Guillermo del Toro to write and direct Zanbato for Bad Robot

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

Over the years, we've become quite accustomed to Guillermo del Toro taking on projects which, more often than not, never actually get made, but I still can't help but to feel a certain giddiness every time del Toro announces something new. According to Collider, Guillermo del Toro has signed on to write and direct ZANBATO for Paramount and J.J. Abrams' Bad Robot.

Collider states that the film will be centered around a young girl, somewhere between the ages of 10-15, with lethal fighting skills. Their report initially described the character as a "ninja," but Guillermo del Toro chimed in on Twitter to say that it is "NOT a ninja project," although admitted that "there are ninjas in it." The director added that ZANBATO has been in the works for over six years and is still in development, meaning that it may not be his next live-action project. If you're wondering what Zanbato means, according to Wikipedia, a Zanbato is an "especially large, single-edged sword dating to the Heian period of historical Japan" whose name translates to "horse-slaying sword" or "horse-chopping saber." Place your bets, folks. What are the chances that ZANBATO actually gets made?

Guillermo del Toro's last film was THE SHAPE OF WATER, which scored him the Best Director and Best Picture awards at last year's Academy Awards, but he's currently in pre-production on a stop-motion animated adaptation of PINOCCHIO for Netflix. The film will be set in Italy during the 1930s, a period of time in which fascism was on the rise and Benito Mussolini was tightening his grip on the country. Guillermo del Toro has teased that "It's not a Pinocchio for all the family," also confirming that the darker adaptation will be a political fable. "Of course. Pinocchio during the rise of Mussolini, do the math. A puppet during the rise of fascism, yes, it is."