World War Z Sequel Gets A Director

"The Impossible" and "The Orphanage" director Juan Antonio Bayona will direct and produce the sequel to "World War Z" at Paramount and Skydance says Heat Vision--even as Plan B Productions® preps an exit from the mountain

Contending with numerous production problems including a pricey restructured third act,"Z" was on course to be one of Summer 2013's duds. Instead, the zombie film ended up getting good reviews and making a very nice $540 million worldwide. 

Brad Pitt is slated to return as producer and star. The first film helmed by Marc Forster seemingly ended the story, so how the sequel will handle this is not yet known.

The film--which is now on disc--bears little resemblance to the Max Brooks' created comic book on which it's based. Set a decade after a virus has turned much of the planet's population into zombies, the story follows a journalist interviewing subjects from around the world about their experiences during the 'zombie war'. The book fuses elements of political satire, war and survival horror as it explores how various nations, governments and individuals respond to the crisis.

The book is actually an anthology, each chapter is essentially an interview of a different subject in a different part of the world, allowing each chapter to focus on how people and nations reacted to the crisis before, during and after.

 No writers are attached yet, and we don't know if Bayona and the writers they do hire will go back to the book for additional material.