When a movie hits cinemas and the opening credits roll, it’s easy to forget that it took a long time for it to get to that point and for the creatives behind it to be put in place. There are moving parts behind-the-scenes and in the lead up to projects that can shift on a dime.

Such is the case with Wool,  an intriguing new post-apocalyptic sci-fi adaptation from 20th Century Fox and producers Ridley Scott and Steve Zaillian. The film is to be set in a world where Earth’s air is no longer breathable for humans and so the population now lives in a futuristic silo-based community below the surface.

The high concept self-published e-book by Hugh Howey was a bit of a sensation when it was made available, selling 140,000 copies in just 6 months. It was the subject of a fierce studio bidding war a few years back which Fox ultimately won. The author also wrote The Shift Trilogy, which is a prequel to Wool and will probably be snapped up for adaptation of this project goes as well as hoped.

The first draft of the script was written by J Blakeson, the man behind the likes of the script of horror sequel The Descent: Part 2 and the director of kidnap thriller The Disappearance of Alice Creed and the upcoming The 5th Wave. However, it appears that the studio has tapped Nicole Perlman to do a major rewrite  before they go on the lookout for a director.

Perlman is a bit of a hot script-writing property at the moment, having co-written Marvel’s smash hit Guardians of the Galaxy to a $800 million+ box office result and has also been tapped to write Captain Marvel alongside Meg LaFuave (she’s also credited as writing the treatment for Black Widow). Hiring her for Wool suggests they’re going for something with a bit of fun to at as opposed to the po-faced post-apocalyptic tale that the plot could be construed as.

Source: The Wrap