'World War Z': Why Zombie Fans Aren't Impressed

Max Brooks loves zombies. He loves them so much that he's written about four books on the subject, each with its own special outlook on the zombie apocolypse. Max Brooks frequently inspects pop cultural references to zombies, historical references and the science of zombie-killing. He's obsessed with zombies, but when it comes to writing the screenplay for a zombie movie based off of one of his books, he's a little less passionate about the process.

Max Brooks has reportedly given up all hope on his latest project, "World War Z," which is a movie adaptation of a book he wrote in 2006. Brooks reportedly stopped paying attention to what Hollywood executives were doing to his book because they weren't interested in his opinions

"I once asked [Max Brooks] ... how he was handling the movie version of his book, and he told me that his strategy was to simply sign over the rights and then not pay an iota of attention to what happened. Once it became clear that the producers weren't interested in his input, he figured that it was the only way to stay sane," writes Daniel Drezner of Foreign Policy. "After watching the trailer, I think his strategy is sound, because it looks like what they're doing to World War Z is a travesty."

It hadn't always been this way. Marc Forster, director of "Quantam Of Solace" has always been set to direct "World War Z," but screenwriter J Michael Straczynski, writer on "Babylon 5," was originally supposed to adapt the book to a screenplay. Straczynski was eventually swapped for Matthew Michael Carnahan, writer of "The Kingdom and Lions For Limbs."

"Originally intended for release in December 2012, World War Z's release was pushed back to June 2013 to allow for a third-act rewrite. Damon Lindelof and then Drew Goddard were brought in to rework the final segment, and reshoots began in September and October," reports Ryan Lambie at Den Of Geek.

Given the shaky production history and delayed recording and release schedule, fans have been hypercritical of the first trailer for the movie. The trailer to the movie shows Brad Pitt playing Gerald Lane, a United Nations researcher that's been caught in the crosshairs of a zombie outbreak. He reaches out to friends at the highest level of the U.N. to determine what he can do to save his family and also save the world.

Brad Pitt looks disconnected from the role and performs dispassionately in almost all of the segments shown in the trailer. The level of urgency seems unbelieveable. Pitt seems to be just going through the motions rather than selling his role as well as he has in more ambitious stories. That's no surprise given that Pitt reportedly had several spats with director Marc Forester early in the production of the movie.

"Things got so bad that when Forster had notes on a scene for Pitt, they had to be relayed through an intermediary - and vice versa. We're told that this awkward function was and is being largely fulfilled by a rotating trio of studio production president Marc Evans, Paramount film group head Adam Goodman, and Dede Gardner, a former executive at the studio who now runs Pitt's company," reports Claude Brodessor-Akner of NY Magazine's Vulture.com.

If we use comments in zombie forums and on YouTube to gauge the interest level in "World War Z," it appears that fans of the book are eager to see the movie, but most of them have accepted that "World War Z" will not be a documentary-style story in the same way that the book was written. YouTube user 6200mrbill wrote, "When I heard about World War Z being made into a movie, I thought maybe they were going to use flashbacks during the interviews, or something like that, to show the action. Then I saw the trailer... and though it looks good, WWZ it ain't."

Here's the first trailler to "World War Z":