With 28 days to go until the movie's release, Sony Pictures has announced that tickets are now on sale for director Danny Boyle and writer Alex Garland's long-awaited horror sequel, 28 Years Later.
In addition to some new official teasers and posters, a leaked version of the 5-minute sneak peek that's been playing in theaters ahead of the re-release of 28 Days Later has found its way online.
The opening scene finds Aaron Taylor-Johnson's character Jamie and his young son Spike searching a seemingly abandoned house, where they find an infected man hanging by his feet with a bag over his head and mysterious lettering carved into his chest.
Jamie tells Spike to "kill it" while reminding him not to feel bad as the infection destroys the mind and soul, but the boy hesitates, giving the "zombie" time to struggle free from his bonds.
According to the official synopsis, "It’s been almost three decades since the rage virus escaped a biological weapons laboratory, and now, still in a ruthlessly enforced quarantine, some have found ways to exist amidst the infected. One such group of survivors lives on a small island connected to the mainland by a single, heavily-defended causeway. When one of the group leaves the island on a mission into the dark heart of the mainland, he discovers secrets, wonders, and horrors that have mutated not only the infected but other survivors as well."
Ralph Fiennes, who plays Doctor Kelson, revealed some more specific details during a 2024 interview.
"It’s three films, of which two have been shot. Britain is 28 years into this terrible plague of infected people who are violent, rabid humans with a few pockets of uninfected communities. And it centers on a young boy who wants to find a doctor to help his dying mother. He leads his mother through this beautiful northern English terrain. But of course, around them hiding in forests and hills and woods are the infected. But he finds a doctor who is a man we might think is going to be weird and odd, but actually is a force for good."
Check out the most recent trailer below, and let us know what you think in the comments section.
Jodie Comer is also set to star, and it's been confirmed that Cillian Murphy will return as the original movie's protagonist, Jim, but he is not expected to appear until the second film.
"[On] this, we wanted him to be involved and he wanted to be involved," Producer Andrew Macdonald said in a recent interview. "He is not in the first film, but I’m hoping there will be some Jim somewhere along the line. He’s involved at the moment as an executive producer, and I would hope we can work with him in some way in the future in the trilogy."
28 Days Later was a massive success, and already spawned one less well-regarded (but still well worth watching) follow-up in 2007's 28 Weeks Later. Boyle and Garland were only involved as executive producers on that project, so a lot of fans are sure to view this new movie as the first true sequel.
Boyle will helm the first instalment, while Nia DaCosta was recently announced as the second film's - reportedly titled 28 Years Later Part II: The Bone Temple - director. Both movies shot back-to-back. Garland is writing all three. The budget for each movie is said to be in the $75 million range.
The first film starred Murphy as a man who wakes from a coma after a bicycle accident to find that England has been overrun by "The Infected." The virus turns its victims into raging killers, but unlike the usual "zombies," these creatures can move with frightening speed. The man then sets out to learn what's been going on, meeting fellow survivors played by Naomie Harris and Brendan Gleeson along the way, as well as a deranged army major played by Christopher Eccleston.