Now Ivan Reitman is Saying Paul Feig's GHOSTBUSTERS is The Only New Movie
For years, Dan Aykroyd would give updates on a third Ghostbusters movie to anyone who would listen, and after about the third or fourth straight year of covering every one of his updates, I eventually just got sick of all of the talk and gave up on writing about it. That movie never ended up happening, but Aykroyd and Ghostbusters director Ivan Reitman recently started a company called Ghost Corps. to develop a cinematic universe for the franchise, with the first entry being Paul Feig's upcoming female-led Ghostbusters film. There's been all sorts of talk about future films in the franchise and who may or may not direct or star in them, but confusingly, Reitman himself is calling Feig's Ghostbusters the only new movie and saying that everything else is just "noise."
"There has been a lot of excitement recently about what is happening with the Ghostbusters franchise. As the producer of the new Ghostbusters film, I feel the need to clarify. There is only one new Ghostbusters movie and that is the Paul Feig directed version coming next July, presently filming and going fantastically. The rest is just noise."
But as /Film reminds us, Reitman's own comments from earlier this year paint a much different picture:
“We want to expand the Ghostbusters universe in ways that will include different films, TV shows, merchandise, all things that are part of modern filmed entertainment. This is a branded entertainment, a scary supernatural premise mixed with comedy. Paul Feig’s film will be the first version of that, shooting in June to come out in July, 2016. He’s got four of the funniest women in the world, and there will be other surprises to come. The second film has a wonderful idea that builds on that. Drew will start writing and the hope is to be ready for the Russo Brothers’ next window next summer to shoot, with the movie coming out the following year. It’s just the beginning of what I hope will be a lot of wonderful movies.”
So Reitman himself not only acknowledged the existence of Drew Pearce's film (which was the subject of much discussion when he confirmed it was still in the works yesterday), but also called it "a wonderful idea" and gave it a release date of 2018. That seems a lot like more of a "solid plan" than "just noise." It sounds like he just doesn't want to distract from Feig's film, which is admittedly the only one with a finished script.
I wrote yesterday that Pearce had finished the screenplay for the next movie based on his quote that he "finished his work" on the movie, but that was a bad assumption on my part: he took to Twitter to say that he just wrote a bible instead of a completed screenplay. He also says the movie isn't an all-male movie like many falsely reported: it's a mixed gender team.
Regardless, all of this back and forth nonsense between people who should clearly be on the same page is making me hate this franchise as much as I hated it when Aykroyd kept yapping about it for years on end. Is this the kind of crap we're going to have to deal with for the next few years as this franchise gets back up and running again? I really hope not. Reitman needs to call everyone involved into a meeting and at least make sure everyone's story is straight so there aren't conflicting stories out there.
Oh, and take this how you will, but Chris Pratt just shared some jokey photos on Instagram that have the Ghostbusters theme song and goats involved: