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28 Years Later - 'Subversion' Featurette
IGN / VideoElephant
This article contains major spoilers for 28 Years Later
Last week saw the release of Danny Boyle’s new highly anticipated horror movie 28 Years Later.
The film is the third in the 28 Days Later film series and was written by Alex Garland. It stars heavy-hitters from the acting world such as Jodie Comer, Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Ralph Fiennes.
It’s a post-apocalyptic horror film littered with jump-scares and gore to satisfy fans of the genre. Over its one hour and 50 minute run time, Boyle and Garland have packed a lot in, including a new mutation of the Rage Virus. Fans will get to see what happened in the decades after the first outbreak.
Here’s everything you need to know.
Major spoilers ahead - don't say we didn't warn you...
The movie opens with a bunch of kids watching Teletubbies on the day of the outbreak. Meanwhile, a house in the Scottish Highlands is being stormed by the infected. Following the gruesome scenes, the sole survivor of the attack is a young boy, Jimmy, who runs away to a church nearby.
Inside, he finds a priest who is, in fact, his dad. The man tells young Jimmy that the outbreak of the virus is God’s judgment day. He leaves Jimmy with his golden cross and allows the infected into the church and takes him. Hiding in a crypt, Jimmy manages to survive yet again.
We fast-forward to 28 years later. The UK is in quarantine while the rest of Europe has managed to contain the virus. The waters are patrolled by NATO and anyone who sets foot in the UK has to stay for good.
Spike, 12, (Alfie Williams) and his dad Jamie (Aaron-Taylor Johnson) live on a remote tidal island off the coast of the north east of England. While the boy’s mother Isla (Jodie Comer) is ill in bed, father and son make their first trip to the “mainland”.
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Despite being two years younger than kids normally are when they make this ceremonial journey, they go anyway, with Spike hoping to make his first kill of an infected. “Head and heart” is where to aim to kill them, and is the community’s mantra.
They see a “Slow-low” infected person. The new variant of the Rage virus makes them big, grey and covered with mould. They eat worms from the ground. Spike kills one and the pair narrowly escape getting snuck up on by another.
In an abandoned house, they find a live person strung up with the word “Jimmy” carved into their torso. They are beginning to turn infected and Spike eventually shoots them after almost bottling it.
They continue and are faced with a group of infected coming over the brow of a hill in the distance. The group is led by an “Alpha” infected for whom the disease has acted like steroids and made them giant.
They manage to escape back to the house and hide out in the attic where they have to spend the night before dad Jamie says they will try to get back home.
Once they narrowly reach home after being chased down by the Alpha, Jamie tells the welcome party of Spike’s success on the mainland. Deep down, Spike knows his dad is exaggerating.
The boy is plied with beer and sees his dad sneak off to have sex with a woman while he is being sick. He tells a family friend that he wasn’t as brave as his dad said he had been.
During a confrontation between Spike and Jamie, Spike threatens his dad with a knife and tells him to leave him and Isla alone.
Spike sneaks his mother off the island to try and find a doctor for his mother’s illness. She saves him from a bite from an infected “Slow-lo”.
They are saved from further attacks by a soldier, Erik Sundqvist (Edvin Ryding), who got stuck on the island after his NATO boat sank.
Isla helps a pregnant infected woman give birth. After the labour, she starts to attack. The soldier has his head ripped off in the process of protecting Spike and Isla. They take the baby, who is not infected.
They are rescued again by Dr Kelson, who tranquilises an “Alpha” that was chasing them. He diagnoses Isla with breast and brain cancer. Dr Kelson agrees to end Isla’s suffering and she dies.
Spike brings the baby back to the island and leaves a note saying she is named Isla. He also says he is going back to the mainland. Jamie runs to try and stop him by the tide is high and he can’t reach him.
The film ends with Spike confidently shooting at a group of infected with a bow and arrow. As more arrive, he is aided by Jimmy, who is all grown up and wearing his father’s cross.
Now the leader of a cult of people out fighting the infected, the group help Spike take out the infected with their various make-shift weapons. Jimmy invites Spike to join them.
Is there a post-credits scene in 28 Years Later?
Contrary to belief, that is where the film ends. There is no post-credit scene, but rather the end of the movie is the jumping off point for what fans hope will be the next trilogy.
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