'The Orphanage' Director To Make 'World War Z' Sequel

Briefly: Brad Pitt is back to produce and star in the sequel to World War Z, but this one will have a new director as Marc Forster will not return. Juan Antonio Bayona (aka J.A. Bayona), who made The Impossible and The Orphanage, will direct the sequel. While there are arguments to be had over The Impossible, the disaster sequence in that film alone suggests that Bayona will be right at home with the big sequences in this film.

No one is set to write yet, and we don't know how the plot of this sequel will jump off from the Wales-set finale of the first film, but Bayona will work with the writer to shape the script. (Which will hopefully be properly finished before cameras roll this time, to prevent some of that third-act scrambling that cost the first production so much time and money.)

Unusually for a tentpole release, Paramount has not yet set a release date, but expect that to happen soon. 2015 anyone? And this one has got to get a subtitle rather than a number, as World War Z 2 looks a bit like World War Zzz, and no studio wants to suggest we should snooze through the sequel. [THR]