For many people, filmmaker Gareth Evans is always going to be known as the guy who directed the ‘Raid’ films. “The Raid” and its sequel are two of the best examples of action films in the modern era, and immediately put Evans on the map as one of the brightest new filmmaking stars on the planet. People have such a love for those two films that fans have been desperately expecting the third film in the series. But according to Evans, it’s not in the cards.
While doing press for his new film “Apostle,” which is coming to Netflix really soon, Evans spoke to Slash Film about the idea of “The Raid 3.” And sadly, it looks like the time has come and gone for the series.
He explained:
“’The Raid 1’ and ‘2’ were incredible for me, but I just didn’t want to be doing ‘The Raids’ all the time. And the more time has gone on from that, the less interested I’ve been to go back there. What we did with ‘The Raid 2,’ we kinda close that off nicely, so it didn’t really appeal to me to jump back into that world again.”
For those not familiar with “The Raid,” the film follows a SWAT team that attempts to infiltrate a building that houses a mobster and his various cronies. The second film in the series follows the star Iko Uwais as he continues the story from the first film, but expands the criminal world past the building that dominated its predecessor.
This comment follows another interview with CinemaBlend where he gave a similar answer but also confirmed that at a time, “The Raid 3” was very much going to happen. “’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,” Evans said. However, as he explained above, the time just passed.
Still, for those hoping to see what Evans has up his sleeve next, “Apostle” hits Netflix on October 12.
