This trailer for World War Z looks awesome! I mean, zombies and Brad Pitt? But that doesn’t mean it’s without its problems.
First, I should address that this actually is a zombie movie. The trailer ironically seems to try to hide the fact that this actually is a zombie movie until almost the very end, and even then you still might be able to assume that it’s a natural disaster movie. World War Z is a pretty popular book about the zombie apocalypse. So if done right, it should be a pretty excellent movie. However, zombie movies cater to a particular type of nerd. Not that most nerds don’t like zombies (see: The Walking Dead) but many of the recent zombie movies have been cheesy Resident Evil movies or parodies of zombie movies. So perhaps the trailer is trying to down play the zombie element in order to distant itself from these types of movies. But make no mistake; World War Z is a zombie movie. There will be zombies and it will be awesome.
The other concern I have with this movie is representation. Brad Pitt is the only character the trailer focuses on along with his family. His wife seems like a stock character, and his daughters seem to be about the same. Are we going to see any other female characters? Also the movie is World War Z. That means a zombie apocalypse is all over the earth. Are we going to see some awesome minority characters? I love Brad Pitt and all, but I’d like to see more than just him fighting zombies. After all, The Walking Dead made a name for itself by being an awesome zombie show with many diverse characters. It seems to me that maybe this movie should take a tip from that.
Lady Geek Girl and Friends 
I don’t understand how it directly ties to the book it gets it’s name from, but from what I know:
-The book doesn’t have running zombies
-The book is split into several shorter stories than one main one
-The book focuses more one gloom and inevitability than action and guns blazing
I understand wanting to speed it up for the sake of action, but it seems to sacrifice it’s own identity in a way. Should be interesting to see.
I’ve read the book, too, and it seems to me that it’s more of a piecemeal documentary compiled during the aftermath of a zombie apocalypse, while the movie might just be doing a linear progression of what happened during the events that (I’m guessing) lead up to the major battle. Though I agree with you – part of the horror for me was that the slow-walking zombies just kept coming, instead of the urgent “THEY’RE GONNA EAT US NOW!” feel the trailer has. Or maybe we will get to see a bunch of other plotlines, and this trailer is just supposed to be “OMG BRAD PITT.”
For what it’s worth, the book seemed to downplay the “traditional zombie” idea and went for a more “realistic” illness/epidemic scenario, so maybe the movie is going to do something similar.