That's no reason for a reboot, they can mention something about the previous Ghostbusters in the 80's.
Ghostbusters 2016: Talk about the movie(s).
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One of the reasons they aren't doing a direct sequel is that Sony is legally prohibited from doing so without the consent of Aykroyd, Murray and Reitman.
The other reason they aren't doing a direct sequel is that Ghostbusters was never designed in any way to be a franchise or to have sequels.
I mean, Christ, why does everything have to be a goddamn universe nowadays? God, this drive for everything being inter-connected is nothing short of exhausting. Continuity is poisonous to good storytelling and eventually you wind up with the horribly bland mediocrity of the Marvel movies because everything needs to fit together just so.
I mean, look at Ghostbusters II. There wasn't even a real creative push behind it -- the movie didn't get made because there was a great idea screaming to be told, it happened because Sony wanted another movie to cash in on the money it was making from the cartoon-based toys. Reitman and Ramis took a lot of convincing (and significantly higher paychecks), and Murray waited until an ungodly amount of money was offered to him.
There's nothing wrong with a franchise. On rare occasion, franchise movies can be really good. But Ghostbusters II is not one of them. It's not a bad movie. But it's so perfunctory -- like most comedy sequels.
All the sequel-pushing for another Ghostbusters set in that timeline is missing the point -- it's not a sci-fi / action movie about trapping ghosts. It's a comedy about three hucksters (and Ernie Hudson) who accidentally save the world, and just happen to do so while using some nifty backpacks that get used all of twice in the entire film.
From what we've heard of on-set reports, Feig has amped up the horror and is also doing some really different stuff with the characters; he hasn't just done a find-replace on the original script and called it a day. And he's doing it without having to work within the constraints of a 31-year-old movie.
The other reason they aren't doing a direct sequel is that Ghostbusters was never designed in any way to be a franchise or to have sequels.
I mean, Christ, why does everything have to be a goddamn universe nowadays? God, this drive for everything being inter-connected is nothing short of exhausting. Continuity is poisonous to good storytelling and eventually you wind up with the horribly bland mediocrity of the Marvel movies because everything needs to fit together just so.
I mean, look at Ghostbusters II. There wasn't even a real creative push behind it -- the movie didn't get made because there was a great idea screaming to be told, it happened because Sony wanted another movie to cash in on the money it was making from the cartoon-based toys. Reitman and Ramis took a lot of convincing (and significantly higher paychecks), and Murray waited until an ungodly amount of money was offered to him.
There's nothing wrong with a franchise. On rare occasion, franchise movies can be really good. But Ghostbusters II is not one of them. It's not a bad movie. But it's so perfunctory -- like most comedy sequels.
All the sequel-pushing for another Ghostbusters set in that timeline is missing the point -- it's not a sci-fi / action movie about trapping ghosts. It's a comedy about three hucksters (and Ernie Hudson) who accidentally save the world, and just happen to do so while using some nifty backpacks that get used all of twice in the entire film.
From what we've heard of on-set reports, Feig has amped up the horror and is also doing some really different stuff with the characters; he hasn't just done a find-replace on the original script and called it a day. And he's doing it without having to work within the constraints of a 31-year-old movie.
Are we sure it's a reboot and not a continuation?
Yes. This is completely separate from the 1984 film. Dan Aykroyd's bit is just a brief cameo gag.
He plays a cab driver who says, "I ain't 'fraid of no ghosts," and Wiig's character makes the joke, "That's a double negative. That means you are afraid of ghosts!"
Ehm Timby I didn't asked it to irritate you
But they get away with doing a remake? How's that work?
The position that Sony took was that because it's a brand-new script, story and cast, completely divorced from the 1984 and 1989 films outside of some basic core concepts, then it was not a continuation of the property per se and the studio was free and clear to do whatever it wished. That's how they got around Reitman and Murray (and, to an extent, Aykroyd, who was blindsided by the Feig announcement but later came around).
Maybe some kind of agreement was put in place to get them to do the second movie? Or Sony owns the trademarks but Murray, Reitman and Aykroyd have the copyrights for the first two films?
The contracts that Ramis, Reitman, Aykroyd and Murray signed for GB2 stipulate that no Ghostbusters 3 could be made without all of them signing off on it. Historically Murray was always the hold-up, although knowing what we do now about just how sick Ramis was and for how long it feels kind of ghoulish in retrospect to think of how Aykroyd was saying in like 2012 and '13, "Yeah, we're shooting in a few months." Anyway, back when Etan Cohen was still spinning his wheels on the GB3 script, Sony was getting ready to take the stance that Murray had abrogated his portion of the agreement by refusing to read any of the drafts, and as such had waived his veto powers. Then Ramis died and Feig approached the studio with his idea, which rendered the whole situation moot.
This is the thing that David Putnam said should have happened (and was going to push to happen) when he was head of Columbia back in the 1980's (one of the reasons he was kicked out, IIRC.)
As I've said before, if Feig wanted to make the movie completely different from the past movies and TV shows, he should have made the Ghostbuster's ride a van instead (a classic Chevy one, a Ford Econoline or a Dodge one) but that's just me.
You don't need ALL of the original cast to make it a sequel. Hell, you don't need ANY of the original cast to make it a sequel.
Continuity is not 'poisonous'. Bad writing is poisonous to good storytelling. A connected universe actually opens up storytelling opportunities.
I agree that Ghostbusters doesn't need a wider universe. Mind you, I'd argue we didn't need the original film(s) either...
YOUR ARE HEREBY BANISHED FROM GEEKDOM FOR ALL ETERNITY!
But Reitman is involved with the new film so they wouldn't have to "get around him".
Where's the evidence that Murray has any ownership or say over the future of the GB brand?
The main reason I heard why they went remake instead of sequel was Feig couldn't think of a way to realistically create his story in a world where ghosts - and the events of the first two films - had become an accepted commonplace thing.
Here's the quote (not exactly the one I was after, but all I could find on a quick google search):
http://screenrant.com/ghostbusters-3-hard-reboot-scary-paul-feig/
"I had lunch with [Sony Pictures co-chairman] Amy Pascal when I got back to town. She was just saying, gosh, nobody wants to do [‘Ghostbusters 3′] I said, yeah, it’s really hard to take that on, especially since it’s 25 years later. How do you come back into a world that’s had these ghosts and all this? It just felt too difficult. How do you do it and not screw it up?
But then it was bugging me for the next few days because ‘Ghostbusters‘ is such a great thing and everybody knows it, and it’s such a great world. It’s a shame to just let this thing sit there. I want to see another one. My favorite thing to do is work with funny women. I was like, what if it was an all-female cast? If they were all women? Suddenly, my mind kind of exploded: that would be really fun. And then I thought, well, what if we just make it new? It’s not coming into the world that existed before. It’s always hard if the world has gone through this big ghost attack, how do you do it again? I wanted to come into our world where there’s talk of ghosts but they’re not really credible, and so what would happen in our world if this happened today?"
Wow, I was worried the film wasn't going to be funny but clearly they aren't aiming to make it a comedy.
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Reitman has no involvement with the 2016 film outside of a token producer credit, which Sony gave him because he had been working on Ghostbusters 3 for so long. He has had literally no part in the writing or production of the film.
Again, this is the contract that was signed when everyone came aboard for Ghostbusters II. It stipulated that Aykroyd, Ramis, Reitman and Murray all had to approve any Ghostbusters 3 film, and it was written that way because no one wanted to do Ghostbusters II in the first place, and Ramis and Murray in particular wanted to be sure that the property wouldn't be whored out as a semi-annual franchise (Murray's very fond of the original film and considers it one of his best roles). Murray's reticence is the reason Aykroyd's Hellbent script wasn't produced in 1999 / 2000.
I'm glad GB2 was made, if only for the utter hilariousness of Peter MacNicol.
Yeah, I think missed in a lot of the reboot complaints is the fact that they did make a sequel w/ the original cast and creators and it wasn't that great.
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