Fans of the 2012 Indonesian martial-arts action thriller “The Raid” and its 2014 sequel “The Raid 2” have been confronted with a very bitter pill to swallow with the news that writer-director Gareth Evans had effectively ended plans for “The Raid 3”. However, fans of the franchise now have a chance to let their imaginations run wild at just what “The Raid 3” would’ve entailed, after some recent comments Evans made on his intended outline for the third film in the series.
The UK born filmmaker, having returned to his native Wales after several years of making movies in Indonesia, revealed that his return to his home country coupled with the conclusion of “The Raid 2” effectively served as the catalyst for his decision to leave the series as is. In an interview with Cinemablend, Evans elaborated on his new outlook on “The Raid” films:
“The Raid 3 was…at one point it was on my radar. I had a full idea. I know what the storyline would have been. But I think enough time has passed now that I think I’m not likely to go back and revisit it. We had a lot of fun making those films, and I think we came to a nice, sort of natural conclusion with [The Raid 2]. And I think sometimes you can have a little bit too much of a good thing.”
Evans would further spill the beans on how he’d originally intended to conclude the series in a subsequent interview with Joblo:
“I knew what I wanted to do with The Raid 3, I knew what that story was going to be. If I was ever going to make it, it really had to have happened after we made The Raid 2. The storyline was going to pick up – I’ll give you a little bit of it – if you were watching The Raid 2 and rewound from the ending about 15-20 minutes back to when Goto gives instructions to his right-hand man to go kill the police, kill the politicians, ‘kill everyone that we work with, we’re going to start fresh’, that was going to be the first scene of The Raid 3. It was going to be more about the Yakuza than it was going to be about Rama; Rama was not really going to feature in that storyline much at all, it was going to be about the bosses in Japan realizing that someone in Jakarta that represented them started to f–k with the politicians and the police in a country they don’t belong in. It was going to be the fallout from that.
It was going to be a 95-minute, 100-minute, sort of…escape into the jungles of Indonesia type of thing. But it really needed to be made at that period of time. Four years, five years later to go back and try to recreate that, it felt a bit disingenuous. I made three martial arts films in a row, I wanted to explore other things first. It was always a cool idea, but it stopped being really special for me. The Raid, it gave me an awful lot that I’m very appreciative about, but that adventure is kind of over now.”
While Evans’ decision to move on from “The Raid” franchise will no doubt leave many fans disappointed, there’s no dearth of Silat-driven action on the way from Indonesia. Series star Iko Uwais , who first made an impact on the martial arts movie world in Evans’ 2009 directorial debut “Merantau“, will be seen later this month alongside his co-star from “The Raid”, Joe Taslim, in “The Night Comes For Us“, which premiered at last month’s Fantastic Fest in Austin, Texas, and is set to be released on Netflix on October 19th. The film also reunites Iko with “Headshot” director Timo Tjahjanto, along with his villainous co-star from the film, Sunny Pang. Iko will also soon be seen in Jesse Johnson‘s highly anticipated martial arts ensemble (or “The Asian Expendables”) “Triple Threat“, alongside Tony Jaa, Tiger Chen, Scott Adkins, Michael Jai White, Celina Jade, Michael Bisping, and Jeeja Yanin.
Iko’s co-stars from “The Raid” films, Yayan Ruhian and Cecep Arif Rahman, will also be seen in next year’s “John Wick 3: Parabellum“, along with their fellow heavy hitters Tiger Chen, Hiroyuki Sanada and Mark Dacascos. Additionally, “The Raid” series itself is set to continue in the form of the in-development English-language remake, being helmed by Joe Carnahan and Frank Grillo, the latter of whom appeared alongside Iko and Yayan in last year’s “Beyond Skyline“.
What are your thoughts on what Gareth Evans revealed about “The Raid 3”? Imagine you could contribute to its making, how would you do it differently, what new elements would you definitely include? Let us know in the comments below; Like, share and join in the conversation on Facebook and follow us on Twitter & Instagram. (Want more? Then RAID KFK’s trove of reviews and more FUxclusives!)