Peninsula – Train to Busan 2 (2020)

Directed by: Sang-ho Yeon | 116 minutes | horror | Actors: Dong-Won Gang, Jung-hyun Lee, John D. Michaels, Milan-Devi LaBrey, Daniel Joey Albright, Re Lee, Bella Rahim, Hae-hyo Kwon, Pierce Conran, Geoffrey Giuliano, Christopher Gordon

Soldier Jung-seok (Gang Dong-Won) and his sister, brother-in-law Chul-min (Kim Do-yoon) and young nephew are en route to a ship that can bring them to safety. A zombie outbreak ravages South Korea and this is your last chance to escape. Along the way, a family begs for help, but Jung-seok ignores them and drives on. Once on board the ship, it turns out that the vessel – which is commanded by the American army – is not going to Busan, which is considered safe, but to Hong Kong. Then things go horribly wrong on board. An infected passenger wreaks havoc on Jung-seok’s sister and nephew.

Four years later, the two are living in difficult circumstances in Hong Kong. They do not have official refugee status and they have to scrape together their living. Then, together with two other Koreans, they receive an offer from a gangster gang (not coincidentally also led by an American). The proposal seems very simple: sneak back to Incheon, overrun by zombies, and steal $20 million from an abandoned truck. If they succeed, they get to keep half of the money and divide 10 million among the four of them.

From the story, the viewer must further conclude that North and South Korea are now united for unclear reasons and that the entire Korean peninsula (the ‘Peninsula’ from the title) is closed off from the outside world. According to the gangsters it is a no-brainer, because the zombies seem to be night blind. They reluctantly agree. It soon becomes apparent that the job is (obviously) not as simple as initially presented. And it turns out that the zombies aren’t their biggest threat, but militias rule the peninsula. And then Jung-seok encounters members of the family that he so coldly left to their fate.

In 2016, director Yeon Sang-ho made a big impression with the zombie thriller ‘Train to Busan’ (‘Busanheang’). Four years later there is ‘Peninsula’, which is set in the same universe, but is not a direct sequel to the earlier film. The marketing is somewhat misleading: the film is labeled as both ‘Train to Busan 2’ and as ‘Train to Busan presents: Peninsula’. The only connection is the zombie outbreak: there is no overlap regarding the cast or the plot.

Anyone who expects Sang-Ho to be able to repeat his piece of art will be somewhat disappointed. ‘Peninsula’ is entertaining and at times also exciting, but the high level of ‘Train to Busan’ is not reached. In fact, ‘Peninsula’ is a pretty messy movie that mixes a lot of genres, shamelessly steals from much better action movies (like the ‘Mad Max’ movies) and where the zombies aren’t even the biggest threat. At the same time, the film does have strong – and also a few funny – moments in which the great talent of the makers is visible. Much of the action sequences are well executed, but Sang-ho just can’t seem to keep the suspense throughout the runtime. The plot also shows quite a few holes and vagueness, so that you as a viewer are occasionally taken out of the events. Another downside is that the special effects are very mediocre at times. Especially in the chase scenes with cars and that gets annoying pretty quickly.

‘Peninsula’ is a mixture of styles and genres, which offers a nice pastime, but is not a significant addition to the genre.