Blood splattered across a TV playing the Teletubbies. Emaciated Rage Virus carriers running amok in rural England. A creepy, consonant clipping British voice reciting Rudyard Kipling’s sanity slipping war poem ‘Boots’ over the radio waves. Yeah, we’re thinking Danny Boyle and Alex Garland are back! After months of dripfed details and buzzy casting announcements, our first proper look at the duo’s 28 Days Later sequel trilogy starter 28 Years Later has finally arrived in the form of a heart stopping, arterial spraying, Ralph Fiennes and Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Jodie Comer starring new trailer. Check out how humanity is faring 10,228 days after the zombie(-adjacent) apocalypse below:
Is it us or did it just get even chillier round here? Save for a mother telling her kids to sit still and keep quiet as choppers circle overhead at the outbreak of the Rage pandemic, this first teaser for 28 Years Later — which, by the way, was shot entirely on an iPhone 15 Pro Max would you believe? — is a dialogue-free, vibes-heavy affair. But what vibes! Reminding us all that Boyle and Garland were doing the devastating, post-apocalyptic rewilded horror-thriller long before The Last Of Us spawned its first cordyceps carrier, nearly three decades on from their last step into this universe, the writer-director duo have lost none of their edge. Here we see Taylor-Johnson and a young boy traversing rural England, bow-and-arrow in hand, infected charging over the horizon line as they seek… something — or, if Ralph Fiennes’ recently shared plot details are accurate, someone. On their travels, we catch glimpses of a dirtied-up Fiennes’ marching towards a pyre of skulls (en route, perhaps, to a Bone Temple), Jodie Comer cradling (presumably) her child, and… could it be… Cillian Murphy’s bike courier Jim in a decidedly less-than-fully-human state?
Here’s our first official synopsis for the movie: “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.”
And here are a couple of cool-looking new posters for the film too:
Loaded with religious symbolism, practically done, good old-fashioned early ’00s zombified carnage, and a powerhouse cast of British acting heavyweights (we don’t even see Jack O’Connell and Erin Kellyman here, but they’re a-comin’), 22 years after 28 Days Later we could not be more ready to find out what happened 28 Years Later when Boyle and Garland’s new trilogy starter arrives in cinemas on 20 June, 2025.