28 Weeks Later - Spoliers

[the_wildcard]

Well I just caught this movie on DVD and I have to say that the plot holes were more fictional than the idea of the virus iteself, hahaha.

1) How do 2 children escape over the bridge without being detected along the way there? (Sure they get detected, but that's after they cross) I mean they show so many military personnel that it's practically overflowing in redundancy....yet when it counts, there are none, haha.

2) Same argument goes to how the father/husband is able to go see his wife. How is it that the military does not put guards in front of the wife's room?! And then they show the infected husband attack an armed guard who does'n't put up a fight at all.

3) The strength of the infected is ridiciously inconsistent. They can punch through wood but not through car glass? hahahaha

4) If the military had to option of using gas and also napalm-like bombing, I do not see why they would use the naplam-like bombing first. Using gas would seem like the 1st option since it causes no property damage.

5) The military setup is ridicuolous as well. If there was any chance the wife was infected, there is no way they would bring her to the same isle that all of the civillians were at. You would bring her to a seperate location, so that if it were to somehow spread, it would not endanger the civllian population.

6) Oh and I love how the movie shows how the husband had to use his ID card to get through everywhere in the medical center. So I guess when he's infected, he's also smart enough to do that as well? Cuz the infected just look like they run around in a crazed frenzy. I doubt they have enough logic to use their ID cards and swipe, haha.

But don't get me wrong, haha, it was pretty entertaining and well I have a crush on Rose Byrne.

 

[nx1701g]

1) How do 2 children escape over the bridge without being detected along the way there? (Sure they get detected, but that's after they cross) I mean they show so many military personnel that it's practically overflowing in redundancy....yet when it counts, there are none, haha.

They were almost caught more than once. It's not really as unlikely as you may think.

2) Same argument goes to how the father/husband is able to go see his wife. How is it that the military does not put guards in front of the wife's room?! And then they show the infected husband attack an armed guard who does'n't put up a fight at all.

It was explained in the movie. Their father was an administrator of the building where they were staying which was why he had the keycard. He had unlimited access.

3) The strength of the infected is ridiciously inconsistent. They can punch through wood but not through car glass? hahahaha

No defense there.

4) If the military had to option of using gas and also napalm-like bombing, I do not see why they would use the naplam-like bombing first. Using gas would seem like the 1st option since it causes no property damage.

They needed to ensure containment and weren't sure that the gas would work.

5) The military setup is ridicuolous as well. If there was any chance the wife was infected, there is no way they would bring her to the same isle that all of the civillians were at. You would bring her to a seperate location, so that if it were to somehow spread, it would not endanger the civllian population.

That was somewhat explained in the film too. Most of London wasn't contained and there were still hazards. But I agree.

6) Oh and I love how the movie shows how the husband had to use his ID card to get through everywhere in the medical center. So I guess when he's infected, he's also smart enough to do that as well? Cuz the infected just look like they run around in a crazed frenzy. I doubt they have enough logic to use their ID cards and swipe, haha.

They were using the ventilation system some times. Also, a lot of security doors you can exit without swiping your card but have to swipe it to reenter (learned that the hard way when I locked my office keycard in my office one time).

But don't get me wrong, haha, it was pretty entertaining and well I have a crush on Rose Byrne.

She's even better in Damages.

 

[mostly_nameless]

My favorite part was when the army knew there was a crisis, so they handled it by herding everyone into the garage, which was about as secure as a high school gymnasium, and then turned out all the lights so that the civilians were helpless when the infected broke in.

Still, I was trying to hang in there, after all, you can write off a lot of stupid things as "government stupidity", until dad turned into super-zombie who could be everywhere and outrun bombs.

That pretty much finished the movie for me.

 

[CommanderTrip]

I'm kind of looking forward to the third movie, 28 Months Later (I think the movie just went into pre-production or someone is starting to put something together.)

28 weeks could have been a lot worse. Horror sequels now adays tend to "bastardize" the franchises that spawn them.

(See: Saw. Jason X. Any of the Chucky Movies after the second one.


Also, I didn't mention this in my last post, so I thought I would include it here.

Hmm.. I would say it's not that big of a deal.

 

[Turd Ferguson]

Personally, I see 28 Weeks Later as the Aliens to 28 Days Later's Alien. Both up the action and stakes and both are fun rides.

Granted, there is a large amount of stupidity on everyone's account, as well as glaring inconsistencies about how the Rage infected people act and their abilities, but I love both flicks and can't wait to see 28 Months Later.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

6) Oh and I love how the movie shows how the husband had to use his ID card to get through everywhere in the medical center. So I guess when he's infected, he's also smart enough to do that as well? Cuz the infected just look like they run around in a crazed frenzy. I doubt they have enough logic to use their ID cards and swipe, haha.

I think the implication was that he was different because he got infected by his wife, who was special. Weren't there weird glimpses into his mind where he could see his wife or something like that (it's been a long time since I've seen the movie).

Granted, the movie had horrendous plot holes (especially with the army's attempts to contain the situation), but it was still fun. I hope they make 28 Months as the Final one. Honestly, these movies are great just for the music.

 

[Dr. Chandra]

Personally, I see 28 Weeks Later as the Aliens to 28 Days Later's Alien. Both up the action and stakes and both are fun rides.

Granted, there is a large amount of stupidity on everyone's account, as well as glaring inconsistencies about how the Rage infected people act and their abilities, but I love both flicks and can't wait to see 28 Months Later.

Agreed. I liked both very much, and I'm looking forward to the next installment. France!

 

[Gotham Central]

The different abilities/behaviour of Rage infected people makes perfect sense. Infection or not, they are basically just people with a disease. People have varying degrees of speed, strength and agility. Rage is probably only giving them a prolonged adreanaline rush. Thus they are are slightly stronger than they would be otherwise (not to mention that they have no inhibitions and no fear). Thus, just like the average person, some people are going to be able to punch through a wooden door and some not. Makes perfect sense to me.

The thing to remember about this movie is that Rage is a virus essentially like any other. There is no mysticism involved.

 

[Ethros]

I liked it a lot. Come on, the helicopter bit was worth the price of admission alone

And I know I'm not alone in thinking the daughter Tammy was hot.


Roll on 28 Months Later

 

[Starkers]

I liked it a lot. Come on, the helicopter bit was worth the price of admission alone

And I know I'm not alone in thinking the daughter Tammy was hot.


Roll on 28 Months Later

Yeah the helicopter bit was fantastic...and no, you're not alone re Tammy!

 

[Tom]

Agreed. I liked both very much, and I'm looking forward to the next installment. France!

Not neccesarily France, while the infection was brought over to there (Thanks kids! lol ) , it must have then spead all over Europe given its not a sealable island like England is. As the notion of '28 Months Later' may indicate that it did indeed become a worldwide plague and now most of the infected have died off like in 28 weeks later.

 

[Ethros]

According to an interview done around when 28 Weeks came out, Danny Boyle's idea was for 28 Months to take place in Russia with a 2009 release.
Not sure how viable that release is now though, but I hope it gets done eventually

 

[nx1701g]

^ I read online in January that plans for 28 Months Later have been temporarily shelved.

 

[Barbados Slim]

The only good part is the first 7 or 8 minutes until he leaves his wife. Then the movie gets really logic-dumb. You've brought up most of the problems I had with the idiotic plot. But let's include:

Why is the US repopulating London without cleaning up the entire Isle of bodies and guaranteeing the infection's done?

Why were those kids so damned curious and lacked any fight-or-flight instinct? They just kept searching out the strange sound in the dark corner.

Why is part A of the Army's infection contingency plan to put everyone in an unguard and not completely locked room?

Why is part B of the Army's infection contingency plan to turn off all the lights in the city case of infection? Shouldn't they have turned on all the lights so they can better tell who's a zombie and who's a scared civilian?

 

[Dane_Whitman]

Yes, this movie has a lot of problems in the logic department, but I had a fun time watching it. I like it better than the first one. And if the writers are not clever enough to get people into extremely dangerous situations without creating plot holes that can swallow a Star Destroyer, then that's a shame, but it didn't ruin the fun for me.

 

[Barbados Slim]

I never bought the "It was dumb but it was entertaining" argument. Even fluffy "dumb" movies have to be smart about something. High School Musical is smart about its music numbers and charm. Fiction writers have to think of their audience. If your audience is smarter than your characters, your story has no legs to stand on.

With horror, if your heroes are incompetent, then there's nothing scary about their peril. The best horror movies take competent, strong characters and pulls the rug from under them. Look at the two priests in The Exorcist. Or the crew of the Nostromo in Alien. Or the badass Colonial Marines in Aliens. Or the six kick-ass, athletic women of The Descent. Who was I supposed to care about in this film? The two, idiotic, obnoxious kids? Or the soldiers who failed to fall back on training and immediately fell into anarchic chaos?

 

[CommodoreKong]

3) The strength of the infected is ridiciously inconsistent. They can punch through wood but not through car glass? hahahaha

My guess is that different infected have different levels of strength. People who were very strong before before they died can break through wood or glass but ones who weren't as strong can't.

 

[Dane_Whitman]

A film can be good entertainment without likeable characters we care about. And not all good horror needs a logical plot. Take Fulci's classic The Beyond for example, or City of the Living Dead. It's just random things happening within the loose context of a shaky plot, and that's what they were intended to be. With The Beyond Fulci tried to make what he called an 'absolute film'. A lot of the old masters of Eurohorror favoured style over substance, and were all too ready to admit it. That doesn't make their films any less effective. Are they scary? Sometimes not, but they are interesting and stylish. Sometimes they are scary just because they are so irrational.

Now, I'm not saying 28 Weeks Later is anything like that particular brand of exploitation and horror cinema. I'm not defending it's rather weak script, in fact the zombie dad who kept reappearing all around town as if he had a personal transporter on him made me roll my eyes. I am saying the "dumb but entertaining" way of reasoning is not bullshit. Not all films have to be critically analysed, sometimes a collection of cool individual scenes will make an incoherent mess great.

 

[the_wildcard]

NX1701g - Haha, I still don't buy the fact they did not put any armed guards in front of his wife's room. Doesn't even matter if the door is locked with a key card, they should have still put guards. But I appreciate the responses. I was glad to see that I wasn't the only one who found the plot holes.

I have to agree with all of you, that yes, it was pretty entertaining. The helicopter scene was quite hilarious.

So how did the virus spread? They showed the helicopter in the ending scenes and it looked abandoned. Sounds like maybe the helicopter crashed? or did the infected just run through the english channel tunnel?

 

[nx1701g]

^ They don't really say. It is implied that the brother infected his sister and she spread the virus along. Remember only the boy was immune to the disease, his sister was not.