. Like, even if they do creep up on you, by the time they get to you, like, come on. And they're not even that fast, I feel like. Like, even once they get to you, what are they gonna do? Like, I don't know, I don't know. But I mean, these are all great kills. I also think, you know, even though we don't get to actually see it happen, like one of the most impactful kills is obviously the mom, right? Because it's like that whole mercy kill of of the doctor like going out there to like help her out. But uh on the other end of that kill, the questions I have is like if you already kind of knew that you might have cancer, why are we trekking it across the entire fucking landscape only to just off yourself? You know what I mean? And leave your kid out there. That's the only thing, like, and maybe she wasn't able to be in consciousness like the right way the the whole time, and maybe that's it. She's like snapping in and out of like being able to think clearly, but like, fuck, did that feel like a waste of time? I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_04 57:41

Yeah, I mean, listen, this whole movie gets avoided if they had just been honest with their son. And granted, he's already been exposed to the horrors of this world with a rage virus running rampant. Of course, they want to preserve some level of innocence or like try to protect him in some way, and I didn't know how to tell him, and it's sad, but she absolutely was not in her complete state when he took her across the gate and into the mainland. She was like, Oh my god, we're in the mainland. She wasn't all there.

SPEAKER_05 58:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 58:12

And yeah, I mean, I get it though. It it did for sure feel like, okay, well, this could have been avoided with a simple conversation.

SPEAKER_03 58:18

Yeah. And that's a little that's a smaller piece of like the irrationality that I have and the lack of somewhat logic to the writing, which is crazy for me to say, because that's like a a jab at Alex Garland, who's like incredible. But I guess I struggle too because the parents, they know what cancer is. Like they've lived a life in society that knows cancer, that knows what the symptoms are. Like they're aware the son is not. And when you have the father basically telling his son that he has to watch all of the kills, he has to not only kill infected, but he has to watch the struggle of at the time that that baghead kill that I had mentioned, right? Like it was kind of a toss-up in terms of whether that person was a regular human that was tortured and used as bait, or if that was an infected person, etc. So you're exposing your kid to death, but you have a problem telling him that his mom mother is dying? I feel like that's the part that, sure, nuances, struggle, vulnerability. Uh I got it, I get it, but seems a little off. And you know, we talked a lot about obviously like the mom's kill and how sad that was and rationality here or there about the cancer, sure. But let's give it up for the production team, okay? Because a lot of this film did it for me, but specifically the area where the doctor lives, like his bone structures, like those columns with the bones, the skull Christmas tree. Are you kidding me, bro? It's the bone throne. It's the bone throne. Sign me up. That's a cool little amusement perk. Beginning to feel a lot like skull miss. Thanks. Did you call him the bone daddy? Not refines being the bone daddy. I kind of like it.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:09

I did. I mean, staying in the bone theme, the newer bones being white and crispy, very nice touch. Very nice touch, and not like weathered and old. I liked it.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:21

I feel like he got the mom's skull ready in like a minute. Like that guy had that shit down, like he threw it in a microwave and peeled that fucking shit off the bone. Like, what the fuck? That shit was way too quick.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:34

Also, I looked at Allie when all this burning was going on, like, not me fucking having thought the skeleton burned too.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:41

No, it needs to be like super, super hot, I think.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:45

Too hot. Yeah. Yeah. It doesn't get hot enough for the skeletons to burn. Okay. What do they do with the bones then? They just dump them somewhere?

SPEAKER_01 1:00:52

If I'm gonna do fucking cremated, I wanna I wanna have the bones. No, I'm sorry. Cremation is hotter than what that fire pit the guy had. Ah, okay. Gotcha.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:02

This is burning the everything to ash, basically. But like, but this guy is literally trying to just get to the bone, you know what I mean? Because he wants to fucking fucking throw bones and and play fucking Lego with bones.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:15

It's like a medium rare fall off body ribs. Fall off the bone ribs. Yep, baby.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:21

All roads lead back to chilies, is really what I'm hearing. Okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:26

Not well done. Not extra crispy.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:29

This is a great comfort to me. I was highly disturbed. I should have known that this is the guy that you know when you know a guy who can do cremations, but you can't afford one. I should have known. I legitimately was concerned for a second that my entire life I had thought that they burn bones and that maybe they don't burn bones, they just dump the bone somewhere else, and you get flecks of ash that are something else. I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:50

It was uh But he also he had the cold plunge. He had it down to a science, you know what I mean? He got like the ice bath like you would with a hard-boiled egg, so it stops cooking, and then he ripped the flesh and the uh the bits off.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:06

Some of that shit was dropping into the river, too, that I feel like we were like, you know, splashing on our faces and drinking out of, you know, and then we're watching the little tiddly bits fall out into the river. No big deal, no biggie. It's all good. I mean, we dump shit in the in oceans and shit all the time, I guess. We're just that's what the human race likes to do. So whatever.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:27

Better than plastic. I actually have in my kitchen a couple mugs from an artist. I'll put a link in the show notes. But it's skull mugs. Well, they're not made from human skulls, but they're designed like human skulls, so you can drink from the skulls of your enemies. It's pretty fucking great.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:43

I'm glad you let us remind us that it's not a real skull.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:47

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think it's really important. Listen, there's so much that I love in this movie, but I I want to start with something that was actually brought up in the trailer, and that is the poem Boots. Had any of you heard that before? Did you know what it was?

SPEAKER_00 1:03:02

I had I don't know if I heard it before this movie.

SPEAKER_04 1:03:05

Yeah, I had only ever heard it in this movie, but that was one of the most striking elements because it's something that caught my attention immediately. There was something about this trailer that spoke to me in a way that I could not articulate, and that was freaking me out in an excited way, in a really good way. I was I was really excited to see it. But the poem itself is rhythmic, it's very repetitive, it's hypnotic, it's like calling cadence, and that feels so suffocating. It captures this monotony, this exhaustion, this like mental anguish and unraveling of soldiers on a march. And that poem hit me harder than I expected. Hearing that instantly sent me back to my own service, and I felt that repetition and that fight against complacency and just like zoning on this monotony in my bones. The way every day feels the same, the way that like your mind starts to slip under the weight of routine with the balance of duty, with a balance of survival, with a balance of like trying to do anything for your sanity. There is this rhythm to war that doesn't let up. And look, sometimes it's marching. Thankfully, I was in the Navy, I didn't do a ton of the marching, but sometimes it's watch rotations, sometimes it's other aspects of your duty, sometimes it's prepping on the flight deck, sometimes it's damage control. But sometimes it's just holding your breath and waiting for the next thing to go wrong. And that's why this movie just put me in like the perfect headspace to receive everything that it was giving me. Because when Boots plays in the film, it doesn't just set the tone, it communicates a kind of psychological where and that is the narrative, that's the through line for this franchise. It's the kind of where that comes from existing in a world where horror is normal, where fear is managed not through panic, but through numbness, because this is how we've arrived. This is 28 years later into this, and this is what this movie gets, right? Because it's not just about infection, right? It's about what it means to survive so long after the headlines fade. And it's not something that just amplifies the mood of the movie, but it's mirroring something that I've lived and it's something that we are all living right now because we are all numb to the real events that are happening in the world around us. So this shit is just fucking great.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:42

Yeah. I mean, it you're right. And then I heard you talking, and the first thing I think of is like the alarm of purge. You know what I mean? Like that sound, everybody's like, oh shit. It's take cover. And I think that that definitely I can see how you connect to that because it's something. That triggers like that that mental, like you know, hypnotic kind of thought. For me, looking at what this film did, like the cutscenes were so great. You you could never get comfortable. I feel like there was moments where you're looking at the past and coming back to the present and then thinking of what could be happening. Um, the cutscenes with the infrared, like Blair Witch. I wanted more. Dude, that's so Raven, like foreshadowing. Ooh, I loved it. I think there were so many neat elements in this um movie that were all like how it was shot to fuck with your mind. And I think that it either was the obviously the wardrobe, everything was what you expect, being 28 years into like just straight doom. But um, yeah, there was a lot of moments where I was like, oh, that would be real, right? We would have a CD tower if we were stuck in that year where it's the doom. We're just living in that doom. So this movie, I mean, the production of this movie was the reason why you really wanted to see these movies. And you're like, okay, this is no matter how you feel and how you felt of the other ones, the reason why this was good was because of the way that it was shot. And then the the Kilinder Forest, like you just feel it, like you feel like you were there. The scenes were beautiful. You felt cold, you felt wet, you felt like the fire, you felt everything that just from the way that it was filmed, which was awesome to see.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:33

Yeah, you touched on like the shots of like the landscaping, and I think that's some of the atmosphere that kind of really drew me into this movie because we get some really stunning shots of like when we're in the woods, even the shots of the ocean and things like that. But there's like moments that really stand out, and like for some reason they're like painted in my mind. Like there is a there was a one shot where we got like the camera angle, like looking up from underneath the ferns, and there's like blood from underneath the ferns, right? From like blood splatter, and it's just like that intentional detail that just looked so good, and the colors looked so good, the lighting was so good. So I really just really appreciated just the way that they captured even just some of the still shots in this movie.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:19

There is so much of this that just looks so damn good, and I have a lot to say about that in my favorite scene, but I just really want to again go one more time on this script because what layers and they are purposeful layers, and this is where I'm curious about you know, being because you said there are some things in here that it adds, and it's not a canon, but I'm like, bro, this is this is the person who made the canon who who is now here adding this to the story, so I'm curious about where that comes in for you. But there is a way that this story weaves in emotional weight, grief, attention, and societal commentary. Like you're talking about these cutscenes, these are all cutscenes from films, and when you think about just the historical footage that we tend to see, this is the cyclical nature of war. Like this is the human experience, this is us numbing ourselves to this. But being wore the canon events that you said were non- Oh, I can certainly rattle it off.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:20

So now that we're in the spoiler zone, I feel a little freer to speak my mind. The specific Star Wars like analogy that I want to give is like JJ Abrams doing the first and third of that trilogy and Ryan Johnson doing The Last Jedi. That's kind of what happened with 28 days, weeks, months, or years. God damn it, they really should have done months, anyways. Because yeah, Alex Garland wrote 28 days later, had a hand in 28 weeks later, but didn't write the whole damn thing. And the same with Danny Boyle, he directed one scene, but we have him back again for obviously 28 years later. So here's the thing with alphas, I find that whole thing very strange, the rationality behind how alphas are created, saying that the virus served as kind of like a steroid for some people, because what I struggle with is that alphas, when we hear that, the way it's depicted, especially how it's introduced, it's like if they are the leaders of maybe a a group, right? But to lead means that you have subordinates, which means that you follow instruction, which is the antithesis of rage. Rage is impulsivity. Rage is you don't listen to anyone, you don't do anything, you just do. So how is it that you lead and you think tact like you are tactical about your strategy, but you have a rage virus that you're supposed to just lose your shit and you just are impulsive?

unknown 1:10:50

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:51

That doesn't quite make sense. And then on top of that, again, so certain the virus creates like certain things in terms of steroids, but I mean, that was never really the case then. It's obvious that they introduced that to kind of change up the game in terms of the world much later. Then so that's one.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:10

It's evolution. Things fight and they adapt to be able to survive. Look at how many different strands of viruses we got from 2020 to 2023, for example. These are things that will continue to change over time. And yeah, in this fictional land, of course, there's gonna be a lot of things that probably it seems like it makes sense or it doesn't make sense. But the point being, this is 28 years later, therefore it cannot be the same exact rage virus. If the same exact rage virus existed, they would die out pretty quickly, or they wouldn't be organized enough to be able to like hunt and gather those resources. This is just evolution doing its thing.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:49

So to that point, I think that's where I struggle because then we're deviating from the rage virus and we're becoming a lot like all the other zombie movies that we've seen, where they are different types of infected. So I'm with you because you're right. I mean, science says obviously that it would evolve and they would adapt, but the thing that I liked about 28 Days Later is that it was a rage virus, point blank period. And I don't even think I would have given much thought if they had stayed the same at that point, because that's the whole shtick. That's the thing about the universe, is that it's just rage virus, you know? But when you look at it from that lens, then it's like, okay, all right, so then they adapt. So then I guess we're looking at obviously outside of the city, because we already saw what happens to the people that are infected in the city. They literally the strategy was to starve them to death, and that's how we got 28 weeks later and they were able to rebuild. So I'm assuming that if they were in a populated city, then we would have no infected. And what we're seeing now is obviously like mainland where they're surviving off of animals, I suppose, and that's why they've evolved and survived 28 years later, but somehow don't end up like the like the chubby, you know, cutie little ones that like to eat the worms, I I guess.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:01

But here's my thing. And to your point, Chris, if we implement science, are we just like hoarding them on this island? Why haven't we even tried to do a vaccine? Why didn't we do like 28 weeks later and just fucking kill them?

SPEAKER_05 1:13:14

No, no.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:15

Here's the thing. This is why I love the script.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:18

They backtracked, they said at the very beginning. So you remember that ending where like they go into Paris? Yeah, Europe just basically got their shit together pretty quickly. So we're back in the UK. Like, we're not done with the UK, actually. Sorry, buddy, you you took a turn. So Paris got their shit together real real quick, and I guess the UK is still in the struggle bus.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:38

Okay, here we go. Let's just dive in on this really quick because this is the brilliance of Danny Boyle. Danny Boyle took inspiration from Brexit and he said, look at the shit that we've been through since this last film came out. And let's imagine a world in which something similar happens here. Because the reality and why this story is so fucking great, and I don't see it as a backtrack to just roll over on an ending and say, Well, we didn't really like how that went. I see this as no, this is very much what's happening right now in our world because it's talking about our tendency to compartmentalize and cope with the horrors of the world by just moving on and accepting it as a fact of life. They fought the fires back to the United Kingdom and they quarantined it. And through years of not being able to contain it, or maybe shit goes wrong, and who knows? Maybe as this franchise goes, we're gonna see a lot more inserted between the weeks and years. We're gonna see the plans that went wrong. But eventually, they started focusing on the progression of humanity while an entire country was decimated and left to suffer. That is happening right now. Certainly. They go look at all of us on our TikTok bullshit and look at what's happening in so many other countries. It's not something that like really hell hit me until I kept parsing my thoughts until after the movie was over. But so much has changed in the world since the last two movies were in this franchise were released. And looking at where we are now and looking at our human response to a lot of the current events that are happening, this feels so fucking plausible. This feels like, oh, I don't know what y'all got going on right there, but just keep it over there. We'll stay over here with our delivery drivers. Thanks.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:26

And I mean, I think we saw something even similar with COVID when it first showed up as well, especially in like third world countries when it was obviously like moving rapidly over there, and we were still like, okay, well, we're fine over here, without a doubt. I think my nitpick is the delivery of that, because the Brexit part for sure didn't really resonate too too much until after when I saw that ending and I saw basically the representation of all of the colonized groups in terms of like Scottish, Irish, you know what I mean? Like overall Wales, like that whole vibe, you know, they're thriving. They're thriving. Although this is where I'm also gonna quickly plug in. It was the representation of those groups in Twilight Volturi mode, because they were the Volturi in like some ninja kung fu fight. I loved it.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:21

Teletubbies. They were they were the t there was the telethysties. I loved it.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:26

They were the teletubbies. See that that okay, so that was like that's what I was trying to say. That's the big point, right? Like, because obviously we get the scene of them watching, which is actually one of uh it's oddly one of my favorite scenes because it's so one that watching Teletubbies is so real because if you've ever watched Teletubbies, you're sitting there with a fucking blank dumb expression on your face because that's how fucking dumb that show is. And it's almost as it evokes almost the same reaction, reaction as watching fucking Bambi as a kid. Because outside of the heartbreaking moments, like there's a whole lot of just dumb shit happening in that movie, and you just look like a mind and whatever. But these kids, that's all they knew. It shit hit the fan in that whole scene. The fucking family's getting eaten alive, like sisters, moms, aunts, they're all dying. The father's getting eaten alive, the father, father is getting eaten alive in the fucking church, just embracing it like fucking take me. And this little band of kids probably escaped, and they're like, you know what? We're gonna be the fucking teletubies or the fucking Power Rangers or whatever the fuck they think they are, the fucking parkour gang.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:31

So my brain immediately went teletubbies when I saw this. Not Volturi. Binks, your your toilet reference was Volturi.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:39

No, it the Volturi was like at the it was like a wham of all of these things at once. It's because I all honestly analyzed top down, and when I saw that platinum blonde hair, I and like this the pale Jack O'Connell, I was like, what the fuck's happening here? And then it all kind of came in at once.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:58

Okay. Well, the ending is I know you talked about like equating it to Brexit, but the ending apparently, and this is not something that I am personally familiar with, but there is someone named Jimmy who was a prolific predator, and he died in 2011. And there was like a TV series where he was like beloved as like a household name and then was revealed to be a child predator. So that is apparently what this is referencing at the end. It's something that UK culture is incredibly familiar with. I'm gonna put a link in the show notes.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:33

Don't love that though. Yeah, I don't really like that, you know. That's not what I expected at all.

SPEAKER_04 1:18:38

It again, it's not to glorify this, but it's to point out some insidious things that could be happening in the trilogy coming up. That's crazy. Because in this world where this is someone who was like very famous famous in a household name and then was revealed to have all these things, but in 2002, this thing kind of happens, right? This rage virus breaks out, then the world wouldn't have known what was up in 2002.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:00

It's isn't it a little like fucked up that I mean, he's obviously the kid from the beginning, yeah, and his dad is a pastor, and he's supposed to represent a pr mm.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:10

I don't think a lot of bad happening there.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:12

I was gonna say he reminded me of being in middle school because A, not only did I dress like they did.

SPEAKER_00 1:19:20

Wait, with a bunch of jewelry and a jumpsuit?

SPEAKER_01 1:19:24

Whack ass tracksuit. I would wear a tiara. I was like a fucking I worked at a hot topic, let's remember. But I had a teletubby, I used to have a teletubby's backpack that I like painted like upside down cross and like painted its eyes black and made it all fucking cool kid. Anyway, that fucked me up, Chris. I really hope that's not the case because then that's not as cool as that's that's intense.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:49

That is not what I anticipated at all in terms of their connection with the UK. Here I was thinking, like, oh, it it was even more in terms of just like the political climate, you know, kneecap is like really big now, and so just in general, that's not what I expected.

SPEAKER_00 1:20:03

You know, I'm still yeah, I'm still down with the whole parkour teletubby gang. You know what I mean? Like, that's what I'm hoping for there. You know, I don't need to go any deeper than that. You know, let's just have some deranged kids that just never really grew up. They're like the fucking lost boys, but they all they know is teletubbies. So you know what I mean? Yeah, I'm here for.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:21

The idea here is that now they are the Jimmies who are fixing the UK throughout this fucking chaos, but again, nefarious underpinnings here, because again, this is then the group who left this person strung up upside down with a bag over his head to be fed to the infected, right? So there is something horrifically wrong with this group, and there's a connection there that listen, I'm gonna be researching between now and the next movie. But when I read that as I was I was looking into the ending, I'm like, man, I was just looking for the confirmation of the fucking Tel Wies, and here we go, we got some deep shit.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:59

I know, but it's interesting. It's killer be killed, right? Like you're imagine your entire family gets fucked up. Your dad is like, you know what? It's salvation. Like it's this is how you're supposed to die. That shit fucks you up. All he leaves you is this you kind of want to do the middle finger to the world and be like, fuck you. I'm gonna turn this shit upside down, and I'm gonna figure out my own way of dealing with shit. I would, I'm not gonna say I would string somebody upside down and you know, do what I have to, but I would do what I have to do to for me and my friends to fucking be able to, you know, hang out and fucking not worry about shit. You have to.

SPEAKER_05 1:21:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:38

It's kill or be killed. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:40

But you bring up actually what made one of the scenes like my favorite scene. And it's something that obviously we'll get more into in the second film or the third film, I would for sure imagine. And it's this introduction of like religion in this world, like religious factions and stuff. Cause like I said earlier, that's the stuff that fascinates me, and I think is obviously very like inevitable when it comes to a post-apocalyptic society. But there's like this moment where we get a little bit of a glimpse of what that is and what that looks like with the dinner scene that they're like preparing for him as or as he comes back, right? And we see like this, these women setting up a table, like the sense of community, but there's just one person just standing in the middle with like the most obscure mask that reminded me of this Japanese horror film called Noroi the Curse, one of the scariest movies I've fucking ever seen in my life. And I saw that and I looked at one of my best friends and I was like, bitch, no, got this film haunting me from another one. I will not accept it. And we get little glimpses of it in the cutscenes, right? Like you had mentioned, it's the editing is genius for that. So just give you a little bit of breadcrumbs for what's to come. But I'm so curious now as to what it is that they believe. And I guess it is unpacking a little bit more of what we started with at the beginning with the dad and this idea of like it being what God, you know, wanted. And Danny Boyle has another film out and Alec Alex Garland. They both have a film that I just watched today called Sunshine, where it explores similar, you know, themes in terms of like the end of days and how that ties to like faith. It's definitely something that they're very interested in exploring in their films.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:21

I think my favorite type of scene is the back and forth. And and I like how it fucks with your mind. Like when Spike's sleeping in the abandoned house and he's dreaming and he's going and he's seeing his mom, he's seeing, you know, what could happen, and then you really just focus on the feeling of he's peacefully sleeping, fucking finally, and then things start shaking up, right? And he starts hearing the yelling and he starts hearing the rumbling, and he thinks it's the animals because he just learned that experience, and everything is new for him. Um, so he doesn't understand, he doesn't understand what's happening.

SPEAKER_00 1:23:58

Sleep with one eye open.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:00

I know, and it it's great, it's a it's focused on his face. You just want to make sure he's okay, and then the dad saves him before it all tumbles down. Like, I think that scene for me, I was like, fuck, that that was beautifully done. No, I said it already, but this entire fucking any zombie apocalypse, you can't get comfortable, which is fucking terrifying.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:23

You know what else was uncomfortable? Watching an infected woman give birth to a fucking baby.

SPEAKER_03 1:24:27

Okay, let's do it because that's round three. That's that's round three.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:32

Let's talk about it because like I wasn't ready for it. I wasn't ready for the schlong, and I wasn't ready for a baby popping out of an infected woman.

SPEAKER_03 1:24:39

Like this should not have been the Renesme of the 28 Days franchise or whatever we want to call it, because you've gotta be fucking kidding me. I have never seen something so cliche than that moment where she's holding hands, helping her push out a fucking baby.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:00

The magic of the placenta. I don't understand how this logically makes sense. It doesn't. This this one I I can get behind. Obviously, we know that the virus like can transform and evolve. And you know, we had like 28 weeks later introduced carriers, people that had some form of immunity, but then we don't know where it goes, and now 28 years later we don't know what the virus did. Maybe it had to evolve, and now we have alphas, but like you're telling me you can conceive a whole ass fucking baby as an infected person, and that baby isn't infected.

SPEAKER_04 1:25:31

Okay, so listen, the questions that I had was this a woman who was pregnant and then became infected, or is this an infected woman and they banged? You know, because the alpha seemed very interested in having this.

SPEAKER_00 1:25:46

Alpha wanted that baby. It's either that baby is his or he likes the taste of babies. Like it's one of the two.

SPEAKER_04 1:25:52

The last time we saw someone chase a baby this hard was Michael Myers when he was chasing his own baby with his own little niece. That was weird. I can't. You didn't see that movie with Paul Steven Rudd.

SPEAKER_00 1:26:03

Yeah, that was true.

SPEAKER_04 1:26:04

Stop reminding me.

SPEAKER_03 1:26:05

I'm not gonna let you forget it. Oh, that's fair. I I deserve that. For the sake of me being an Alex Garland fan, I swear that it better be that it was just a pregnant woman that got infected, and somehow, like the rest of the infected, they all lost their clothes for some fucking reason. Who knows why? It better be that, because if you're gonna go ahead and tell me that these infected are also fucking like at that point, show me the orgy, all right? You know, like show me that it's actually happening. I doubt it. I doubt it. Also, what do you mean?

SPEAKER_01 1:26:36

That's part of the rage. You rage fuck, you rage run, you you're really hot, so you don't have to wear clothes. You fucking that's the whole rage. No, you're right. I guess the rage. That's that's the rage.

SPEAKER_00 1:26:49

No, get down with the rage. You can just run around naked.

SPEAKER_03 1:26:52

I can't. It's gonna keep me up at night. It's all the rage. It's the worst. It's the worst, is what it is, because I agree with you, Sean. They already teed us up with this idea of immunity with 28 weeks later. At that point, okay? Now with the Brexit thing, sure. All of a sudden, no doctor survived 28 years later. So I guess there's that except for one loon. So whatever. Okay. But then what? Alex was the only person that had a mutational like DNA gene that made him immune? No one else in this bitch is immune either.

SPEAKER_04 1:27:27

I think that baby's gonna be the secret to the cure.

SPEAKER_03 1:27:32

Well, God, I would hope so, because now that they've introduced it, they certainly gotta explain and they better explain the fuck away. Because the difference between what happened there with that baby and the mom and the son in 28 weeks later is like sure it ha clearly is some type of like DNA situation that's happening there because they got bit and thus discovered that they were immune. In this case, they're trying to make it seem like. Like the last of us. They're trying to make it seem like it's the last of us. But the problem here is that with that rationality, the mom had gotten bitten as she was about to give birth to Ellie, the main character of The Last of Us, and that's why she is immune. In this case, we've got a full-fledged infected person that is sustaining a birth, a perfect birth, off of eating all kinds of who knows what and where, people, mostly. And it just so happens to also be infect uh have this DNA mutation and it's immune. Like, no, I don't know.

SPEAKER_04 1:28:35

All I'm I can buy a lot of all the facts yet.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:38

There's so much we don't know.

SPEAKER_03 1:28:40

There better be so many facts. But the worst of it all, I'll even excuse that insanity. But the worst part of it was the hand holding and her aiding an infected person to give birth. There is no explaining your way out of that one.

SPEAKER_04 1:28:56

She's a girl's girl. That's the explanation.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:59

No, no, I I mean I can say one thing, and I cannot agree with like I would have expected her to be dead and then maybe the baby come out or like something. But the fact that she was like, oh shit, I'm not going to kill you. I wanted to kill you five minutes ago, but now I think you're gonna do something with your hands. I'm okay. I'm happy now. We're friends. Let me push this thing out. And then five fucking seconds later, never mind, I want to kill you. The only thing keeping you sane is that child, okay, which is literally the spawn of Satan inside of you. No.

SPEAKER_04 1:29:36

Maybe it's less of an actual choice. And listen, first off, let me just go back here and just say it was a fucking we're good scene. It was a fucking weird scene. This is the thing that made me as uncomfortable as Victoria fucking herself with a shard of glass in Terrifier 3. Oh, okay. It was uncomfy.

SPEAKER_00 1:29:56

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 1:29:57

It was uncomfy. It was cringy. I was like, no.

SPEAKER_00 1:30:00

I see it. I see it. Not quite as crazy, I think, but I see it.

SPEAKER_04 1:30:04

I do think maybe complete different ends of the spectrum. It's not as crazy, but it was a similar sensation. However, now that I have having said that, let me just proceed with sometimes this shit is just fucking overwhelming. I don't think that that infected woman ever had any conscious choice of not attacking. I think she was just a little busy pushing pushing something out of her fucking vagina. I think that was it. It was a momentary distraction.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:31

If I were Spike or his mom, if I were, I would have killed the bitch. And then the baby, what, you got like five seconds to get that baby out? Okay, you want to save the baby? Fucking cut it out. Like you would like there's so many moments where moms die in car accidents, but the baby's fine. You know what I mean? It's still beating and shit. So I know I got real gruesome, but I you kill her. You kill her and you take the baby if you really want that baby, but just leave it. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 1:31:01

How cool would it have been if the baby just like ate its way out of the mom? You know what I mean? Like that's even like we just lingered in that scene for a little bit, like she was just raging out, but then they realized she wasn't really raging at them because she was just raging because her insides were being eaten by this raged-out fucking baby that just like it's like the alien like chest popping, chest bursting scene, but like instead it's just like the baby just like slowly eating its way out. That'd be fucking crazy. Yeah, it rips its own umbilical cord out. Like, I'm free, bitch.

SPEAKER_04 1:31:33

So I'm so glad you brought this up. I would like to just read you the overview of a movie that I watched in March of last year. It's called It's Alive from 1974. Leaving their son Chris with a family friend, Frank and Lenore head to the hospital for the birth of their second child, which turns out to be a mutant who kills many doctors and nurses as it escapes. Convinced his monstrous son must be destroyed, Frank ignores Lenore and Chris's plea and tries to destroy their freakish progeny, unaware that the infant may be the blameless product of an experimental drug gone wrong. That is a killer fetus. It literally fucking fights its way out of the womb and fucks everybody up.

SPEAKER_00 1:32:13

Love it.

SPEAKER_04 1:32:14

I think you do want to see that movie.

SPEAKER_00 1:32:15

I love the resilience.

SPEAKER_03 1:32:17

I really do. But I want to just really quickly, because I'm still not over the fact that it made you as uncomfortable as Terrifier 3 in that scene of Phonica, although absolutely warranted. It wasn't being teabagged by the Alpha because the way that that scene was shot was at an angle where the alpha lands on his feet, does a full-on squat, like massive dick and balls, just right on the camera. It was a lot. That was one of the jump scares.

SPEAKER_04 1:32:45

I don't think I possess the personal experience to be alarmed by that. That's fair. Completely phased over my head.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:52

Shot on iPhone. Shot on iPhone.

SPEAKER_00 1:32:55

All 28 inches.

SPEAKER_03 1:32:56

So a little too personal. I won't have it. I won't have it. But I just wanted to quickly say that because it was very, very alarming. But moving on to other things that happened, because there's so many other characters in this film, and Vero, you're right. Maybe a little too many. Maybe a little too many.

SPEAKER_04 1:33:10

Well, can we shout out just a great character who actually was involved in my favorite scene, which is Isla. Her euthanization was devastating. And this is a moment in this movie where I sobbed quietly trying not to just cause too much attention and draw too much attention to myself. But the reveal of her diagnosis, despite having to come to terms with that, to realize that, okay, Spike, listen, kid, you're naive as fuck. Good for you. You're trying, your heart's in the right place, you're a good kid, but you don't know how to make sense of the world because your parents haven't had the most essential honest conversations with you. So to see his raw pain when he was just absorbed in this devastating news and this disbelief, demanding to know better. But then to have the doctor being so supportive and actually try to sit him down for the conversation that she he should have had to understand the meaning of balancing life and death and love. Oh my gosh, that whole scene was just a gut punch and then a knife into my heart with some twisting.

SPEAKER_00 1:34:24

It was like the most in like insane part. Like that made my wife cry. Like she was like, I didn't expect to cry in this movie.

SPEAKER_04 1:34:32

Yeah, it was honestly, it's the ritualization of grief. And it's it's heavy.

SPEAKER_03 1:34:37

Well, and that's where I was gonna bring up Ray Fines as the doctor, because I think, man, obviously, one of the greats, I think he's an incredible actor in everything that he does, no matter if it's comedy, drama, frickin' Harry Potter, whatever. It's just like stellar acting through and through. But Jody Komare also is incredible. I I need to familiarize myself a little bit more with her. I've seen her in a few things, but like she's incredible. Everyone there is is incredible. And that scene is really, really heartfelt. And I r uh God, I do wish that I wasn't so like bitter and annoyed by all of the other ridiculous things that had happened in the film so that I could really sink my teeth in. If I were to force myself to re-watch this, now that the anger and like the annoyance has passed, I feel like maybe I'd allow myself to feel the depth and the weight of that scene a little bit more. But I agree, in terms of the delivery, he Ray Feinz just knows how to like have that balance between like the com the comedy and the dialogue, play into the fact that he is this, you know, seen as crazy doctor that lives out on his own, but then ha still has so much wisdom and tact and insight on death because he's a doctor. He's seen it plenty and now he's inciting, but almost as a s as a means of salvation.

SPEAKER_04 1:35:54

Yeah. But that's also goes to speak to how far gone this society is, right? Like this is a group of people who took a sane man and they feared him to be insane, and it was because they as a population observed him from afar and just assumed.

SPEAKER_00 1:36:09

They just don't understand him. It's a mis it's in being misunderstood and outcast for just fucking, you know, but what do you expect? You're in a post-apocalyptic shit. You're there's a bunch of fucking raging fucking freaks running at you, man. You're gonna kill him, and you know what I'm gonna do to pass the time? I'm gonna build a fucking tower of your fucking bones. How's that? Yeah, you know, seems perfectly logical and fun to me.

SPEAKER_04 1:36:31

Look at this, right? They as a community have patrol boats for a quarantine, looking to keep them in, and they themselves outcast one of their own. And granted, he made the choice to stay out there, but he welcomed them, he waved at them, he never did anything violent towards them. He just stayed out there and built the bone throne, the bone kingdom, the memento mori museum, the mausoleum.

SPEAKER_00 1:36:58

This was the neighbor from home alone, basically. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 1:37:02

Like that's exactly it.

SPEAKER_00 1:37:03

They thought he was a monster, but really he's just a nice dude.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:07

But to be fair, he did the bones were from both, right? It was from people that were infected, from people that have died. Like he was not biased on his bone selection, I'll say. But the fact that he knew the importance of saying, take your mom's skull that burned way too quickly, her entire body, um, and put it somewhere that matters. Put it wherever you think. And he he was giving back, you know, what you feel when you lose somebody, right? You you need something to remember them by, and he gave them that opportunity. But I think that the way that they built the characters, if they would have done more on how they built him with everybody else, I probably would have liked it. I will say that Eric was fucking pointless and he pissed me off the entire time. I wish he would not have been in the movie. I everything about him, everything, the way that he tells his story about the delivery driver, like I could have done without any of that. Doesn't matter at all. That's why he's in the fucking movie for like five minutes. He thinks he's fucking some hot Swedish guy. I don't know. Everything about him was cocky, disgusting. He wasn't funny. I didn't need him at all.

SPEAKER_04 1:38:25

But Eric exists to show us that our world still exists outside of the UK.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:32

I feel like we could have done it differently, though. And and I think you're right, we could have done it differently. We could have shared it in a cutscene. We could have like maybe showed some type of aid that never made it. We could have showed how they patrolled and quarantined. I wouldn't have given them spoken words. Like I wouldn't have given them an a name to begin with, you know. Like, yes, they need to get saved some way or another, but I honestly sometimes wish it would have been Spike that figured it out and fucking did it on his own. But I I just I the only thing I liked about him was the predator spine ripping skull, you know, the little predator fucking head jam.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:16

The only thing you liked about him was his death.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:17

His death, yes.

SPEAKER_04 1:39:18

It sounds like what you wanted was the M night Shyamalan village treatment of this where we go through the whole movie and then Spike makes it off the island and realizes holy shit, you got fucking world star out here in Taco Bell.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:31

Not even, but I just feel like, and you to be fair, like, yeah, if I want to give it some thought, uh they're the jar head bro dudes that you're never gonna like that are like oh warp, okay, let me go. Like, I look at me, I'm fucking up my life and everybody around. I get it. He'd played it really well, but I feel like we could have done it maybe at a later time. I don't know. I it felt weird being in that moment, in that time, in that second.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:59

Yeah, well, you know, Chris, you mentioned specifically, you know, feeling like he represents like a life outside of this, right? And I I agree with you to a certain extent. I think what I'm kind of getting from his character and the whole tie with his phone and all this stuff, and even the very beginning scene, because I've been thinking a lot about the opening of this movie, right? And it doesn't make sense that that scene was the like start of the outbreak, because I don't think if you go 28 years from that, you have this Jimmy character at the age that he is. I think he would be like way older, or look maybe looking a little bit older. I don't know. I think that this is probably like a representation, all of this is a representation or a hint that they did successfully like stop the virus for a moment, and then we had another outbreak, like another unexpected outbreak. So there was some level of like living in some normalcy, but I think that there was another outbreak that happened, another evolution of this virus, and that this is worldwide potentially, or did affect some parts of the world. So I don't know. It's just my thought. That's what I'm getting from it.

SPEAKER_01 1:41:06

I mean, we figured out a shot for rabies, right? Isn't that the original fucking rage? Let's be honest. And if you get rabies, you're fucking dead. Sorry. So even if it's an uh a you're gonna need a booster every fucking three months, whatever it is, something should have come. They chose to isolate these people and quarantine them and do whatever it is because of who they were or whatever. But I don't know. It's hard to truly buy in to what the fuck is gonna happen because I, you know, the this movie, I was like, would that actually happen? Let's be real. What you can make an iPhone, but you can't give me a fucking little a little needle that gives me just a little rage. Well, just a little rage. People wouldn't take it.

SPEAKER_03 1:41:52

Yeah, I was gonna say he also, I mean, there also would be a slew of people that would be afraid to take it, as we see in present day. So we've got all that, and then we also could say, well, there's no cuter cancer still, so I guess there's that, and then we also know that the politics and surviving surviving the rage and getting cancer.

SPEAKER_01 1:42:13

Bro, just nuke the island.

SPEAKER_00 1:42:15

Lame.

SPEAKER_03 1:42:16

I feel like also I need to tell the girlies at this point, it's a little too late because you've seen the movie if you're in this part of the episode already. But Aaron Taylor Johnson is not in this movie as long as you may think. Like he's in it for maybe a third of it, but he'll be coming back for more, one would assume. I thought that he was going to be our lead. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:42:36

Wait, let's talk about this guy, though, because I have some feelings about this dude. Unpack it, let's go. I mean, obviously, he's an asshole because he's like fucking on his wife who's sitting there dying, right? That's one thing. But just help me to like piece this together, right? Like your kid steals your wife, his mom, they go trek it out on the mainland. It's like his second time out there, right? Like, you are just cool with it. Like, you just don't do shit. You just like sit home and fucking twiddle your fucking balls or whatever the fuck you're doing over there, right? But then the kid decides to like leave a note and then you get pissed off, and then you're gonna go after him. Like, you start flipping, like, it's too fucking late, buddy. Like, you it's too late to step up and become a father at this point. You're just a fucking idiot.

SPEAKER_04 1:43:24

You know why? It took an agree more. He was out. Wow, there it is. Yes. I agree.

SPEAKER_00 1:43:30

It's all the rage, actually. It's all the rage.

SPEAKER_04 1:43:33

Okay, but again, I do think he is the moral gray in this character because I don't love him for sure. I'm not a huge, huge, huge fan of him. I didn't misunderstand his name at the beginning of the movie when she called him Jamie, and I definitely thought she called him Jimmy. So there's that.

SPEAKER_00 1:43:51

Too many Jimmies, Jamies.

SPEAKER_04 1:43:53

Don't be fooled by the rocks that I got.

SPEAKER_01 1:43:55

I'm still I'm still Jimmy from the It's the UK, y'all. It's the UK. There's a lot of Jimmies, Jamies, Greggs, Crags.

SPEAKER_04 1:44:03

But there is the the aspect of him as a dad, because there's a couple moments that are really endearing. A, it's helping your son navigate through all of this. He is obviously immensely proud of his son, and there is that moment when they're overlooking uh from the addict, and Spike is apologizing for his failures, and his father is just absolutely having none of it. He's like, I've seen grown men who can't even get a bow off because they're shaking so bad. You were perfect, like you were great.

SPEAKER_00 1:44:35

It started strong, and then it went way downhill, way fast.

SPEAKER_04 1:44:39

It for sure did. And listen, far be it from me. I'm usually the person trashing all the fucking dads and husbands here, okay? Like, this is my brand. However, there is the extreme of this situation, and there's something about how Aaron Taylor Johnson plays him that really executes the moral great nicely. Because I still don't like him at the end of the movie, but you realize that he is a flawed human being.

SPEAKER_00 1:45:04

Super flawed. I I mean, he's like that that opening part is definitely emotional. It's good. Like he's playing a really good father figure in those moments where he takes Spike out hunting or whatever. It is great, and then all of a sudden they come back and he's just getting fucking wasted. It's like a fever dream. He's lying about everything. It feels weird. It now doesn't feel the same at all. Like it took a drastic turn. Now he's then he's also cheating on his wife, and then like it's just a whole mess from there. It's just a whole mess from there.

SPEAKER_04 1:45:35

Again, I think there's more to learn about him, right? In the next film.

SPEAKER_01 1:45:40

I will say the the one thing that fucked me up a little too hard, just from you know, I'm like, cancer always gets you, and maybe that's my my life and my you know history with it. But I'm like, no matter what, you're never safe from cancer. So I was fucking I hated it.

SPEAKER_04 1:45:56

Well, I'm excited to see what the next movie has in store for him, but I actually won't turn my attention to what I thought was the worst fucking part of this movie. How many times are you gonna sedate an alpha and not fucking put his ass down? Take his ass out.

SPEAKER_03 1:46:10

There it is. The grand finale of my takes. Take his ass out. Wow. And Chris, you you brought it up before I did. That was my grand finale of my like dissertation of all the shit that's questionable about this movie.

SPEAKER_00 1:46:24

That dude's skull would be at the top of my fucking skull tree for sure.

SPEAKER_03 1:46:29

Absolutely. Because to your point, Vadel, he doesn't have a bias until he does with alphas. I guess he's really into it because he literally just sedates them and keeps them around. And if someone comes to me and says that he's potentially experimenting on them, but all of a sudden doesn't have the equipment to help the mom, but has enough equipment to experiment on the alphas, get the fuck out of here with that.

SPEAKER_04 1:46:54

Okay. I don't know about experimentation in terms of like he's I don't think he's making the alphas. I think he's trying to study and learn about study and learn them. Yeah. I don't think it's anything where he's trying to do it posthumously where he would need any equipment for it. But there are clearly more fucking alphas you can learn from. They're not exactly endangered, my guy. They're not any more endangered than you are. Take his ass out. Maybe he didn't square up with them one-on-one in the past, because he usually say he said he usually tries to avoid it, and maybe he's is more of a passive person, but I think when you're in the situations that you're in multiple times, if you can sedate this fucking thing, exterminate it. Get rid of it. This thing is a danger to you.

SPEAKER_01 1:47:38

At least learn how to fucking kill it. Learn how to kill it, because one, two, shree shots ain't it. Maybe a fire shot? What the fuck? Like learn how to kill them so that you can be Yeah, you have to take them out for sure.

SPEAKER_00 1:47:52

I mean, I still think this movie did a lot of things different, a lot of things really well, but I one thing that I'm still gonna always feel that I didn't get is the like raw grit that the first two movies had. Like I wanted a little bit more of that. I loved how it looked, some of the shots that we got with the cinematography, but I was kind of low-key missing the moments that felt like really just raw and chaotic. Like I wanted to see more of that chaotic handheld style. Like, I think like the smartphone filming, it did make it look a little bit too good in some moments, and I wanted to see some of that graininess come back.

SPEAKER_01 1:48:34

So I don't know if we'll ever get that again, but I like the Living Dead because of how gross they look, and and we nailed it with this movie. That's my favorite part.

SPEAKER_03 1:48:44

I'm with you on that because as another like hair away from a hack, I would say that that's also the best part because the gore and the editing is what drove it home in terms of it still being an overall like tense, stressful film. So that was definitely not a pretty sight to see, most certainly not in theaters, when you're like four rows away from a massive screen on like IMAX or Dolby. That was a choice that I don't know if I would ever make again. Much like me watching this movie. I am very hard pressed to watch this again before the next film. I think I remember enough. I think that ending will remind me exactly what I need to see. And if I need a quick refresher, I'm sure I could just watch it on YouTube or something, like some a quick recap. But I I just don't feel the strong need to put myself through that. And quite frankly, it could be that I'm just really upset and disappointed by the film right now. Catch me in a few years, maybe I'll change my mind. But right now, not even my AMC A list could be used to rewatch this movie.

SPEAKER_04 1:49:50

That is wild to me. This movie is so much better than you're giving it credit for. I really hope you come around to it. Listen, I'm gonna rewatch this again and I'm going To uh do a franchise binge before the next one comes out in January 2026, because again, I am open to revisiting the first one because of how good this movie was. And I'm just honestly, I'm so excited for what this means. Let's also just go back to the fact I know that you all prefer perhaps the uh a different look than what they were able to achieve on this film, but the fact that we have a major motion picture, a blockbuster raking in with a lot of success right now, and it was filmed on something as accessible as an iPhone, incredible era for filmmakers to be in.

SPEAKER_01 1:50:37

I will re-watch this. Thanks. This is the first time that I disagree with you on this entire thing. I will rewatch it. And I love Easter eggs, and I feel like I missed some. There has to be one, right? Like when they're putting the the whole like party together, you see the banner that says establish in 2002.

SPEAKER_00 1:50:54

Oh man. I definitely think I'll watch this one again. Uh, I'm probably the same as you, Chris. I'll probably do a franchise binge. I'm excited to see this trilogy unfold. So I'm I'm really curious to see like how the story progresses with the thought of three movies that are gonna happen. So then also watching all five would be crazy. So we'll see. But I am excited to watch this one again.

SPEAKER_04 1:51:17

Wow. Maybe you and I'll watch together since we're the only ones who actually really enjoyed it very passionately. But for now, there you have it, folks. 28 years later from 2025 has earned a universal slash, and we'll see if it stays that way by the end of the year. Now we've certainly had a robust discussion here, but the conversation doesn't end here by any means.

SPEAKER_00 1:51:37

Yeah, if you want to find out how you can do some post-apocalyptic parkour with us and go further than this episode, consider supporting the show. Visit patreon.com slash hackerslash and enjoy even more of the show, including bonus content with early access, extended episodes with our B-sides, movie nominations, and live shows.

SPEAKER_02 1:51:56

And if you enjoyed us recapping 28 years later, leave us a five star review wherever you get your podcasts. This helps us to continue to deliver great content for all you horror fiends out there.

SPEAKER_04 1:52:06

We'll see you next time, folks. And remember, Memento Marie.

SPEAKER_00 1:52:09

You're all insane.