Beaks here...
This is some potential good news on Paramount's panicked rewrite of the WORLD WAR Z finale: while Damon Lindelof was brought in to "crack" the ending, Deadline is reporting that the actual writing chores were handed over to Drew Goddard, who dazzled us earlier this year with the excellent CABIN IN THE WOODS. So the Marc Forster-directed (loose) adaptation of Max Brooks's novel might finally be on the mend almost a year after the production wrapped principal photography!
Or not! There's also talk Paramount would like Christopher McQuarrie to punch up Goddard's ending, but he might not be available on acount of becoming Tom Cruise's new Robert Towne (they're both moving on to Doug Liman's ALL YOU NEED IS KILL). So then what? My modest proposal: stick with what Goddard gives you, 'cuz he's good. Brad Grey's proposal: I'm due for an George-Segal-at-the-end-of-CALIFORNIA-SPLIT run, so back off.
In any event, it's hard to argue that Paramount didn't know exactly what they wanted from a WORLD WAR Z movie when they greenlit it. I mean, pair this with the schedule-shuffling confidence behind G.I. JOE RETALIATION, and you've got a portrait of a studio that knows what it wants, fucks up what it wants, then bleeds out countless millions of dollars trying to end up with something semi-releasable. This is how you run a studio.
