Alex Garland Says 28 Months Later Is Happening Without Him

Writer-turned-director Alex Garland has confirmed that ‘28 Months Later,’ a third installment in the horror series which began with 2002′s ‘28 Days Later,’ is in the works, without his involvement.

Having written the 2002 film for director Danny Boyle (Boyle having previously filmed Garland’s novel ‘The Beach’), Garland went on to serve as executive producer on the 2007 follow-up ‘28 Weeks Later.’ Rumours of another sequel have come and gone ever since - but now Garland has confirmed to The Playlist that plans are in motion to get that third film off the ground.

However, it seems that Garland (who has since written cult hit ‘Dredd,’ and recently made his directorial debut with sci-fi movie ‘Ex Machina’) will have a somewhat smaller role to play this time around.

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For starters, Garland makes it clear that he isn’t necessarily a big fan of sequels in general: “the thing of expecting and needing more of something, has it’s own built-in issues, I think. Because most stories don’t stand up to being repeated.” This, it seems, is why he opted not to write ‘28 Weeks Later.’

Garland says the lack of a further film in the series in the interim has been largely down to a combination of legal issues and overall lack of interest:

“The rights to ‘28 Days’ were frozen, effectively, because they were shared between Danny [Boyle], [producer] Andrew [McDonald], myself, and Fox. After the second one, none of us really wanted to do another. Fox may or may not have, I don’t know.”

However, in the case of ‘28 Months Later,’ Garland explains an idea came about quite organically:

“About two years ago, Danny started collaborating on the potential to make ‘Trainspotting 2,’ another sequel… In that conversation, an idea for ‘28 Months’ arrived…

“I had this thought, and I suggested it to Andrew and Danny, but I also said I don’t want to work on it. I don’t really want to play a role, and Andrew said, 'Leave it to me.’ So he’s gone off and is working on it.”

Garland reveals no further plot details, nor does he comment on whether or not Danny Boyle may return to the director’s chair on ‘28 Months Later’ (having relinquished those duties to Juan Carlos Fresnadillo on ‘28 Weeks Later’). However, he does emphasise his happiness that a third film has developed in this way.

“Don’t you think those are, in a way, better? Because there is no momentum now, and you’ve had an organic, real spark about where I can take this. And it just popped into your head, kind of thing. Rather than, ‘Okay, I’m going to make a sequel.’ “

While not a zombie movie in the strictest sense (its ravenous hordes are living people infected by a rage virus, not flesh-eating ghouls risen from the dead), ‘28 Days Later’ was arguably the key film in bringing the zombie genre back to prominence in the early 2000s.

Most notably (and controversially for genre devotees), ‘28 Days Later’ popularised fast zombies, which would also be utlilised in director Zack Snyder and writer James Gunn’s 2004 remake of zombie classic ‘Dawn of the Dead.’

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Picture Credit: 20th Century Fox, WENN