Although the trailer for 28 Years Later looks fantastic, the eagerly anticipated follow-up to 28 Days Later has a problem that the franchise’s previous films did not have because of its genre change. With every year that goes by, the popularity of the many subgenres of horror films increases and decreases. While ghost stories and possession films have dominated the horror box office in earlier eras, slashers have occasionally been popular. The planned sequel to 28 Days Later, 28 Years Later, is placing a significant wager on the resurgence of zombie films, but there is one significant caveat.

28 Days Later told the story of Jim, a coma patient who woke up to find himself alone in a mostly empty London. Cillian Murphy’s protagonist soon learned London had been overrun by victims of the Rage virus who infected or killed everyone they encountered. The sequel 28 Weeks Later ended by revealing that the virus had escaped Britain and made its way to France, setting up a more apocalyptic follow-up. Now, the story of 28 Years Later looks set to pay off this promise, judging by the events depicted in its first trailer. This could be a problem.