28 Weeks Later is the blood spurting sequel to 28 Days Later, tapping the same vein (ahem) of horror with extra ketchup as the original. It’s 28 Weeks Layer and the infected have starved to death so the US army heavy-handedly piles in to help secure and rebuild Britain starting with the Isle Of Dogs in London.

As with previously the infected are all Olympic class sprinters, no messing around with slow lumbering moaning zombies (a word the makers avoid with a passion by the way - preferring to call them Infected). The Rage virus also causes the victims to become screaming and bloody thirsty in a matter of seconds - so no guessing game as to who has been bitten/scratched and wondering when they will turn deadly.

Full marks for the use of famous London sites, as with the original the eeriness of seeing well known locations devoid of life is disquieting - Tower Bridge, Canary Wharf and even a digitally completed Wembley all feature as litter strewn derelict districts - wonderful if you actually live in or around London.

Oh, and by the way, refugee Brits returning to their ravaged country now run by a trigger happy US army has absolutely no comparison to any current events happening today in the middle east, oh no Sir, whatever are you implying? - but they are army not all mindless killers, there is a modicum of balance with one soldier deciding to help the main characters escape.

Visually the film is stunning - a slow start, but it improves as it progresses - it certainly riffs on a huge number of other genre films, but the mass destruction of [SPOILER REMOVED] and the night vision scenes are brilliantly realised in a guerrilla hand-held kinda way. It’s impossible not to draw comparisons to similar attempts to show a locked down militarised future London in Children Of Men - and I can’t say 28 Weeks comes close to the pressure cooker feel realised there, (little does - Children Of Men was probably the best film I saw last year), but it feels gritty and dangerous.

Overall, the film is a success - the gore is to the fore from the off - it’s actually a proper 18 Rated horror film - which you don’t see many of nowadays and it’s clear the makers were going for that rating from the start - punctured eyeballs, helicopter decapitations and geysers of blood are represented in abundance.

Cheap(er) sequels in this genre tend to adhere to the law of dimishing returns, but this can stand shoulder to shoulder with the original 28 Days. Just one minor quirk for me - Robert Carlyle will forever be Begby in Trainspotting, and no matter how much makeup he wears he’s just too distracting as a zombie to be convincing - I keep expecting him to ask his victims “Did you spill my pint?” (of blood presumably) before tearing into their guts.

Original? Nah. Bloody good fun? - absolutely.

8/10