28 Weeks Later [spoilers aplenty]

[AdmundfortGeographer]

I just kept staring at the blood all over the kid's face and thinking, "that there is the Rage virus just waiting to infect somebody."

OH, I was, too. I was just coming up with a rationalization for what the director might have been expecting us to think. Another rationalization, it is likely that when the blood dries the virus dies. Not unusual for blood-borne disease, they can't survive long outside the body. But seriously, I kept looking at the face wondering when the boy would wipe it with a sweaty hand and smear some of it to an eye or mouth. So I came up with the thought that dried blood is inert as a carrier. *shrug*

 

[WayneLigon]

--So she never mentions that her brother was bitten, why? The kid never mentions it? The helicoptor pilot never asks if they're hurt?

Bothered me, but not so much.

He's never bitten; he gets it when the blood spatters on him - probably a microdrop in his eye or on his lip tissue. He's a carrier just like his Mom was; he'll never get sick from it but anyone whose eyes, mouth or nose comes in contact with his blood, sweat, tears, spit, etc will. All it takes is drinking after him, probably.

The pilot doesn't know about the possibility of carriers, yet. Honestly, I can't remember at this point if the doctor ever specifically tells the sister or brother about carriers. I'm sure there might be some people back in the States that know once the doctor filed her reports, but she may well never have gotten around to it before everything hit the fan. But anyway, helicopter guy doesn't know such things exist.

Remember that if someone is bitten or otherwise infected they go insane within seconds of contact. If someone is not frothing at the mouth trying to kill you, then they're obviously OK to someone who doesn't know about the possibility of carriers. His sister does know or at least suspects, given her reaction in the sewers.

We don't know, but I can speculate she does tell authorities in France. I doubt she's going to mention it to the scary military stranger because the first thing he's likely to do is shoot her little brother the second he hears the word 'infected'. They probably put him in a medical facility to try and create a cure. All it takes, though, is one unguarded instant or accident or someone not paying attention to security measures around him or any liquid he produces and the whole thing starts all over again. Such accidents, in fact, are virtually unavoidable.

 

[mmu1]

We don't know, but I can speculate she does tell authorities in France. I doubt she's going to mention it to the scary military stranger because the first thing he's likely to do is shoot her little brother the second he hears the word 'infected'. They probably put him in a medical facility to try and create a cure. All it takes, though, is one unguarded instant or accident or someone not paying attention to security measures around him or any liquid he produces and the whole thing starts all over again. Such accidents, in fact, are virtually unavoidable.

None of this makes sense given that we're actually shown the helicopter sitting in the middle of Paris, abandoned.

Which, in and of itself, just underlines how sloppy the movie is - France was never affected by the virus, and shouldn't be until the kid gets on the ground, but a helicopter that comes in over the channel (a US military helicopter, when everyone knows the US military is involved in managing the fallout of the Rage virus in the UK) doesn't get either re-directed to a military airfield and placed under quarantine, or shot down if it doesn't comply?

What possible reason would the pilot have for not getting in touch with the French authorities as soon as he approached the French airspace, and heading for Paris instead?

And that's ignoring the idiocy of heading for France to begin with (I suppose they wanted to get that shot of the cliffs of Dover in...), when a US military effort of any kind outside the US borders would have the navy sitting offshore in large numbers to provide transport, carrier support, and - last but not least - a safe base of operations, since the infected aren't going to swim out to the ships...

I suppose there could be a weak argument made that the pilot ignored his orders to make the pickup and for some insane reason would be reluctant to contact the military (when any number of white lies he could come up with could probably get him off the hook, given the chaotic nature of a warzone and the apparent communication and command breakdown) but I don't really see how deserting to France would make things better (and get him back to that family whose picture he so often looked at)

 

[hexgrid]

I don't doubt that they wanted to piggyback on the sucess of the original but couldn't get the writer on board for some reason, so they decided to grab three other people and told them to write a move using the same "forumla" as the first.

Not quite. The writer -and director- of 28 Days Later were definitely on board for 28 Weeks Later, as the executive producers. It was still their project, but I don't know why they handed off the writing and directing this time around.

 

[hexgrid]

None of this makes sense given that we're actually shown the helicopter sitting in the middle of Paris, abandoned.

Which, in and of itself, just underlines how sloppy the movie is - France was never affected by the virus, and shouldn't be until the kid gets on the ground, but a helicopter that comes in over the channel (a US military helicopter, when everyone knows the US military is involved in managing the fallout of the Rage virus in the UK) doesn't get either re-directed to a military airfield and placed under quarantine, or shot down if it doesn't comply?

What possible reason would the pilot have for not getting in touch with the French authorities as soon as he approached the French airspace, and heading for Paris instead?

And that's ignoring the idiocy of heading for France to begin with (I suppose they wanted to get that shot of the cliffs of Dover in...), when a US military effort of any kind outside the US borders would have the navy sitting offshore in large numbers to provide transport, carrier support, and - last but not least - a safe base of operations, since the infected aren't going to swim out to the ships...

I suppose there could be a weak argument made that the pilot ignored his orders to make the pickup and for some insane reason would be reluctant to contact the military (when any number of white lies he could come up with could probably get him off the hook, given the chaotic nature of a warzone and the apparent communication and command breakdown) but I don't really see how deserting to France would make things better (and get him back to that family whose picture he so often looked at)

You're only finding plot holes here in a scenario you've created yourself, not with anything that happened in the film.

We don't have any idea exactly what happened between when the helicopter picked up the kids and the final scene, or even how much time has passed. Any number of events could have taken place.

 

[mmu1]

You're only finding plot holes here in a scenario you've created yourself, not with anything that happened in the film.

We don't have any idea exactly what happened between when the helicopter picked up the kids and the final scene, or even how much time has passed. Any number of events could have taken place.

Unfortunately, the people who made the movie did nothing to imply that anything logical happened between the time of the pickup and the final scene, they just went for cheap thrills and a setup for a crappy sequel.

Just because any number of things could have happened doesn't make the ending adequate, or intelligent. It's a movie - if it's not information that's conveyed or implied in some way by what we actually see on screen, it doesn't count.

 

[AdmundfortGeographer]

Unfortunately, the people who made the movie did nothing to imply that anything logical happened between the time of the pickup and the final scene, they just went for cheap thrills and a setup for a crappy sequel.

In other words, exactly what nearly every movie in the horror genre does.

 

[Merkuri]

We don't have any idea exactly what happened between when the helicopter picked up the kids and the final scene, or even how much time has passed.

It was 28 days later, according to the words flashed across the screen.

Not quite. The writer -and director- of 28 Days Later were definitely on board for 28 Weeks Later, as the executive producers. It was still their project, but I don't know why they handed off the writing and directing this time around.

I feel like they must not have put much time into it, though. The first movie was high above the average horror movie, and the second was just one face in a very large crowd.

 

[Gunslinger]

What really bothered me was how the dad got out of that operation room, after he was infected. It looked to me like it was locked from the outside.

I suppose the soldiers whose job it was to kill the carrier might have inadvertently let him out when they entered the room, but I mean come on. You know she's carrying the virus, her throat has been ripped out, there's blood everywhere, and the door is still locked from the outside. You think there might be a slight chance there's still a zombie inside?

 

[sedarfaery]

I actually watched it in the theater yesterday. It was definetely a fun movie.