The original Quiet Place was a smash hit, and now its sequel seems to be the first true “welcome back to the movies” post-pandemic box office draw. Suffice to say that there will be a third in the series, provided John Krasinski wants to make it, while hopefully maintaining this level of quality at the same time.

I wanted to talk about the potential future of the franchise based on the events of this film, which was comfortable having the creatures fully visible the whole movie out in the open, and yet it didn’t reduce the terror in any capacity.

We did, however, discover something new about the creatures that sort of changes everything. Spoilers follow.

When the family meets up with their former neighbor, Cillian Murphy, he laments that there’s “nothing left” out there. But toward the end of the film, we learn that not only are the creatures disoriented and weakened by certain sound frequencies (so far, just the feedback from hearing aids, but probably reproducible in other forms). It’s also the case that the creatures cannot swim.

On a planet that is 70% covered in water, that seems like a pretty big deal, and it also happened to be a similar twist found in the movie Signs. Although these creatures don’t burn when you throw water at them, they just can’t swim. Still, that’s a big deal.

What we learn in the film is that there’s a nearby island community off the east coast living like nothing ever happened with a handful of families that don’t need to be silent, because no creatures can hear or reach them (well, one does eventually, but that was sort of a freak occurrence).

What this means for the future of the Quiet Place franchise is that there should be a lot more safe havens than anyone ever suspected. We saw the “arrival” of the creatures in this movie, they crash to earth in some sort of series of meteors, but if they can’t swim then…the only time islands would be vulnerable would be if a meteor hit them directly.

Some islands are so small they’d probably come with their own problems. This island in the sequel, for instance, seemed small enough where they’d probably run out of food and clean water eventually unless they went back to the mainland.

But what about like, Hawaii? Japan? New Zealand? Puerto Rico? Cuba? What are the odds that a meteor hit those directly and spread creatures everywhere? Probably not very high. Like Australia, sure, but it stands to reason that there could be plenty of fully-functional nations still going in isolation if the creatures have no way to traverse water other than getting lucky and coasting on a boat in the right direction (and they don’t seem smart enough to do that on purpose).

And now we can combine that fact, the idea that there are probably still a lot of humans left alive, with the development of this film, that by broadcasting that anti-alien frequency, you could essentially just bring any radio with you anywhere, weaken and creatures you see and shoot them in the head. Hell, a teenage girl killed one with the single swing of a metal pole. They’re not exactly tough now that every radio is now their kryptonite. I can see a future movie being a sort of extermination, where the hunted become the hunters and track down remaining creatures to reclaim the land.

Anyway, things are not looking great for the aliens thanks to one young girl and their lack of fins and gills. Great movie, and I want to see a third to see where else they can go with this concept.

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