Back in June, Danny Boyle and Alex Garland released 28 Years Later, the follow-up to 28 Days Later and 28 Weeks Later.
The film depicts a post-apocalyptic Britain three decades after the outbreak of the Rage virus.
The first film in a new trilogy, its back-to-back sequel is 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, which arrives in cinemas on January 16.
And now a teaser has been posted on the film’s official Instagram, reading “Everything is about to change” over a shot from within the Bone Temple, where Ralph Fiennes’ Dr Kelson made a shrine to the dead.
The post is captioned: “Then out of the smoke locusts came upon the earth. And to them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power.”
This is the Bible verse Revelation 9:3, taken from the Apocalypse, when demonic powers (the locust-like creatures) are commanded by the angel of the Abyss (known as the Destroyer) to torment all people without the seal of God on their foreheads, as a warning to the unrepentant. The chapter says people will long for death, but will not find it.
A verse from Revelation also featured in the first movie and is linked to the villain of the second, a film that Boyle says will explore the nature of evil.
28 Years Later concluded with Spike coming across Jack O’Connell’s Sir Jimmy Crystal, the leader of the Jimmy cult, who were all dressed like the late sex offender Jimmy Savile. In the film’s opening scene, set in the 2002 outbreak, we saw Crystal as a boy in the Scottish highlands. The son of a vicar, he found his father praying in his church, manically welcoming the zombie invasion as the actual apocalypse. The priest gave his son Jimmy a crucifix before welcoming being infected himself. Flash-forward to 2030, and on the mainland, Jamie and Spike discover a house with a man tied upside down with his head in a bag. The father explained to his son that there are strange wandering people living in the mainland and that his man, who has the name “JIMMY” carved into his back, was tied up like this as punishment and had now become infected. Outside the house are the words of Revelation 1:7 graffitiied on the wall with the name “JIMMY” again.
That Bible verse reads: “He is coming with the clouds”. This refers to the Second Coming of Christ in the Final Judgement. Yet it seems that Sir Lord Jimmy Crystal has taken his father’s strange teachings to heart, that the 2002 outbreak was the apocalypse, and he is perhaps something of a false saviour himself instead of Jesus. This ultimately manifests in the final shot of the film of Jimmy wearing his father’s cross from the opening scene, but upside down. Symbolically, this can be taken to mean the chaotic disorder of the new world, but also a sign of the Devil, implying that Jimmy claims to be and appears to be a saviour, but is actually a monstrous villain – further tying into why he’s dressed like Savile. No doubt his intentions for those outside his cult will be violent and apocalyptic.