That was the ending to 28 Weeks Later, the bleak continuation to Danny Boyle and Alex Garland‘s classic indie horror hit from 2002. When the sequel released in 2007, helmed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, it seemed to solidify 28 Days Later‘s status as a franchise starter. There were even tie-in comics made at the time! And then silence. Despite favorable reviews (no, it’s not as good as the original but still worthwhile), 28 Weeks Later fell about $20 million short of the first film’s global box office. It brought the fledgling franchise to a screeching halt. There’s more to it than that, of course, as Garland himself hinted when he was asked about a third film in 2010: “I’ll answer that completely honestly. When we made 28 Days Later, the rights were frozen between a group of people who are no longer talking to each other. And so, the film is never going to happen unless those people start talking to each other again.” Now, we have yet another update, and a new hope that 28 Months Later will finally get made. Speaking to NME this week, Boyle confirmed that Garland has penned a script with a “lovely idea” and that he’s considering returning to the director’s chair for it.
“I’d be very tempted [to direct it],” Boyle said. “It feels like a very good time actually. It’s funny, I hadn’t thought about it until you just said it, and I remembered ‘Bang, this script!’ which is again set in England, very much about England. Anyway, we’ll see… who knows?” The focus on England could mean the third film wouldn’t follow up on the cliffhanger at the end of 28 Weeks Later — or perhaps it could be an inverse situation where the UK is the only nation in the world who’s now Rage Virus free… That certainly would be a different direction than the first two, a sort of Day of the Dead scenario where survivors are watching the end of the world from the safety of their own walls. (Boyle does love the most ambitious of George A. Romero‘s zombie films.) Best of all, both Cillian Murphy and Imogen Poots have said in the past that they’d be up for returning to the 28 Days Later universe. Murphy even reiterated this to NME in the same interview this week. “Every time I do bump into Danny or Alex I always mention it,” Murphy said. “Because I showed it to my kids recently, some Halloween about four or five years ago, and they loved it. It really stands up, which is amazing for a film that’s 20 years old. So yeah, I love the idea and it’s very appealing to me.” “It might come back into focus because one of the things that’s happening in the business at the moment is it has to be a big reason for you to go to the cinema, because there are less and less reasons,” Boyle said. “It’s hard for companies distributing films and for cinema chains to show films, they’re struggling to get people into the cinema unless it’s something like Top Gun: Maverick or a Marvel. But a third part would get people in, if it was half-decent.” In other words, we’ll just have to wait and see.