Twenty-eight years after the rage virus outbreak, 28 Years Later follows Spike, a 12-year-old boy, and his father, Jamie, living on a fortified tidal island off England’s coast. For Spike’s first mainland trip—a rite-of-passage hunt to kill an infected—they cross the causeway, encountering mutated infected, including slow-moving “Slow-Lows” and intelligent “Alphas.” Spike spots a distant fire burning on the horizon, a haunting signal from deep within the wasteland. Drawn by what he saw, Spike returns to the mainland with his ailing mother, setting off a journey that leads them into the heart of a ravaged and secret-filled UK.

28 Years Later Review

28 Days Later redefined the zombie horror subgenre, supplanting the slow shambling brain-eaters of 50s B-horror for hordes of rage-filled, lightning-quick undead (or near enough) rampaging monsters wanting only to tear their next victim to shreds. 28 Weeks Later was a jazzed-up Hollywood-infected cash-grab capitalizing on the original’s goodwill but bringing nothing of value to the table.

28 Years Later is… a platypus—several different animals stitched together to create something awkward and ungainly and utterly forgotten by everyone unless it stabs them with its poisonous barb. That might be a touch overdramatic, but this entry into the franchise is definitely a strange animal, one that I’m not sure I can adequately critique without spoiling some significant beats. Ye be warned.

The initial 45 minutes of the film are a father-and-son coming-of-age story set in a lush but eerily empty post-apocalyptic world. Director Danny Boyle shines as he masterfully creates a world that feels lived in and authentic, with its own organically wrought rules and culture.

Aaron Taylor-Johnson plays a charismatic and loving father who’s a capable and resourceful man, and whose son wants nothing more than to make him proud and emulate him. It’s three-quarters of an hour of tension that is full of a special type of depth only a father-son adventure can generate.

Then, after a harrowing and nearly fatal expedition into the wilderness, Dad is discovered to be lacking in some very fundamental ways. So, his son wants nothing to do with him from now on, and we don’t see Taylor-Johnson again (except for a brief one-minute scene at the film’s end).

The next hour is a cross-country journey in which giant toxically masculine and very naked zombies known as “alphas” litterally swing big d!@k energy (DO NOT SEE THIS IN 3D) around while chasing down the same twelve-year-old boy and his ailing and helpless (expcept when she isn’t) mother as he attempts to take her to a man he suspects of having once been a physician in the hopes that he can heal her.

Mind you, the day before was his first time ever off his community’s secluded sanctuary island. He has no practical understanding of the mainland and didn’t even know that it was possible to walk far enough that one wouldn’t be able to see the ocean.  Oh, and he was all but helpless against the zombie attacks and only survived thanks to his dad’s abilities and bravery. Now that Dad’s shine has been tarnished, he’s single-handedly trailing a schizophrenic quasi-invalid four times the distance that nearly killed him yesterday with nothing to protect the two of them but a bow, a quiver of arrows, and a buck knife. Um…ok.

The subsequent “adventure” is full of… let’s call them “oddities” and character interactions that go nowhere, and a conclusion meant to be pregnant with meaning and depth, but is… let’s call it “head-scratching” (that’ll get a laugh if you watch the movie). Were it not for the brilliant cinematography, equally emotionally present performances, and tight dialogue, most of the film’s second half would be worthy of a Benny Hill soundtrack.

28 Years Later feels as though its writer had two completely different scripts set in the same time and place, but he couldn’t bring himself to trash one for the other. So, he shortened both and Scotch-taped them together at odd angles. When you consider the ambling window dressing that was one of his other recent scripts, Civil War, the platitudinal veneer of this film makes a lot more sense.

Ultimately, 28 Years Later is one quarter of an excellent film full of potential that could have easily built a franchise on the original’s concrete foundation, but is ruined by bizarre choices and a pointless second half.

Now, let’s talk about the last three minutes. Cause… whoa boy.

WOKE REPORT

Daddy Issues

• The capable, loving, and strong father turns out to be
  Spoiler

  having an affair while his wife of many years is dying of cancer in her bed.
  . You know… like a scumbag. So, from that moment on, the boy (and the movie) no longer needs his father.

It Gives You Wings

• Before you go and see this movie, ask yourself, “Do I want, or need, to see 20oz Red Bull can-sized undead donkey doinks helicoptering as seven-foot-tall toxically masculine ‘Alpha’ zombies run down women and children?” Because none of that is hyperbole, and if you don’t want to see it, you better watch a different movie. There’s a lot of it in 28 Years Later.
  • The male form has been turned into a Hollywood plaything, meant only to be exploited or ridiculed—sometimes both.

Alpha Males

• Yup, the main zombie villains are called “alphas.” You know… like alpha males. Something about the infection raises their testosterone levels even higher than that of other zombies, making them larger, stronger, and more aggressive. Each one of these muscle-bound monsters controls its own pack of lesser zombies—many and more of whom seem to be female.
  • It’s impossible not to see this as a social commentary about masculinity writ large. Perhaps, if the filmmakers didn’t go out of their way to blur or hide the nudity of the smaller and weaker zombies, while tattooing these monsters on the audience’s brains, it wouldn’t seem so.

Transcendent Femininity

• While the gigantic and mindlessly aggressive male zombies wreak havoc, the film’s mother and son duo stumble upon a pregnant zombie in the midst of giving birth (remember, in these movies, they aren’t undead, just mindless rage monsters).
  Spoiler

  Inextricably called to her via an implied spiritual bond of womanhood, the mother approaches, and the zombie snaps at her before doubling over amidst a contraction. So, the mother holds up her hands, palms facing the laboring mombie, and the two connect on a level to which only those who have shared childbirth can ascend. The mombie gives birth and dies, the baby is fine, and the storyline goes nowhere.
  • Men bad, women magical.

Work It Girl

• In the film’s closing minutes, a man appears wearing a tiara and multiple jewel-encrusted, effeminate rings. There’s no reason given, and his character isn’t developed in any way, so I didn’t mark down the Woke-O-Meter nearly as much as I would have if he were clearly trans.