AceShowbiz -

"World War Z 2" has lost its director. Juan Antonio Bayona has reportedly exited Paramount and Plan B's sequel to 2013's "World War Z". Brad Pitt will reprise his role as Gerry Lane who is trying to stop a zombie pandemic.

According to Deadline, Juan's abrupt exit is being attributed to timing. While the studio wants to get the sequel into production for June 9, 2017 release, the director felt he needed more time "because he has commitments on the movie he just filmed, "A Monster Calls", starring Felicity Jones, Liam Neeson, Sigourney Weaver and Toby Kebbell.

Paramount said in a statement, "Bayona is no longer able to make 'World War Z 2' this year, and it is our ambition to do so. He is a wonderful director and we hope to work with him soon."

Production for "World War Z 2" is expected to begin this summer. It has a script by Steven Knight ("Peaky Blinders") which is rewritten by Dennis Kelly ("Utopia"). The first "World War Z" director Marc Foster had announced in October 2013 that he won't return for the sequel.

"We're certainly talking about it, yes," he said of reprising his role in the sequel at 2013 Toronto Film Festival. "We have so many ideas on the table from the time we spent developing this thing and figuring out how the zombie worlds work. We have so many ideas and so much information - we think we have a lot of stuff to mine from. We gotta get the script right first to determine if we go further. We'll wait and see how the script turns out but yes, I'd love to come back."