“28 Years Later” hits theaters this weekend, kicking off a new trilogy for a horror franchise that hasn’t had an installment since 2007. But sorry, Cillian Murphy fans: the “28 Days Later” star isn’t in the new film, although he’ll show up in Nia DaCosta‘s “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” next January. And, according to director Danny Boyle, Murphy has an even bigger role in the trilogy’s third film, although its script isn’t even finished.
Boyle revealed the size of Murphy’s upcoming role in “28 Years Later: Part 3” in a new interview he did with Alex Garland for Variety. “[Murphy] appears briefly in Nia’s film,” Boyle confirmed. “I don’t think that’s giving too much away, and our plan is that he will be an enormous character in the third film in the way that Jack O’Connell’s character — who you see briefly at the end of the first film — is an enormous character with Ralph Fiennes in the next film.” Boyle’s comments also confirm Fiennes returns as Dr. Kelsen in DaCosta’s upcoming sequel. It’ll be interesting to see how Murphy’s Jim crosses paths with the new trilogy’s protagonists.
But it’s still unclear when Boyle will shoot “28 Years Later: Part 3,” mainly because Garland still needs to write it. “The script isn’t written,” Garland told Variety. “It’s strange: there’s a story, there’s a plan, there’s a structure. These three films are in some ways distinct from each other, in other ways interrelated, because there are characters that have a through line throughout all of them, although they are also essentially separate stories. It makes it, in filmmaking terms, have something in common with television. Both Danny and I have worked at some point on television, and TV has a slightly more organic element about the way things can unfold. So people might write a whole story arc, but then they will discover in the shooting how that story arc really lands.”
Garland’s comments explain the extreme tonal shifts in “28 Years Later,” particularly its final minutes. But that sense of discovery is a major part of Garland’s creative process for the new trilogy. “I think that, having written the first one, in many ways I didn’t know at that point what the film would be, because there’s a whole set of discoveries left to uncover,” he continued. ” The same is also true with the second film. So I had to understand something about what Ralph Fiennes is going to create with Danny, to be able to lean to that. There is always a gap between the thing that exists on the page, as it’s gone through the filter of many people’s imaginations and agendas and preoccupations, and then again in the edit.”
But what do all of those comments mean for “28 Years Later: Part 3”? “So short answer: I’ve got the idea, I’ve got the plan, but there’s not a script,” said Garland. “I’m waiting to see what happens, I suppose.” In other words, it may be a while before the trilogy-capper hits theaters. No surprise there, as Garland has his “Elder Ring” adaptation he’s working on for A24. But if “28 Years Later” does well at the box office, and it looks like it will, then expect Boyle to shoot it as soon as possible.
Check out The Playlist’s review for “28 Years Later” here. As for Nia DaCosta’s “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple”? That one hits theaters on January 16, 2026.
