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Go ahead and chalk up a win for quiet, independent cinema. Star-making production company Sony has at last deigned to give niche director Danny Boyle a shot at wrapping up his 28 Years Later trilogy, despite the first film in the saga only making a paltry $150M at the box office against its $60M dollar budget. And get this - they've even been gracious enough to bring along an actor familiar to the franchise, but who you've probably never heard of.

That is, total unknown Cillian Murphy.

The news comes from Deadline, who reported on Sony's greenlight in an article published December 10. While there's no title yet to report for the third film in the infection-horror film, Deadline does clarify that the film will see Alex Garland back in the world of the Rage Virus, putting the OG team of director Boyle, star Murphy, and screenwriter Garland - who created the movie that started it all, 28 Days Later - back together. Oh, and they've also clarified that Murphy will indeed be reprising his role form the first film.

Now some of you real cinema nerds out there might be asking 'What took so long to get this approved?', but we at Popverse just wanted to say we completely understand the company's decision to wait. I mean, it's not like 28 Years Later was the 5th best grossing horror movie of 2025, or that the latest trailer for its sequel is sitting at 764K views on YouTube, or that this actor and director are both Oscar-winners for billion dollar-projects.  

Because if those were true, waiting to greenlight this project just now would be nothing short of INSANE.

Anyway, congratulations on taking a real risk, Sony. So brave of you to put the next Kraven on hold for this.

28 Years Later: The Bone Temple comes to theaters January 16, 2026.

In the immortal words of Danny Elfman, "Life's no fun without a good scare." Join Popverse's weekly explorations of the best opening moments of horror cinema in The Coldest Open, and then check out:

• The best horror movies of all time, according to horror aficionado Greg Silber
• The most underrated horror movies from the past couple years
• All the new and upcoming horror movies for 2025 and beyond

And much gore. Er, more. Much more.