While TV shows like The Walking Dead and iZombie currently have a vice grip on walking corpses, there's plenty to look forward to on the silver screen, as well. One such zombie movie that many fans have been waiting years to see is World War Z 2, which has maintained radio silence since David Fincher signed on to direct in April. In the face of mounting fan curiosity, Fincher recently addressed the status of the sequel to Marc Forster's 2013 film and confirmed that it's still in the story phase, but it's still definitely coming. Fincher said:
World War Z [2]? We're trying. A lot of stones have been laid. We're just deconstructing it right now against the mythology that exists to see where we can go.
So, if nothing else, it sounds like World War Z 2 is still happening. According to David Fincher's recent comments in an interview with Little White Lies, everyone involved is just trying to dissect the story to figure out which pieces of the overarching mythology need to be used in the sequel. When we last heard about the film, producer David Ellison confirmed that a script had been written, so now it looks like that story is still being workshopped to make sure it's ready for production.
As far as mythology goes, World War Z is about as dense as zombie fiction can get. Although the original World War Z film mostly focused on the early stages of the zombie outbreak, Max Brooks' book is a decade-long story about the introduction of zombies into our collective consciousness and their subsequent socioeconomic impact on the world. These stories take a look at a New Deal-esque approach to government-funded work programs, Cuba becoming a major world superpower, and England returning to a feudal system thanks to castles proving themselves to be major strategic assets against the living dead. There's quite a bit of material to pull from, but putting it all together (and making it work with the story of Brad Pitt's Gerry Lane) has become an intensive process for everyone involved in the sequel.
The desire to get World War Z 2 wholly locked down before commencing production makes quite a bit of sense when we take the first film's tumultuous production into consideration. According to many reports, World War Z was a nightmare to shoot, and the rocky production eventually led to exorbitantly expensive reshoots. Among the many changes made to the film included the decision to entirely scrap the original third act and scale things down from the bigger set pieces from earlier in the movie. Despite an overall positive critical and commercial reception, it makes perfect sense to assume that everyone involved wants more solid footing for the sequel.
At this point, it sounds like we're going to have to keep waiting for more concrete information about World War Z 2. Until more details about the project roll in, you can take a look at our World War Z 2 guide, as well as our 2017 movie premiere guide and our 2018 movie premiere guide.
