Train to Busan (2016)

Episode 125, 2 Guys and a Chainsaw Horror Movie Review Podcast

Todd:  Hello. Welcome to another episode of 2 guys the chainsaw. I’m Todd.

Craig:  And I’m Craig.

Todd:  And today we have a very special guest here. Joining us in China, is my dad Craig. Craig, say hi to everybody.

Craig K:  Well, hi everybody. Glad to be here.

Todd:  Now, as we’ve talked about before in this podcast, my dad isn’t a huge fan of horror movies, but he liked to indulge me as we were growing up And so he would rent horror movies for me and occasionally, he would rent one that he agreed with that he we could watch together. Right?

Craig K:  That’s correct.

Todd:  It just couldn’t it couldn’t be too gory, or or whatever. Right?

Craig K:  I’m not for slash and blood. Nope.

Todd:  That’s true. But you chose this film.

Craig K:  Yes. Well, I I think it’s a little bit different than the ordinary zombie film.

Todd:  It is. This movie that we’re talking about is called Train to Busan. It’s a 2016 South Korean zombie apocalypse action thriller, according to the Wikipedia page. And, it’s directed by Yun Song Ho, and we’re gonna screw up all the names in this, I think.

Craig:  Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Todd:  But it’s a great it’s a great movie. I’ve enjoyed it. Now, this came, as your recommendation, dad. So please tell me, why did you decide this film for us to do together?

Craig K:  It was one of those late night shows. I was up and wanting to watch something do a little bit different. I’m not into real zombie shows, but I looked at the reading up on that, and I thought, well, you know, this might be a little bit different. It might be something I’d like to see. So I pulled it up and gave it a try.

Todd:  And it must have made an impression on you since you wanted to watch it again.

Craig K:  Yes, it did. I enjoyed it very much.

Todd:  So here we are. Craig, had you ever heard of this film before?

Craig:  You know, I I have. I I had heard the title, but that’s it. Like, for whatever reason, the title, struck a bell. You know? I I recognized it, but I didn’t know anything about it. And I know you’ve talked about your dad a lot very fondly on our podcast before, and so I was really surprised that this was what he picked. But but but after I watched it, I think I get why. You know, this I’m not a big fan of zombie movies either. I’ve said that, on the podcast several times.  But I really liked this one, and I think that the reason that I liked it was because it’s it’s so well made and, especially, the characters are so well written that you really care about them.

Todd:  Yeah.

Craig:  And so you really invest yourself, in the plight of these characters And, you know, it’s a zombie movie. Spoiler alert. People die. And I found myself getting emotional at several points, throughout the movie, and I will confess that I shed a few tears, which really which really surprised me. But ultimately, I really liked it. I just thought it was a really good movie.

Todd:  Yeah. I was looking over at my dad, and it felt like his eyes were watering up a little bit.

Craig K:  Oh, yeah. They were. Even the second time around, I knew what was happening.

Todd:  But you had even forgotten a couple major plot points.

Craig K:  Right? Yeah.

Todd:  So, you know, this movie while I was watching it, it’s funny you talk about emotional because here we are in China, and both China and when I was in Japan, it seems like the Koreans have the foothold on television dramas over here. All the Chinese folks, all my Chinese friends, everything that’s super popular over here is not the Chinese television shows. It’s the Korean soap operas and the Korean dramas that are popular here. And I think one of the reasons for that is they’re much better written, At least I’ve been told. But another reason is pretty obvious even without being able to understand what’s being said is the quality of the acting. Mhmm. I don’t mean to knock China, but I think anyone could kind of watch any Chinese made film for about 10 minutes, or a Chinese made television show especially for about 10 minutes and realize that the acting is not so great.

Craig K:  Well, I love Jackie Chan, but even Jackie Chan’s movies sometimes get hokey at places.

Todd:  Yeah. It’s a little over act I mean, it’s just like a different style of acting, you know.

Craig:  Yeah. Yeah. Just different.

Todd:  It’s Yeah. It’s just different. It’s not so natural. But the Korean, dramas tend to be extremely dramatic.

Craig K:  And I have to say it. I picked this one because it was the Korean movie, and I watched it because it was Korean. Because recently, I have stumbled upon the Korean genre there. And even though it’s subtitled, and I’m not wild about subtitled movies, the acting and the quality of the film and everything, you really got hooked into it and, like you said, care about the characters and what’s happening. And so if it’s a Korean show when I’m looking at at different things to watch, I’ll kind of lean towards those of over other things just because of that.

Todd:  What we watched what? We you saw The Host too as well, didn’t you?

Craig K:  Oh, I love The Host. Yes.

Craig:  Yeah. Great movie.

Todd:  Yeah. So there just seems to be a thing.

Craig K:  Right? I know I mentioned to you before Tiger Mountain. I don’t know if you’ve ever watched Tiger Mountain.

Todd:  Oh, yeah.

Craig K:  It’s not a horror story, but it’s more of a war story. But it it’s a Korean one, and it’s more about the development of the Chinese government from the old feudal warlords into the People’s Republic of China. But it’s just a a whole story about this village and this Chinese national soldiers that come to kinda save him from the feudal warlords.

Todd:  Wow. It’s

Craig K:  really a good show.

Todd:  Well, so we all agree the Koreans are making great movies.

Craig K:  Yes.

Craig:  It’s it’s I mean, it seems like it based on my limited experience.

Todd:  This movie starts out, with a a man driving up a truck up through the mountainous region in Korea and he’s stopped by some folks who are spraying down the roads and he’s told that he’s entering a quarantine zone. That there’s been some minor leak from the nearby biomedical facility. How many movies start out that way. Right?

Craig:  Right.

Todd:  And, and he’s just bitching about it as he drives through and he he hits a deer, complains about that too. And as he drives along, the car goes by, but the camera lingers on the deer, and pretty soon the deer straightens itself up and stands up and turns to us with zombie eyes.

Craig:  Yep. Zombie deer.

Todd:  Which I thought was a great, actually a really great way to start the movie.

Craig:  Yeah. And and I I can’t believe that we’ve now reviewed 2 movies that have had zombie deer in them.

Todd:  No kidding. Right?

Craig:  How random is that?

Todd:  Somebody needs to take this and run with it, the zombie deer. I have a thing here. And then we get, we get to focus on our main character, which is I’m gonna mispronounce this probably, but it’s Siew k Wu. His name doesn’t get mentioned a whole heck of a lot anyway, but, he is a hedge fund manager and, he has a daughter named Soo Ahn. And as the movie starts out, we get to hear a little bit more about him and his family. So we see that his daughter, he’s obviously divorced and, he’s a single dad right now. His daughter is being taken care of by his mother at home and there’s clearly some tension in the family. He is, at work and he’s talking with his coworker and, we also happen to see that somehow they also have some interest in this biomedical facility.  It’s maybe one of the, maybe it’s a big, aspect of their fund portfolio. 1 of his subordinates comes in and asks what they’re supposed to do about some of the latest weird things that are happening. And and sort of like, Craig, what other movies have we watched where it’s a zombie movie and it starts out slowly and it the the film is slowly peacing out to you, kind of in the background or through news reports or things like that, that weird things are happening as kind of a build up?

Craig:  Oh, gosh. I don’t know. But it happens all the time. And it’s it’s it’s subtle and I really like it, you know. And I thought that this movie did it really well. What we learned about this guy, and I’m not even gonna I didn’t even write their names down because I knew that even if I wrote them down, I would mispronounce them because they don’t look anything like they sound in their native language. So I just call this guy business guy. Business guy’s daughter is unhappy because he doesn’t spend much time with her because he’s so involved in his work.  And she wants to go it’s her birthday, and she wants to go to, Busan where her mom lives for her birthday. And and she says that she’s willing to take the train by herself, but she’s very young. What would you say? She’s, like, 9? Something like that?

Craig K:  Yeah. I’d say that’s good. Yeah.

Craig:  Yeah. About about 9. And he tells her, you know, I’m way too busy and you can’t go by yourself. But his mother kind of lays a little guilt on him and the daughter lays guilt on him. And so he decides, that he will take her. And so they get up early the next morning. And like you said, you know, there are just all these small kind of signs. Like, you like, they’re driving along, and then all these fire trucks, go by them, you know, towards some emergency.  And And the little girl, puts her hand out the window and and the ash is falling like snow and she catches some in her hand. And the dad looks over to his, out of his window, and there’s a a building burning, like a skyscraper burning. But and then and then they get on the train, and it it’s kind of background. I mean, you know, we’re looking for it because we know this is gonna be a monster movie, or a zombie movie. But, it’s just kind of little things, like commotion right before the Craig right before the train takes off, this Todd looking and acting girl kind of bolts onto the train behind the train attendant so he doesn’t see. And, of course, we know what’s coming, but it’s played very subtly, and and I thought very well and very suspenseful. You know? Like, even though I knew what was coming, I was like, wow. You know? Like, I was getting excited.  Like, here, they’re gonna be on this Craig, and it’s gonna be chaos all around. And and what’s gonna happen? And how are they gonna deal with this? And, I I just thought it did a great job. And this is all very early in the movie, like, in the first 10 minutes. Yeah. Yeah. So it doesn’t take it doesn’t take a long time to get to the excitement, and I thought that was great.

Craig K:  I thought it was a real subtle touch Todd, as you mentioned, the buildup. As we’re on the Craig, and the train is pulling away, the little girl is looking out the door, and she sees the top head of a man running like he’s trying to catch the train. And and all of a sudden, you just see this blur, this flash. Somebody’s, like, somebody’s jumping on top of him, but it’s just so fast. You you know, something happened, but you don’t know exactly what.

Todd:  Yeah. Right. That was really cool. It’s like, what’s that? Right? And it’s done.

Craig:  Yeah.

Todd:  Yeah. There are all these nice little things and even on the train up above. Now, I’ve ridden the train to Busan, actually. It wasn’t nearly this dramatic. But, these high speed trains do have, like entertainment in there and they’ll have the TVs down. And you can see in the TVs, they they use that technique to show us news. And and this is also cool because later on, as things are going on in the rest of the world, the passengers, can see, the news on the televisions that are in the top of the in the carriages. And I thought that, oh, that was pretty handy for them to have that device.  Because if you’re if you’re setting this whole thing on a train and you’re wondering what’s going on with the passengers and how are they gonna deal with it, and you know stuff is happening in the outside world, you kind of are always asking yourself the question, as I was through this, what’s gonna happen once they get to Busan? Right? Right. Are they gonna be any better off than they are now? And that’s a device, along with their cell phones, that kind of allows them to gate us to gauge and and get that suspense and aspect of the story in as well.

Craig:  The like you said, there is TVs and stuff that are showing the news. But just as the passengers are not really paying attention, you know, we only kinda get bits and pieces. So we see that things are happening, but it’s not like we’re getting the full report because, you know, the people aren’t really paying attention at least until things really start to go down. But I also liked how when they got on the train, this could have felt very contrived, but I didn’t feel like it felt contrived. Really quickly, we are introduced to most of the main characters that we’re supposed to care about.

Todd:  Right.

Craig:  Like, there’s a a Craig attendant girl, that we see. And I thought that she was actually gonna be a larger part of the plot, so I wrote down her name, but she actually gets she’s one of the first to go. But then there’s a a teen boy who’s part of a baseball team, and a girl who has a crush on him. And and they’re gonna be fairly large characters. There are 2 older ladies who it turns out are sisters. And, eventually, we meet, a couple, this larger guy and his pregnant wife. And it just it felt very natural to me the way that, you know, the the camera would spend some, you know, just a few seconds with these people and then move on to somebody else. But it was enough for me to understand, okay, Here are the people that I’m gonna care about.  Here are the people that I need to watch. You know? And as it turned out, you know, all those people, not all of them had big character arcs or anything. No. But all of them were in some way I don’t know if relatable is the right word, but recognizable. Young teenage kids, you know, an older pair of sisters. You know? They’re they’re sympathetic characters, I guess, is what I’m getting at. I don’t know. I just I I got invested in them very right away.  And how however they managed to do that, it worked for me.

Todd:  Yeah. That’s definitely a function of the writing. And then, you also have the, conveniently, the COO of, such and such train company. I don’t think it, you know, it wasn’t Co Craig, which is the company the the railway that they’re on, but maybe he I don’t know. Somehow he had some connections, to the operation of the train line. I considered him kind of a stock character. I Yeah. This guy, you know immediately he’s gonna have some problems.  He’s gonna be causing issues for everybody. He’s thinking only of himself. And, if I had any knock on the movie, it was in a film where all of these other characters are pretty relatable and don’t seem that stock. This guy Todd be thrown in there is the big bad Meanie. It felt a little contrived.

Craig:  Okay. Alright. I will go with you on that, that it totally was contrived. But I liked the fact movie where the real threat is the zombies, of course, the true villain or villains, as it turns out, are human. And that’s what I thought was really cool about this movie. You know, I I I felt like it it had there was messaging, you know, going on here, like, even before they got on the train. The dad, you know, he’s super busy. He’s a business dad, and he missed his daughter’s recital.  And she was really upset about that, and she says to him at some point, you only care about yourself. That’s why mom left. And that really gives a starting place for him to really have a character arc.

Todd:  Yeah.

Craig:  Because, you know, throughout the course of the movie, you know, it’s not like it’s immediate. She says that, and then he’s like, oh, you’re right. I’m a changed man. But over the course of the movie, he, you know, evolves, and it it doesn’t just become about him. It becomes about, you know, looking out for your fellow man and and your friends and the people that you care about. And you just don’t see that very often. You know, you don’t see that kind of character development. You don’t see that kind of messaging, especially in a zombie movie, very often.  And I thought that this movie did a really good job of exploring, you know, what humanity means. You know, you’ve got these eventually, we’re gonna get there. These zombies are freaking cool zombies, some of the coolest zombies I’ve ever seen. Yeah. And they’re scary. And they’re scary. This is a scary movie. You know, we watch horror movies every single week, and I don’t usually get scared.  I was on the edge of my seat a lot of the times in this movie. But it really is, I think, a story about humanity and about what it means to, you know, be a person and and to care about your fellow man. And, gosh, you know, that’s that’s way deeper than most of the stuff that we talk about.

Todd:  Even if it was a little on the nose at times. But yeah, I agree with you. I I like the fact that that was, and and it came about fairly naturally. This guy, throughout the course of the movie, kind of learns that he needs to look out for other people because he quickly begins to see how essential it is to his own survival, you know. Right. And Todd his Yeah. And to his own daughter’s survival in a very natural way when he’s kinda put on the other side of the fence at times to where he needs the help of others.

Craig:  Right.

Todd:  And again, like you said, it’s not like they Todd the film and go, you know, and he says, I’m a changed man. I now see, daughter, how important it is for me to look out for people and I promise I’ll do that from here on out. You just kinda see that start to happen in his actions as it goes along and that’s that’s really quite good.

Craig K:  And it doesn’t really come about on on his own. He has a lot of he gets hit over the head a couple times about it. The young couple with a pregnant wife, the man Mhmm. The husband calls him on it because the businessman father does something very selfish. Again, looking out for himself, trying to sneak himself and his daughter off or whatever. Of course, it doesn’t work out. And and he says the businessman confronts him and says, you’re a jerk.

Todd:  Yeah. Yeah.

Craig K:  All you care about is yourself. He has to point it out to the guy, you know, hey. What are you doing? You know?

Todd:  Well, there’s even that conversation in front of his daughter.

Craig K:  Yes.

Todd:  Right? The the pregnant woman is in the bathroom and the daughter’s waiting for the bathroom, and that’s how she meets up with the pregnant woman’s husband, the big guy. Right? And Yeah. And they have a little chat and it’s like, this big guy kind of is like, yeah, I I can see your people like your dad from a mile away. I know exactly who they what they’re like, you know. And she just asked he just asked her some questions about him and says, oh, yeah. He’s a hedge fund manager. He’s used to leaving people behind. He’s used to screw people over and that kind of thing.  And is like Yeah. You see that in front of her daughter? And she’s like, oh, I know.

Craig:  Yeah. Because

Todd:  I’m one of those people. Right? So you’re right. It’s a nice it’s nice intricate little web there.

Craig:  It’s just really well written, I think. You know, the characters are very believable, as as real people. None of them are perfect. I don’t know. They they I I just believe that these people could have come together, on a train. And, you know, I like I said, you know, at one point, some weird girl, you know, jumps on the Craig, and as it turns out, this girl is infected. And then very quickly, she turns into a zombie. And the zombie metamorphoses, in this movie are super quick.  Like, if you get bitten, the the transformation happens almost instantaneously, like, within seconds or minutes depending on, you know, how much time they needed in the movie for you to have.

Todd:  Yeah. Depending on the dramatic needs at the time.

Craig:  Right. But the transformations are really cool. You know? Like, they’ll be dead on the ground, and then they will just, like, unnaturally bolt up off of the floor. And there’s always, like, these bone crunching sounds and they’re moving in very inhuman ways. And they’ve got, you know, the foggy eyes. I’ve seen tons of zombie movies, and I’m really you know, they’re okay. I’ll watch them, but it’s not my favorite genre. But these zombies, I don’t know.  Like, they were a combination of things. First of all, they’re fast zombies, like, from 28 Todd later or something like that. They’re not the lumbering slow zombies. They they’re a little bit Sam Craig esque, like Evil Dead esque, like, in the way that they move, in the way that they move so quickly.

Todd:  Sharply jerk around.

Craig:  Yeah. But they’re they’re really scary. And, like, this movie does a good job of building tension where, you know, I’m sitting here in my living room watching it on my computer and I’m I’m like, what are you doing? Get out of there. Like like I was really heavy, like, my heart was racing. The the suspense and and the adrenaline, they did a great job. I I have to I I’m just gonna kinda gush about this movie because I was so impressed.

Craig K:  Yeah. I thought it was interesting. The tension in it, like you say, they they convert so fast. You had a whole train Todd of of passengers in a car, and it just takes one little zon one zombie to walk in and bite. And within seconds, the whole car is infected and they’re en masse hidden out the door for for more blood.

Todd:  Yeah. Yeah. I

Craig:  I love that.

Todd:  How the zombie goes in, the first thing she does is, like, basically infect the entire baseball team.

Craig:  Yeah. Oh, it’s wild. Like, you know, it’s just that one that one zombie they got on the train. And as soon as she bursts into 1 car, car, she bites 1 guy, and he immediately turns. Then he attacks and bites. And like you said, you know, within the course of a minute, you know, the whole train car is infected, and then, you know, it’s just mass hysteria. It’s it’s chaos, and people are running. They’re trying to run away from the chaos, and, it’s very exciting.  It’s I understand why it’s billed as an action, thriller, horror because it it is very action heavy. It reminds me a little bit of, I think it was World War z. Was that the Brad Pitt zombie movie?

Todd:  Yes. Uh-huh.

Craig:  It reminded me a little bit of that with the nature of the zombies, but better. You know, that that movie was huge budget. I have no idea what the the budget for this movie was. It had to be fairly large because it was it was impressive. But, you know, that a Brad Pitt American Summer Blockbuster, and and it was good. I liked it, but I thought this was even better. Again, I’m just gonna continue

Todd:  to gush until you guys cut me off.

Craig:  So go for it.

Todd:  We’ve done, you know, we’ve done movies on trains Todd, and I think that the, what was it what was the David Copper the one that David Copperfield was in? Was it Terra Train?

Craig:  Terra Train. Yeah.

Todd:  So and, you know, we talked at that time too about the inherent issues of doing a movie like this on a train. It can go one way or it can go another way. I think in that movie, we had problems with the train almost being too constrictive of an environment. Be it became a little unbelievable. Like, how can these pea how can these things happen without other people knowing it? Or how can passengers be in one end of the train and make it to another end of the train without somebody else seeing them? You know, a train is inherently, I think, a challenging place to have it. And in this movie, I was kind of wondering, how are they gonna get out of this? Just from the very get go, once that woman comes in and infects this whole carload of people, you can either go one way or you can go the other way. Otherwise, you’re just stuck. And I thought, unlike Terror Train, which is more of a suspense movie of a killer who’s loose on the Craig, In this one, it just seemed bleak from the very get go.  You have no chance, if you’re anywhere on this train, of getting away from these people. The only thing that they can do is take advantage of, it sounds like, 2 of the zombies weaknesses. 1 is, they can’t see very well. So I guess if it’s dark, they find out later, then, the zombies are more confused and they kinda stop what they’re doing and start staring around. And the second thing is is the sound. They seem to be attracted to sound as well, especially if they can’t see. So as long as they can’t see you, they’re gonna stop coming after you. If they hear something, they’re gonna turn around and run-in that direction.  Sometimes it works, sometimes I was like, oh, really? You know, because a train’s kind of a noisy environment anyway, especially a train full of snarling zombies.

Craig:  Right.

Todd:  Is a train full of snarling zombies who are headed in one direction gonna suddenly stop and turn the other way if they hear like a Coke can crunch, you know. Sure. But but I’ll give it a pass.

Craig:  I know what you’re saying, but at the same time and and with the sound, it was a a little bit I don’t know, a little bit more tenuous. But, I actually thought that it was really clever, you know, that they the humans realized fairly early on that they only the the zombies only go into their, you know, raving lunacy if they can see us. If they can obstruct the zombie’s view of them, then the zombies kind of calm down. Like, they, you know, they still stay active. They’re still, you know, like, awake and kind of lumbering around, but they’re not raving and and trying and trying actively to get at them. And so they can do simple things like at one the first time that they realize that is the case, some random I think it was a random woman. It may have been one of our characters. I don’t know.  But some woman just grabs a newspaper and slaps it up on the window of the door between the cars and sprays water on it and plasters the, newspaper up on the window, and the zombies can’t see them anymore and so the zombies kind of calm down. I don’t know. I thought that was clever and innovative. I’ve never seen that before. And later on that, you know, they do different things. Like, they use, fire extinguishers to cloud out the windows. And I I just thought it was, really clever. The thing with the sound, kind of comes up later because, at some point, they they start going through a series of tunnels, on the Craig.  And they realize that, when it’s dark, the zombies can’t see as well, but they will react to sound. And then there are all kinds of cool tricks that they do with misdirection, like, you know, using you know, sliding a cell phone down the car and and various things like that. Plausible? I don’t know because I’ve never been in a zombie apocalypse. But, original? Yeah. I mean, I’ve never seen that before. I and I thought it was, pretty clever, and it and it made for some really suspenseful moments. And, I don’t know. I I liked it.

Todd:  A lot of original stuff in here.

Craig K:  And several surprise elements, of course, along with the action. Some subtle, some more, obvious. But like at the beginning of the show, when the infected girl pops in and she hides in the bathroom. The conductor is told by one of the passengers, somebody strange has gone into the bathroom, been there a long time. And they go, and there’s a suspense that’s building as they approach the bathroom door. And the conductor opens it, and, of course, you expect to see this zombie jump out at him. But instead, there’s this old hobo looking guy huddled down on the floor in there. Now with all of a sudden, there’s introduction to this new character where you didn’t expect him to be.  Yeah.

Todd:  That was a good way to do it. Mhmm. It really was. And and also, like, the very first victim, I think, is the stewardess.

Craig K:  Yes. Exactly. Yeah.

Todd:  Stewardess, is that what you would say? Yeah. Yeah. Craig attendant or whatever?

Craig:  Right. Yeah. Yeah.

Todd:  We we got so much of her, at the beginning that I thought she was gonna be a central character in this whole thing.

Craig:  I Todd too. I did too.

Todd:  And then she gets killed the first time. That’s pretty shocking. And that that kind of sets up that mentality, like, gosh, we really don’t know who’s gonna live and who dies. You know, it’s something like The Walking Dead does really well, is it kills off characters who you figure are just gonna live till the end. You know, I felt like this movie really set it up from the beginning that way when it when it hung out so much with that stewardess and then knocked her off right right first thing.

Craig:  Well, and I I thought that the movie did a good job of, delivering some real gut punches too. Like, you know, the the the zombies break out in the train. There’s immediate chaos. The it’s a huge action sequence very early on. And and it’s chaotic, and the zombies are attacking everybody, and all the people are running. And, like, this goes on for a little while, and I was like, wow. This is really early in the movie. Is, you know, is this gonna is this gonna carry out through the whole thing? They found ways, to take breaks in the action, which I appreciated, but the action scenes are really, really strong and exciting.  But then even in the quieter moments, there are these gut punches. Like, after the first big zombie outbreak on the train, once they finally get some security, the first thing that business guy, our main guy does is he calls his mom or she calls him maybe. And, she she’s on the phone, and and the business guy is trying to, you know, talk to her and see if she’s okay. And you can hear chaos going on behind her and you can hear something strange in her voice and you know that she’s turning and and she’s saying things like take care of Suwon. You know, make sure that she’s okay. I love her so much. But you can hear her turning and and and eventually she turns on the phone. And, you know, this this man is just listening to his mother die, I guess, essentially, or turn into a zombie over the phone.  And his little girl is standing right there looking at him saying, is grandma okay? And and, you know, it just it got me.

Todd:  The little girl gets you a lot in this movie, I think.

Craig:  She does. She does. But I also like how she’s a little bit bratty, I guess, a little bit in the beginning. I mean, you understand why because she feels neglected by her dad, and and they have this kind of tense relationship between them. She’s a little bit annoying, in the beginning. But then when they’re put in peril together Todd see them cling to one another, but at the same time Todd see her pointing out his flaws, as your dad mentioned before, they have to speed through the first stop. They say the first stop is not secure. We’re gonna have to speed through.  And when they when they get there, you know, the zombies are all there, and they’re trying to, like, attack the train and stuff. But then they say, alright. The the next stop we are gonna stop, it seems like it’s secure. And the dad apparently has some military connection, and he says, you know, he’s on the phone and the guy’s like, well, just get to the central square and we’ll get you there. So everybody else is going one way and the dad takes his daughter another way, and she says, where are we going? Why aren’t we going with everybody else? And he says, well, we have to go to this place cause it’ll be safe. And she says, well, I’m gonna go tell everybody else. And he says, no. In a in a situation like this, you just have to look out for yourself.  And she basically calls him out and just says, you know, this is why mom left you. You’re a jerk. You know? And just to, you know, to I think sometimes I don’t have kids, but I work with kids And I think that sometimes kids kinda slap you in the face with reality every once in a while and really teach you something about yourself, and and that dynamic. And then it progresses from there, and you see them, you know, in their peril, really coming together and clinging to one another. So that by the end, their bond is is so important Todd, you know, the way that we feel about what’s going on. It’s just it’s really well developed. It’s really well developed.

Todd:  Another interesting character relationship is the relationship between the the the businessman and the father of or the wife the husband of the pregnant woman. They’re they’re trying to get into the safe car after the first zombie outbreak and businessman ends up at the door of the the door between the the cars and he’s trying to close it and he’s almost not going to let this other guy in. And at the end of the day, he ends up letting him in and he shuts the door and after everything is calm, he turns around and says to him, so I expect an apology from you, you know. Yeah. Right. And he doesn’t doesn’t really apologize. He’s like, well, look, you want me to sacrifice the rest these guys or not? And that almost like literally comes into play later on because back there in the scene you’re talking about, it turns out that no place is safe and the zombies are attacking that train station. They have to get back to the Craig.  And there they are at some glass doors, and here’s this guy now on the other side of the door trying to get in. And, you know, it’s funny because they didn’t make like this a huge deal. You know, like, some movies will be like, The tables are turned. Now, let’s kind of play the same situation out, but with the roles reversed, you know. So that we can really hammer home the point that we’re making.

Craig:  Right.

Todd:  But it turns it’s just more subtle than that, you know. And this guy ends up letting him through. And again, they don’t make a big deal out of it, but you can see the change in businessman as he kind of just just just naturally understands what’s going on here that he has to, you know, they need each other.

Craig:  Right.

Todd:  I like that aspect. And then, I thought that whole sequence there in the train station was really cool. Wasn’t it, Dan?

Craig K:  It was. I mean, just as you mentioned before, the action of the zombies and that. I mean, they get off this Craig. They’re expecting the army to be there to protect them. They walk down the steps. They see as their their vision becomes clearer and clearer of who’s down below on the deck. You see the the legs of all these army personnel and stuff, and they’re thinking, oh, good. We’re saved.  Of course, as it get becomes more clear, they’re actually zombies, and boom. Mhmm. I mean, they’re hit right away. And even though they’re turning around and and running back up the steps, of course, they’re not all gonna make it up the steps.

Todd:  And they’re on an escalator that’s feeding them down into it.

Craig K:  And then the scene one scene where they’re being held back by some glass Todd. It’s like the movies where you see the aquarium break and the clay and the the water just gushes out. It’s it’s like a sea of zombies. Just glass breaks, and it’s just this pile of zombies. It’s just a giant mass bursting through the glass and tumbling on the floor all over each other and then getting up. And and as they’re climbing all over each other, heading down the hall towards the passengers.

Todd:  It’s like a sea. You’re right. It is. Like water. Mhmm. It’s crazy. And even when they’re down and they’re at the Craig, and it’s like they’ve, you know, they’ve kinda made it there and the train’s running. They’ve gotta run to get on.  And and then up above, where they they were previously were, the walls the the windows of the place, like, burst open and the zombies are falling down a story onto the Craig. And then onto the tracks and getting up and coming after them some more. Right?

Craig K:  That’s right.

Craig:  Yeah. Oh, oh, gosh. The action sequences are so good and so, suspenseful and tense. I I I was just on the edge of my seat, and that that scene was one of the the best ones. And and the way you guys described it is exactly right. You know, it’s like waves, like, they’re just crawling over one another. And, there are so many of them. So many of the zombies in in comparison to how many of the living people that we’re trying to follow.  And, you know, even even the characters that, you know, we’re not entirely invested in. You know, you’ve got this this, baseball team of teenage boys, and they are some of the ones the last ones trying to run to get on the Craig. And they’re just besieged by zombies and all but one of them, gets taken down. And even though, you know, I don’t particularly, you know, I don’t know these characters. I don’t know who they are. They’re kids and they fought so hard up into up until this point And to see them getting taken down, it just kinda gets you. It’s it’s good.

Todd:  And he seizes up there. And then you know, okay, this is gonna be his his problem to overcome, you know. He’s gonna seize up later and have to take the the the world. And this all this being said, I do have a bone to pick with one of the scenes in here.

Craig:  Okay.

Todd:  Dad, I think you know which one I’m gonna talk about. It’s after they’re back on the train, after this relentless horde. Now, keep in mind, these zombies seem to be able to run towards us with with whatever. They fall down multiple stories. They get back up. You know, they have limbs and arms broken in odd directions, but still they can come after you. Then we have a sequence where they’re back on the train, but because they’ve all had to get on this train very quickly and the train was moving at one point, they’re now split up. Yeah.  So we have the zombies in the middle of the train and on either ends, such and such cars are the survivors and they’re trying to get back to each other.

Craig:  And the most vulnerable ones are in the middle. The pregnant woman, the kid, the old lady, and somebody else are trapped in a bathroom in the middle.

Todd:  That’s right.

Craig:  The men, business guy, big guy with the pregnant wife, and baseball kid, they have to work their way from train number 9 up to train number 15 or something like that, and they have to pick up their loved ones along the way.

Todd:  Yes. So what do they choose to do? Just plow.

Craig K:  Yeah. They wrap a few bandages around their arms. And then they just attack the zombies working and fighting their way through.

Todd:  And as we’re watching this, I’m asking my dad. I’m like, okay, so they’re so they’re they’re beating their way through this trot par. So some guy swings a baseball bat Todd zombie, he falls into the seat. Some guy punches a zombie or pushes him away, he falls into a seat. I’m thinking, so what? Like we’ve seen these zombies fall like 2 Yeah. Stories. What why are they not coming back up behind them? Right. You know? And that whole sequence had me kinda, oh, are you kidding me?

Craig:  It’s it’s a little silly. And even though, you know, the what I was thinking was even though they wrap their hands up in, like, leather straps or something, I don’t know, you know, they’re punching these zombies, the zombies are coming at them, I was thinking, there’s just no way that you’re gonna get through there without, you know, you might get through. Maybe. Probably not. But okay. You know, suspension of disbelief. But there’s no way you’re gonna get through there without getting infected. You know? Like Yeah.  Eve even if they don’t actively bite you. I mean, if you’re punching them directly in the mouth, you know, like, you’re gonna get some of their blood on you in the cuts on your hands or whatever. So I I get I understand your complaint with that. Nonetheless, it was exciting and heroic. Very very

Craig K:  And I

Craig:  still liked it. Very very

Todd:  well, they go through a lot to get there. Some of these scenes are really cool. This is when we get these tunnels that must be really really long. Yeah. I like that bit. I don’t know. What was your favorite sequence in this one, dad, when they were going through the tunnels and they’re kinda making their way down?

Craig K:

Like you, I was just struck with the length of tunnels. You know, they they say, okay. Well, we got this tunnel coming up, and it’s in 2 miles. And if if that one doesn’t if we can’t get through that one, then we got another one coming up 10 miles after. But, yeah, these tunnels must be 10 miles long because it’s probably about 10: 10 minutes of fighting sequence in the dark that hook them through 1 tunnel.

Craig:  It’s true. It does allow them

Todd:  the time to do some cool things, again, for dramatic purposes. Right? I I like the bit where they were crawling around the luggage racks. I I don’t know. I don’t even know how I could even hoist myself up into a luggage rack. Let alone, you know, all 12 of them or or 6 of them or however many had to get up there. Wasn’t At some point, did they caught up with a pregnant lady? I think this was after they caught up with the kids.

Craig:  Yeah. It is.

Todd:  And they were trying to make their way back to the rest of the survivors at the one end. Right?

Craig:  Yeah.

Todd:  Oh, I don’t know. It was cool though. It was a cool sequence.

Craig:  It it was cool. You you know, I I already mentioned the thing with the cell phone that they did at one point, and they do some other things with, you know, noise distraction. But that that crawling on I you know, they had shown the luggage rack several times, so I thought at some point somebody might get up there. And it’s dark and the zombies can’t see or whatever. And like you said, trains are kind of noisy anyway. So, you know, I could kinda believe that they could kinda scoot themselves up there. But I think that what made it tense for me is that they put the most vulnerable characters in this situation. There’s a whole car of people who are still okay at the front of the Craig, yet the people who are in peril, aside from these 3 guys who have shown that they’re badass asses and can, you know, beat their way through zombies or whatever, the rest of them are a pregnant lady, a kid, an old lady, and, was there another one?

Craig K:  The hobo.

Craig:  The hobo. The hobo. Right. And who seems to be either injured or somewhat disabled. Gosh. You know, you put a pregnant lady, a kid, and an old lady, you know, in

Todd:  the the poor’s left.

Craig:  Right. Right.

Todd:  We needed a puppy. We didn’t have a dog.

Craig:  Or like a blind girl or something. But, you know, yeah, it’s very tense, you know, because they’re in such close proximity. But they get through, you know, there’s some hullabaloo with, you know, the homeless guy kinda falls out and they hear him. And again, this is another moment where business guy, the dad, kind of shows that he’s evolving and he stays back to help this guy and they get through. But again, like I said before, what really struck me was kind of the human drama. Because at some point, the teenage boy, the baseball boy, calls it’s not his girlfriend, but it’s this girl that’s interested in him. He calls her and she’s in the safe car. And he’s like, we’ve got these folks.  We’ve rescued these folks. We’re on our way. We’ll be there soon. And she’s all excited, and she announces it to everybody else. And rich asshole guy is like, we can’t let them in here. They they might be infected. And so there’s, you know, they get through the the car, you know, crawling in the luggage rack or whatever, But then the zombies hear them and are on their tail, and they’re trying to get into this safe car and the people on the other side have barricaded the door. Like, not barricaded, but like they’ve, like, tied it off so that it can’t be open.  And I just found that to be so, I don’t know, unusual, I guess, in this type of movie. And it’s not entirely unusual. You know, Todd, you and I have done Night of the dead, and, there were the group of people who wanted to barricade themselves in the basement, and they said you can come with us or not. But one way or another, we’re locking ourselves down there. Don’t be trying to get in there later. Yeah. So it’s not like this is entirely unique, but, I just I felt like it was commentary on, yeah, zombies are bad, but humans are dicks. Like, it’s a dog eat dog world.  Like, you know, just look out for yourself, and and who cares if grandma and the kid and the pregnant lady and the hobo are on the other and the guys that have just rescued all these people are on the other side of the door. We’re not taking that risk. And I I just I thought that was, really effective.

Todd:  Yeah. It is. And, and in this, that’s but it’s kinda part and parcel of zombie movies, isn’t it? It it always turns into some Lord of the fly situation.

Craig:  I suppose. I suppose. I guess it’s not that original. I just thought they did a really good job with it.

Todd:  That’s why I stopped watching The Walking Dead. I got so sick and tired of these guys coming along, attacked by zombies, fight off the zombies, barricade themselves against the zombies, find some people who are gonna help them. At first, everything seems fine, and then they can’t get along, and they fight, and then they go back out into the zombie world. And it seemed like that had infinitum. But, yeah. I know I know what you mean and I think that at this point was where I kind of wondered where are they gonna go from here, you know. Okay. They’re all together in the back of the train.  Now, I guess, they they seem safe. All the drama is going to be what what happens when they get to Busan. But that again, the movie throws you that curve ball. Right? I said to I said to dad, what did I tell you once once the group of people decided, okay, you guys are gonna have to go to the front. I said, well, okay. That’s great. Doesn’t matter. Right? Who cares if they’re together, at least they’re in the adjoining Craig? And you said, they’re even safer.

Craig K:  Oh, yeah. They’re even safer. Yeah. Because now the the whole car full of people are between them and the zombies. Even Right. But lo and behold, another surprise. The one sister got left behind that was in the group that finally made it into the car, and she’s turned into a zombie. And the other sister on in the safe car sees her and is so upset about it.  She goes and she’s mad at the people for not letting them in that she goes and opens the door and lets the zombies in. Yeah.

Craig:  Yeah. I really I really liked it. You know, these 2 old ladies, who had gotten separated. Yeah. And cute. You know? I don’t know if that’s the word for it, but, like

Todd:  Oh, it was cute. That’s they were so sweet to each other.

Craig:  It was it it was it was sweet. And it was even sweet when you’re seeing them on opposite sides of the door, and you’ve got the one sister who’s still living and the other sister who’s a zombie now. She looks like a sweet old lady zombie. It it’s not like it’s not like she’s emoting, but she’s also kind of not raving like the other ones. And they it’s not like they lock eyes and share a moment or whatever, but the the fact that the the living one can has a clear view of her sister on the other side, I just felt like at this moment, she was just kinda like fuck it. And and she just opens up the door and lets them in. And I absolutely loved it because I wanted to see those jerk ass people get their comeuppance. They were so mean.  They were so mean. And I don’t again, I’ve never been in a zombie apocalypse, but I would really like to believe that I wouldn’t be like that. But who knows? You know, maybe when you’re in absolute peril where it’s life and death, maybe instinct takes over and and you do, you know, just put yourself first. But I just even, you know, the the the folks got in. They had to batter their way in, but they got in. And then even when they got in, the, other people in the car were, like, you might be infected. Get out of here. You have to get out.  Like, it was just so mean, but and not unbelievable. You know? Like, I believe that that could and might happen. But again, I just thought that it was the movie doing a good job of showing an ugly side of humanity and that we can be just as vicious and nasty as a zombie horde.

Craig K:  And then then comes another little twist and surprise in the movie too because just as you think, that whole car got their comeuppance. I mean, nobody could have survived that. You know?

Craig:  Right.

Craig K:  Finally, the bad guys are gone. Now what’s how now what are these heroes gonna do? You know? And lo and behold, all of a sudden, stuck inside one of the washrooms, that old a hole man and Yeah. And the, the attendant survived.

Todd:  Yeah. And and he just continues to prove himself to be a bigger asshole as he goes along. Right? Because he

Craig K:  Oh, yeah.

Todd:  He ends up pushing yeah.

Craig K:  Yeah. He pushes the attendant out the door so the zombies will go after him and he can get away.

Todd:  Yep. Yeah. And it turn it turns out they can’t get to Busan. They and, because, there’s a problem on the tracks at this one spot, and so the train actually has to stop and the conductor comes over and says that they all have to leave and transfer. So the conductor runs off the car, to find another train for them to get, and this starts a whole sequence of everybody coming off and, trying to work their way across this train yard to get to another train.

Craig:  And all the trains are full of zombies. I loved that. It was so creepy. Like, they’re just walking along and in every train, every car is, like, just teeming with zombies, like, beating on the windows, trying to get out. It was it was scary. But it seems to be pretty safe out there for the time being, but then things start to happen. The conductor runs and eventually finds another engine. It it’s just like the engine car of a Craig.  But he starts it’s going. Rich a hole guy gets off and starts running and looking around. Our friends are, you know, heroes get out, and they start looking around. Some zombie chasing and stuff that goes on, but then there’s this huge action sequence where this

Todd:  Flaming.

Craig:  Runaway the yeah. Flaming runaway engine is coming towards them, and it just, you know, rips through this train yard. And it ends up trapping the business guy and his daughter and the pregnant lady. We forgot to say that the pregnant lady’s husband got bitten and infected and died. Oh, that’s horrible. Sad. Yeah. It was so sad.  I can’t believe we skipped over it.

Todd:  Make me super sad.

Craig K:  Because it was so sad. Yeah.

Craig:  But it comes through, and it it ends up like the pregnant lady and the kid and the dad get trapped underneath this, train car that is, like, tipped over. With what?

Craig K:  With a hobo.

Craig:  Oh, the hobo too. I keep forgetting about him, and he’s a good guy. I’m glad you keep bringing him up because he’s a good guy. But they get trapped under there. At some point, the rich guy finds the train that is, you know, going with the conductor, and the conductor jumps off to try to help him. And, again, the rich a hole guy just throws the conductor to the zombies so that he can get on the train. And then we have this action sequence where the others are trying to get out from underneath this train. And it was just such a cool scene because, like, this train car is is tipped over almost entirely on top of them.  And there are it’s full of zombies. And so, like, they’re right there with just a a pane of glass between them. And, they’re struggling to get out and, eventually, the dad gets out, but then the train shifts and something falls in front of the opening. And so he’s trying to get that out. Meanwhile, the glass starts to break and zombies start to pour in in the underneath where everybody else is. And the hobo being the good guy that he is sacrifices his himself to hold them off until the dad can get the obstruction out of the way and he gets the girl and the pregnant girl out and they take off, but the poor hobo gets killed. The dad and the daughter and the pregnant lady see the engine and they run towards it, but there’s this huge horde of zombies chasing after them. And they’re these big aerial shots where you see them running and you see just hundreds of zombies right on their heels.  And they get to the engine and they jump on, but some of the zombies are able to grab on to the train and it just turns into this chain of zombies holding on to the back of this chain or train climbing over each other. And oh my gosh. I just thought it was so scary.

Todd:  I was on the edge of my seat. This pregnant lady is, like, the world’s fittest pregnant woman at this point. Right? She can run fast.

Craig:  Yeah. She could run. She could jump on

Todd:  a train. She’s good to go.

Craig K:  You mentioned the big huge aerial shots where the zombies are chasing them to the train, and I’m sitting there thinking, there’s no way. Looking at the distance between the the good guys and the train and the good guys and the zombies, the distance was a lot shorter between the zombies and the good guys than what you guys were to the train. There is no way they could possibly get to the train before the zombies overtake them. And No way. Another little play there. They had the zombies trip over each other, and all of a sudden, there’s there’s a big pile of zombies tumbling over. It gives them just enough time to make it to the train before the rest of the zombies get to them. Yeah.

Craig:  It was awesome. It was awesome. And and so there’s this big, like it’s just a couple of, like, I don’t know, 3 or 4 4 zombies hanging on and everybody else just glomming onto them. And then I would say it turns into, like, a massive, I don’t know, a 100 or more just dragging behind the train. And eventually, the the dad, he, like, stomps on the ones that are holding on. He stomps on their knuckles and eventually, you know, dislodges the whole thing. And it seems like they’re gonna be okay, but we know that that rich butthole guy is on there. And the dad goes into the engine room, and the rich butthole guy is there, and he’s infected, and he’s turning.  But it seems like he doesn’t know it. And he says something like, I’m scared. Take me home. My mom is waiting for me. And he he gives the address. And I was sitting here thinking, dang, movie. Kudos for you for making me feel sympathy for this jerk of a guy. Like, he is such a jerk, but in this moment, he exposed such vulnerability and, like, he’s he’s scared.  He just wants

Todd:  to go home to his mommy.

Craig:  And I I felt bad for him for just a second, but then I didn’t really care.

Craig K:  You know, I didn’t I’m I’m sorry. I didn’t feel the same sympathy as you I was just grinning from ear to ear the whole time because one thing we mentioned forgot to mention is right before he got to the Craig, Remember, baseball guy and his girlfriend

Craig:  Aw.

Craig K:  Had were also running from the zombies that had gotten out of the the train there after that accident, And they made it onto another train and closed the door, you know, we’re we’re trying to get out the other door because they knew the zombies were coming. And who shows up with zombies behind him is a hole man who then throws the girl in front of the zombies so he can get away. And, of course, she’s infected, and he gets away. And the boyfriend’s left there with the girl. Well, he managed to fight the zombies away from the girlfriend, but it was too late.

Todd:  Yeah.

Craig K:  So here she is in his lap turning into a zombie. And

Todd:  He’s just despondent.

Craig K:  He’s just so despondent. He just lays there. And, of course, she turns and he attacks him, and they’re both gone.

Todd:  Yeah. It was really really

Craig:  quite sad. It was really sad. You’re right. I’m glad you brought that up because that guy, even though I felt a little bit of sympathy for him there at the end, he was a real jerk. And and that and that scene, that was it was it was super sad. It it was very kind of Romeo and Juliet.

Todd:  It was. I think it was the same thing.

Craig:  Something else that I liked this movie, and I think that this may be a cultural thing. I don’t know because I am not nearly as worldly as either of you. But in this movie, men Craig. And I was you you just don’t see that in American movies very much. Like, when, when when the teenage girl gets infected in the, again, it’s not her boyfriend, but they’ve bonded. When he realizes that she’s been infected, he weeps.

Todd:  Yeah.

Craig:  You know, openly weeps back onto the engine where the butthole guy is now a zombie. He attacks the dad, and the dad fights him, and, like, it’s all very exciting. And, like, they’re hanging off the train. And at some point, the pregnant lady tries to help, and then the zombie guy goes after the pregnant lady. And so to try to, you know, protect her, business guy grabs the zombie from the back, and he puts his hand right over his mouth. And I was like, no. Don’t do that. And of course of course, he gets bit.

Todd:  I did not see that coming. I did not see that.

Craig:  I didn’t either and I didn’t want it to happen. And I thought,

Todd:  what’s he gonna do? He’s gonna chop his hand off? Is he gonna put a tourniquet around there? I mean, surely. Sure.

Craig:  No. No. Instead, he throws the butthole guy off, and he ushers the pregnant lady and the girl into the car. And the girl is, you know, just a mess. She’s screaming and sobbing and weeping, and he he tells them, you know, this must be the break. Once you’re safe, pull the break and and that’s what you’ll have to do. And then he goes and talks to the girl, and it’s so sad. I mean, she’s just weeping and she’s saying, please don’t go.  It’s my fault. Like, I assume that she’s thinking that, you know, they were only on the train because of her. And he says, you know, something very sweet, like, I’ll always be with you or whatever. And then he runs out of the room knowing that he’s gonna have jump off the train because he’s infected. And then he just sobs, like, he’s just sobbing, weeping. And, I just I I found that to be so refreshing and real to see in cinema a man responding with that kind of emotion. And you just don’t see it in American cinema ever.

Todd:  It’s true. You know,

Craig:  like, is is that is is that a cultural thing? Like, is it okay for guys to cry in Eastern culture?

Todd:  I I see it a lot in these in these dramas, the guys crying. They’re all extremely dramatic. Everybody cries.

Craig:  Well, whether or not it’s a cultural thing or whatever, it was real oh my god. I was crying too. I like, it was so sad. I felt so bad. This poor guy, you know, who’s had a rocky relationship with his daughter and through all of this trauma seems to have really established a bond with her and now, you know, it’s it’s just over. There’s there’s nothing that he can do. And in the fight and in the final moments when he’s turning and we get to see, you know, his physical transformation, But in those final moments, he just has a very bright brightly, lit white flashback, to his daughter’s birth. And he’s crying, but at the same time, you know, he has a big smile on his face.  And then I thought that it was just such a beautiful shot. Instead of showing it, we see the shadow, the silhouette, the shadow on on the the tracks on the ground of the train car and of him standing there, and he just falls off and he’s done. I didn’t see it coming either, but it broke my heart, I swear to God. I’m a big crier anyway, but I was definitely crying at that part.

Craig K:  Well, Todd mentioned in the beginning of the podcast here that I had seen this before and yet there were several places that I had couldn’t remember. And I have to admit, the ending was one I didn’t quite remember. I didn’t really remember if the dad was gonna make it or not Uh-huh. Until we got to that point. And I thought, oh, yeah. Now I remember. But it’s like I mentally wanted to

Todd:  block that part out of my mind because I didn’t want it to end

Craig K:  that way. You know? Yeah.

Craig:  But I know.

Craig K:  One one thing that did bother me about that last whole scenario with the a hole guy and with him, during the whole movie, from the very out break in the in the train car. As soon as somebody was bitten, man, instantaneously, they turned.

Todd:  Yeah.

Craig K:  But here at the end, you had these two characters that turned, but it took forever. And they were so conscious of what was going on during the whole time where Todd else had that opportunity. That’s so true. Yeah.

Craig:  It is. It was a little inconsistent.

Todd:  Well and that flashback to his daughter’s birth Todd me. At first, I’m thinking, oh Todd. You’re gonna do this to us? Like, you’re just trying to rub some salt into the wound of the audience. But then, of course, I realized this is just they’re trying to put a happy spin on it, you know. Yeah.

Craig:  To

Todd:  get trying to give him a smile on his face before he goes down. So I don’t know how I feel about that. I thought it was a bit much, but okay. Whatever.

Craig:  I thought it was so sweet and I just cried and cried.

Todd:  It wasn’t it wasn’t as bleak, you know. I mean, for for a movie that should be pretty bleak, I guess they tried to make it less bleak, you know. I mean, we review a lot of bleak stuff, you know, where just horrible things happen to people and there’s no nothing Todd smiling at the end of it. So for them to kind of put that touch on to the end of this movie was, was actually pretty nice for us.

Craig K:  And that wasn’t quite the end. They they still have one more twist at the end.

Todd:  That’s true. That’s true.

Craig K:  They come up to the finally get finally get to Busan and what happens? They they come to a a blocked train track right in front of the tunnel right before Busan. So they get off the Craig, and they’re going through this dark tunnel. And what’s on the other side? The army waiting for other zombies to come through the tunnel so they can shoot them and kill them. You know? And you’re thinking, these people aren’t gonna make it. You know? Yeah. In fact, you know, they couldn’t tell in the dark if they were real or not or zombies, and the commanding officer gave him the order to go ahead and shoot him. So sniper is just getting ready to shoot him. And you think, well, nobody’s gonna make

Todd:  it. You

Craig K:  know? Right.

Todd:  I was really thinking that was gonna happen. I thought, surely not. A movie that just gave us this beautiful moment with his father and his daughter isn’t gonna kill the last two survivors. I was worried.

Craig K:  And what saves them? She sings the song that she did wouldn’t sing in school at the recital because her dad wasn’t there.

Todd:  Yeah. Oh. And that’s

Craig:  Oh, and it’s so sweet. And it’s I don’t know that song, but I it I always think of it as the hula song. Yeah. I love it when you sing, Todd.

Todd:  I try to put a little bit of singing into every episode because Craig loves it so much.

Craig:  But I don’t know, like, I, you know, I I that song is very familiar, but I didn’t know the translation. And, of course, we have the subtitles. Apparently, the lyrics of that song are, we’ll meet again when the flowers bloom, and the last words of the song are, until we meet again. And that was the thing that saved them from getting shot. And and then, you know, you see, like, the the soldiers, I feel like you see them racing in to get them, but that’s it. Then that’s the end. But I just thought that that was such a sweet ending that, you know, she had said to her dad, I couldn’t finish the song because I rehearsed it for you, and you weren’t there. I’m getting choked up talking about it.  And then she just lost her dad, and she sings that song out loud and proud and that’s what saves them and, oh, gosh. It was so sweet. I loved this movie. The I thought that this was a great movie. I I would certainly go as far to say as that this is my favorite, zombie movie that I’ve ever seen. And I would recommend this movie to just about anybody because even though it is a horror movie and there is gore and it is scary, I feel like it’s also a a very human drama, and it’s good storytelling and and you care about the characters. You’re invested in the characters. I was on the edge of my seat for most of it.  I just I was so surprised because I went into it thinking, okay. Another zombie movie, whatever. And I I it was done, and I turned it off. And I walked into the kitchen with my the tears running down my face, and I said to my partner,

Todd:  that was a really good movie.

Craig:  And he was like, you’re Craig?

Todd:  I was, like, yeah. It’s really good.

Craig:  He was, like, a zombie movie? I was, like, yeah.

Todd:  Oh, well well, this I think what makes this movie and this movie was a blockbuster hit when it came out all over Asia. It was the number one film in Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Japan, Korea, obviously. Made more than 90,000,000. Obviously, you can watch it now on Netflix if you want. There was talk of a sequel. I don’t know if that’s still going on. That was a couple years ago. But I think the thing that gives it that universal appeal is, kind of like you said, it doesn’t really dwell on the horror aspect.  Right? I mean, the zombies are the obstacle to overcome, and they’re relentless, and they’re ruthless, and some gross things happen, and they’re gross. But this isn’t a movie where you’re getting lots of close ups of people ripping flesh out, you know, severed arms and blood splattering everywhere. It’s really, I say, just as much an action, action thriller, you know, as, it doesn’t need the zombies. It could be, you know, it could be guys in black trench coats, you know, running around shooting people. Sure. It’s the drama. It’s that aspect that you care about the characters. It has these great action sequences that are really well shot and really tense, that makes this a movie, I think, that would appeal to so many different people.  Except my wife who wouldn’t wanna see anything with a drop of blood in it.

Craig:  Yeah. Fair enough. I I told Alan. I said, this would be one of those movies that if you had watched it with me, you would say, well, it was a lot better than most of the shit you make me watch. Oh, man.

Craig K:  What does it

Todd:  mean your final thoughts, dad?

Craig K:  When you asked me to what would I have for a suggestion for a movie, I had to sit for a few moments and think and think and think. But yet, this movie popped into my mind pretty quickly after a few moments, more so than any other movie that I could think of. And I didn’t know why. Todd didn’t know why at the time. I just remembered seeing it. It was that kind of a genre thing that I thought you guys would really get into. So I really thought it was a great movie.

Todd:  It it stuck with you, obviously.

Craig:  I’m so glad you recommended it because I don’t think that I would have watched it otherwise. And, I’m so glad I did, and I will probably watch it again. I thought that it would I just loved it. I thought it was fantastic.

Todd:  Well, thank you, dad, for, recommending it.

Craig K:  Oh, you’re welcome.

Todd:  And it’s been wonderful here, having you join us for this episode. Very special.

Craig:  Thank you so much. It’s been great.

Craig K:  Well, I’ve enjoyed listening to your podcast. I never expected to be on one myself, but I thank you for inviting me.

Todd:  Big surprise. Maybe this won’t be the last time. Anytime.

Craig:  Yeah. Anytime.

Todd:  Well, thank you again for listening to another episode. If you enjoyed this podcast, please share it with a friend. You can find us on Google Play, Stitcher, Itunes, anywhere you can find your favorite podcast. You can also also find us, on Facebook. We have a page there where you could like us, leave a comment, tell us what you thought about this movie, and, of course, recommend other movies in the future. We also have a website, 2 guys dot redfortynet.com, and you can go there and occasionally even find some written movie reviews that we put out usually about every Thursday. Until next time, I’m Todd.

Craig:  I’m Craig.

Craig K:  And I’m Craig.

Todd:  With 2 Guys and a Chainsaw.