This Review of “Two Weeks Later” Might Be Satirical but Maybe Not

Pedro Pascal steps up in this prequel to the cult classics about a rage virus

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By Ruminato Film Critic Wesley Williams Jennings Bryan Hutchinson XIV

If there’s one thing we can depend on, it’s a quality cinematic performance from Pedro Pascal. He delivers again as U.S. Senator Alejandro Padilla in this terrifying prequel to the apocalyptic films about a rage virus.

Fans of the original movie, “28 Days Later,” might be initially disappointed in the reboot of the canon, as the movie and its index patient are relocated to the United States. Luckily, the franchise’s original masterminds, Alex Garland and Danny Boyle, remain true to the original film’s tenor.

The film’s opening sequence shockingly declares that it is based on true events, as we discover that a rage virus has erupted in the continental United States (Hawaii is spared).

The virus spreads so quickly that authorities are not only unable to do anything about it, but they become engulfed in symptoms themselves. Meanwhile, right-wing militia groups are incorporated into law enforcement agencies created by the index patient, who becomes president.

Gerard Butler plays a general named Mark Milley, who tries vainly to stop the takeover of the military by a perpetually drunk victim of the virus, known only as the white nationalist Hegseth. Milley is forced underground and flees to Canada, where he is invited to become an honorary member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

There, he falls passionately in love with a Canadian singer named Starlight, played by Ariana Grande, as he plots his return.

The sickened president names Hegseth as the Defense Secretary, who immediately injects moments of much-needed comedy into the film’s perpetually dark and terrifying series of events. A scene involving a meeting with Hegesth with his defense team using a popular chat app lightens the mood temporarily with moments of hilarity.

As the virus spreads, we’re introduced to a California senator named Alejandro Padilla, played by Pascal.

Padilla confronts an empty-headed vassal of the infected president named Kristi - we never learn her last name, as she mindlessly tries to use a press conference to justify a pattern of abduction instigated by the infected president’s storm troopers.

As Kristi challenges Padilla, screaming, “I don’t know this man!” she orders the storm troopers, known as ICE, to arrest him.

Padilla, however, is armed, and he shoots the stormtroopers with typical Pascal precision while Kristi, who is the chief of Homeland Security, looks on. Terrified, she runs to her office, but she remembers she can’t get in because a homeless man robbed her of her purse in a burger joint, where she lost her IDs, along with an undisclosed amount of drug money.

I realize as I write this that this scene seems like slapstick comedy, but the sizzling dramatic performance by Tina Fey is convincing. Her wide-eyed expression of terror as she sees Padilla approaching after she discovers she is locked out is haunting, because we know that she fears the color of his skin, not his intent.

Spoiler alert here: Padilla tells her it’s okay, and arranges to take her to the hospital, which issues a press release about what it describes as an allergic reaction, but is in truth a drug overdose.

This is where Pascal always shines. One minute he’s the gunslinger shooting bad guys, and the next he’s the compassionate hero whose nature is to help both enemy and friend.

When he arrives at the hospital while carrying Kristi in his arms, we get the sense that despite the madness, all is well with the world. When the sliding doors open and they’re greeted by a nurse whose face is adorned with eyes that seem to breathe goodwill, I’ll admit that my eyes might have become a bit misty.

Meanwhile, in Canada, Milley receives a communication from Padilla, who thinks he may know the secret to stopping the plague, which has by now gripped half the population. Working with Starlight, who happens to also be a bioengineer and psychiatrist, he confirms Padilla’s theory that the infected population forgets everything that happens after two weeks.

“This explains why he’s been elected twice!” he declares to Starlight while grasping her perpetually naked shoulders. Milley’s clue is driven home when the infected president declares that a long-anticipated decision on carpet bombing Iran will be put off for exactly two weeks.

“Nobody does that shit,” he says to Starlight as they enjoy a romantic dinner in Montreal. “Nobody!”

The movie only gets better from there.

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Notes

Image of Pedro Pascal by Gabriel Hutchinson Photography, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Image of stealth bomber is public domain. Mock IMDB created by the author.

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