28 Years Later ending explained: Isla chooses to die peacefully amid the chaos and Spike is a kid no more

28 Years Later is finally here, and the film is 92% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes at the time of writing. Interestingly, the horror thriller ends with a cliffhanger, which comes as no surprise as a sequel was already in development. Unlike the time gap between the last film of the franchise, 28 Weeks Later (released in 2007), and the latest release, you won't have to wait for nearly two decades. The next film is set to arrive on January 16, 2026.

The new film continues the saga after 28 years, where an island that's cut off from the rest of the world is still surviving against that Rage virus we saw in the earlier films. The film's main characters are Spike (Alfie Williams), a 12-year-old boy, and his mother, Isla (Jodie Comer).

** Disclaimer: The following article contains spoilers about the plot and ending of the film. **

In the end, we see Isla dying at her will after she realizes what her sickness is. It is hard for someone to see their mother die, but that is also what leads to a transformation in Spike. The boy now becomes a man, as he decides to enter the mainland and survive alone. However, he is alone no more.

Isla let herself euthanized by Dr. Ian Kelson

Ralph Fiennes plays Dr. Ian Kelson in 28 Years Later. (Image via Sony Pictures Entertainment)

Dr. Ian Kelson, played by the brilliant Ralph Fiennes, appears to be a creepy figure in 28 Years Later, especially because of the fact that he burns the bodies of the dead and uses them to create his bone monuments. However, he is probably the sanest man in the film.

Spike believes there is something wrong about the man because his father, Jamie (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), told him that he saw him burning hundreds of bodies when he was younger. However, the doctor was only honoring the dead, which he explains when Spike and Isla are in his company after he saves them from an Alpha, a new kind of infected introduced in 28 Years Later.

He then diagnoses that she has cancer, a sickness that has been a mystery since the beginning of the film and explains her amnesia and headaches. Isla doesn't want to die of cancer, so she chooses her day of death and asks Dr. Kelson to euthanize her.

After she says goodbye to her son, Isla is euthanized by Dr. Kelson with a morphine dart.

The 12-year-old boy Spike is a man now in 28 Years Later

Spike is grieving, of course. He has just lost his mother. However, he also understands the fact that she was suffering and that's why her decision was important. He has to carry on.

After Dr. Kelson has euthanized Isla and performed her final rites, he gives her sterilized skull to Spike, who chooses to put that on the top of the Bone Temple. However, the danger isn't suppressed yet, and Spike and Dr. Kelson have to survive another attack by the zombie-like people, which they do survive.

Spike then heads back to the mainland and leaves a baby, who was born of an infected woman but is uninfected, in the village, and heads back to the mainland. It is shown that he has survived the infected 28 days after that, thanks to the training he did with his father, and meets a cult of survivors at the end of the film.

This surviving group of "Jimmies" is likely to play a major part in the sequel, with Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Jack O'Connell, and more returning in the film.