Opening an Excel 2016 file with data links to other workbooks

when trying to open a workbook that I created with links to other workbooks it will not open. All that appears is an excel page with greyed out tool bars and a grey screen without the gridlines. When closing it asks me to save the document. When opening it asks me to update or dont update the links. I have chosen the update and the dont update actions without success. It is almost like the file has corrupted somehow.