Danny Boyle's 28 Years Later opened to overwhelmingly positive reviews earlier this year, but it wasn't the box office hit that Sony Pictures likely anticipated.
The movie only managed to gross $150 million at the worldwide box office, a decent result on a $60 million budget, but one which means the filmmaker's planned threequel depends on the success of Nia DaCosta's 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple.
Well, there may be some good news on that front. World of Reel (via FearHQ.com) reports that a recent test screening went well and featured "multiple applause breaks during the film." One attendee even told the site that, "I thought part 1 was outstanding, but this surpassed it."
Despite the mixed response to Jack O'Connell's Jimmy (he debuted in a tonally jarring action scene in the closing moments of 28 Years Later), this screening has seen him touted as delivering the "villain performance of the year."
The site adds, "The central dynamic is essentially a duel between O’Connell and Ralph Fiennes' bone shriner, Dr. Ian Kelson, who has a larger role than in the first instalment and delivers a performance that's 'even better' than the previous film."
The third act—which reportedly features a sequence "that will be talked about for much of 2026"—is similarly praised, as is Alex Garland's script.
Also of note is the fact that DaCosta hasn't gone down the iPhone/handheld camera route, instead choosing to embrace a more orthodox shooting style. However, with Cillian Murphy only expected to have a few seconds of screentime in 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, whether any of this will help make it a box office draw is hard to say.
Zombies are no longer as popular as they once were, but if Sony can market this follow-up in a way that's perhaps less niche and a tad more mainstream, then odds are a third chapter will happen. We'd bet on Murphy being included in the trailers, anyway.
"[Nia] gets a bit of Cillian at the end," Boyle said earlier this summer. "All I can say is you have to wait for Cillian, but hopefully he will help us get the third film financed."
"You promise [the studio] Cillian Murphy, that's quite a deflection of any technical concerns, they soon forget," he added. "Yeah, we nakedly used that to get our own way. What better promise could you make?"
"We haven't got the money for the third one yet. It will depend how the first one does, I guess," Boyle noted. "But hopefully if we do ok, they'll give us the go-ahead for the money and for the third one. Everybody's standing by for that, really. Including Cillian."
In 28 Years Later, 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.
28 Years Later: The Bone Temple is set to be released in theaters on January 16, 2026.