‘World War Z’ Somehow Still Needs a New Ending, Despite Drew Goddard-Penned Rewrite

By  · Published on July 11th, 2012

What’s most bizarre about Marc Forster’s Brad Pitt-starring adaptation of Max Brooks’ novel “World War Z” is not all the bad mojo swirling around the film’s production – including a release date shove and weeks of reshoots with “help” from Damon Lindelof – it’s the fact that a book that looks back on a devastating zombie apocalypse appears to be a film that tracks such a breakout as it’s occurring. Which is probably one of the reasons that the beleaguered production of World War Z is now apparently in need of a new ending for the film.

Here’s your ending, guys – the zombies win (and Cuba becomes a super power power and everyone in North Korea is gone and most people are, you know, dead). Not so hard, right? Tell that to Paramount.

According to Deadline Copenhagen, while Lindelof “cracked a potential new ending of the film” (we can only assume it included not tying up a bunch of narrative threads and forcing the characters to make a a series of increasingly stupid decisions), it was actually Drew Goddard who did most of the actual new writing (thank heaven for small favors). However, even the involvement of Goddard isn’t enough to get this thing copacetic, because the outlet also reports that the project might need yet another writer to sew it up.

With both Lindelof and Goddard busy with other projects, Paramount might be in the market for another scribe to “punch up” the new ending (if they even decide to use it). The buzz appears to be on Christopher McQuarrie, “whom the studio is high on after he adapted and directed Tom Cruise in Jack Reacher.” Yet, McQuarrie is also busy, so that might not even happen. And, also, those reshoots are still not yet scheduled. And, one more thing, it’s possible that this movie doesn’t even exist.

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