"I didn’t watch it — not because I thought it would be bad, but because something didn’t feel right."
Rotten Tomatoes, the Cold Metric
Critics Score (Tomatometer): 89% (based on 311 reviews)
Audience Score (Verified): 67%
(As of July 2, 2025)
Those are not the numbers of a failure. In fact, an 89% critics score suggests a well-crafted, stylistically competent film. And yet, I chose not to watch it. Why?
The World Reacted First
28 Days Later and 28 Weeks Later were more than zombie flicks to me — they were about space. Empty streets, abandoned farms, bleak interiors — these weren’t just backgrounds, they were emotional structures. Every frame breathed with dread.
But with 28 Years Later, the spaces feel different — more open, more global, more... generic. Critics praised the scale and energy. Audience reactions, however, often noted the lack of emotional weight. "It just doesn't feel the same," one review said.
I’m a Designer. Space Comes First.
As someone who watches films like a designer, I tend to read the emotional temperature of a film through its spaces. Not the plot. Not even the acting. Just the spaces.
And what I saw — in the trailers, in the reviews, in the stills — didn’t match what I remembered. The darkness was gone. The stillness replaced by spectacle. The isolation became expansion. That emotional geometry, the thing that made this series so haunting, felt diluted.
So I Didn’t Watch It.
That’s not to say 28 Years Later is a bad movie. Far from it. But the version of this world I carry — the one that felt personal, suffocating, terrifying — wasn’t there anymore. And I wasn’t ready to let that version go.
Maybe one day I’ll watch it. But not yet.
“The world expanded. But my fear lived in the small, locked rooms.”
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