Why did The Raid 3 never happen after the acclaim enjoyed by its two predecessors? Director Gareth Evans made his mark on action movies with 2009's Merantau, which also marked the film debut of Iko Uwais. Evans had traveled to Indonesia to film a documentary about the martial art Silat, and after seeing Uwais' talent and screen presence, cast him as the heroic wanderer Yuda in Merantau. It was with 2012's The Raid that Evans and Uwais really shook the action world up.

Following a police raid of a Jakarta apartment complex filled with killers and psychopaths, The Raid combined the Silat-based action scenes of Merantau with the tone of a survival horror game and became an instant action classic. Its 2014 sequel The Raid 2 continued to turn the volume up with a more complex crime family plot and even wilder action. Though Evans conceived of The Raid franchise as a trilogy, The Raid 3 ultimately never happened, with a combination of factors explaining why.

RELATED: Warrior's Best Fight Borrows Heavily From The Raid

Evans had already wanted to take a break from action moviemaking in the interim between The Raid 2 and The Raid 3, with his next film being the 2018 Netflix horror Apostle. A combination of the ending of The Raid 2 and Evans' return to the UK from Indonesia led to him moving on from The Raid 3. Evans explained in a 2016 interview with Impact Online (via AICN), "Whether it was a conscious decision or not, moving back to UK felt like a closing chapter on that franchise - we ended the story pretty neatly (I feel) in Part 2." Evans also reiterated this point while promoting Apostle, stating in an interview with Slash Film, "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".

The Raid 2 Fight

Evans has also stated Uwais' character Rama would've had a minor role in The Raid 3 compared to its predecessors. Instead, the film would have focused more on the Goto crime family coming into conflict with their Yakuza superiors. The film would also have been set mostly in the jungles of Indonesia as the Gotos battle their Yakuza bosses. From the sound of it, The Raid 3 was going to take quite a left turn from the end of The Raid 2. Evans also seemed intent to hold true to Rama's minimal involvement in the third movie, with The Raid 2 ending on a weary Rama declaring "No, I'm done" when approached by Goto. The American remake of The Raid remains in developmentthough a parting of ways between rights owners XYZ Films from director Joe Carnahan and star Frank Grillo now makes it an unofficial one on the latter pair's part titled Zeno.

Though The Raid 3 never happened, both Evans and Uwais have gone on to great careers, with Evans directing the aforementioned Apostle and creating TV series Gangs of London. Uwais has also become one of the biggest martial arts stars in the world, continuing to wow audiences in movies like Beyond Skyline or The Night Comes For Us, along with the Netflix series Wu Assassins and its upcoming movie sequel, Fistful of Vengeance. While the world may never actually see The Raid 3, enough is still known about it to ponder what it could've been.

NEXT: Mortal Kombat Reboot: Where You Know The Sub-Zero Actor From