Candyman director Nia DaCosta joining 28 Years Later

Nia DaCosta brought one undead guy back to life in Candyman, now she's looking to deal with a whole lot of them. According to Deadline, the director is in talks with Sony to helm the follow-up to Danny Boyle's 28 Years Later.

In the world established in 2002's 28 Days Later, a rage virus was accidentally released in England. It turned people into zombie-like monsters intent on nothing but death and destruction. Carried through blood, it spread easily and quickly. The story itself followed Cillian Murphy's Jim who woke up in an abandoned hospital and slowly figured out what had happened to a now-ruined and mostly empty London. He eventually met other survivors played by the likes of Naomie Harris and ran into that age old question: which is worse, humans or monsters?

A sequel called 28 Weeks Later came out in 2007, but Boyle and screenwriter Alex Garland were uninvolved. Juan Carlos Fresnadillo stepped into the director's chair to oversee a cast that included Rose Byrne, Jeremy Renner, Idris Elba, Imogen Poots, Harold Perrineau and Robert Carlyle. After the titular amount of time, England had mostly handled the infected problem by walling off parts of the city and fully clearing out the killers. When a pair of kids tried to get back to their old house they come back with a lot more than they bargained for. It's actually a great follow-up to the first film that expands the world without retreading the original. Plus, it seems like every time you watch it, you recognize someone new who has rocketed to fame.

Boyle made a name for himself in the mid 90s with Trainspotting, but proved he was a true creative visionary beyond that with 28 Days Later, Slumdog Millionaire in 2008 and 127 Hours two years later. He has been talking about a return to the zombie world for a while now, but earlier this year, it was announced that 28 Years Later would land at Sony with not one, but two scripts written by Garland. Boyle is on board to direct the first and DaCosta looks to be taking the reigns for the second one. Murphy has also been mentioned as returning, primarily as a producer, but there's talk that Jim might also make a return to the screen.

Like Boyle, DaCosta has taken on a variety of projects as a filmmaker. Right after directing Candyman in 2021, the director was tapped by Marvel Studios to helm The Marvels and up next she's adapting Henrik Ibsen's play Hedda Gabler as Hedda. Her first feature, Little Woods, was a tense drama about the lengths families will go to help each other out and survive in an uncaring world. Regardless of the type of film she's working on, Dacosta always foregrounds the characters' humanity no matter what kind of craziness is going on in the background, which makes her an excellent choice to play in the 28 Years Later sandbox.

As of now, Sony has not announced a time frame for either film.